Posted on 05/07/2005 8:02:03 PM PDT by rface
It really is one of those things that until you experience it, it sounds totally fake.
I'd laugh it off too, if I didn't have it.
My husband bounced everyone on the whole pew during church. I guess they stayed awake that way.
ROFLMAS!
I don't think my husband would go for this!
It's odd that you say that. My son is a Celiac and they say it runs in families. Our whole family's cut down on wheat because of the little one and I do feel better overall.
I do recommend the sleeping pills, though. I've not had any side effects. I take them around 7:30 or 8PM and I sleep fine. By morning, I don't have that "drugged out" feeling. (If I forget and take them after 9, I'm in big trouble the next day.) If the sleeping pills don't do the trick, I add 800mg Advil and an ice pack on my spine. After about an hour of "freezing out", I'm usually able to get to sleep. Don't knock the drugs, they really can help.
I know it sounds weird, but I get RLS in my left arm as well as my legs. Hubby and I are getting a Nautilus mattress so my thrashing doesn't keep him up on the bad nights. Good luck to you and I'll keep the wheat thing in mind!
I freeze out my spine. I'm convinced that the problem originates there. I have RLS in my arm as well as both my legs and an ice pack on my neck (for my arm) or my lower back (for my legs) does more to relieve the symptoms than anything else.
You have a sleep cycle?! That is *SO* COOOOL!!!
LOL!
I'm convinced that my son broke me. I vaguely remember feeling this thing called "sleepy" around 9PM until he was born. After that, I somehow developed a 28 hour biorhythm. I don't feel sleepy (without chemicals) until about 5AM. The RLS kills me, though.
Have you ever seen a chiropractor? Mine was a minor god. Look for someone who uses the "activator" method, though. That's the only way to go. I had a friend who was in a terrible accident with a cement mixer. She was diagnosed with severe brain damage. I flew out to her and drug her to the darn doctor. Two months with the Activator method and she now owns her own business. (Check it out at www.activator.com.) It really does help. (I'm in misery right now because I *don't* have an activator chiro. here in AZ. The last one treated me for two months and I was good for two years.)
(On an aside, I'm so sorry about Dix. I've been reading his posts for years. I won't say more, but it's a sad week for FR.)
Type 1 or 2? I'm curious, because my son's a Type 1.
I'd also like to know if anyone here has been diagnosed with hypokalemic periodic paralysis...
The way I describe it to friends: Imagine that you feel the urge to stretch... So you stretch. But, after you stop stretching, you still feel like stretching. So you stretch again. And again. And again. After about five hours of stretching, the feeling is still there. It's overwhelming and you can't stop your body from stretching, not even for a minute. You take a hot bath. You take sleeping pills. You take aspirin. You take a shot of whiskey. You still can't stop stretching. You try to ignore it and you body takes control. It starts stretching by itself.
Now you manage to start to drift off to sleep. You vaguely wake up to a strange sensation. There's an earthquake. An earthquake in Wyoming! There are no earthquakes in Wyoming. But the whole bed is shaking. You sit there for fifteen minutes, half asleep, half awake, feeling the bed shake.
Then it hits you. *You're* the one shaking the bed.
How many nights of this could you take before you went insane? A week? Two?
Try 11 freakin' years!!!
I'll give that a try - certainly easier than marching around the garage in the middle of the night.
"other members of the institute include: Pelé, Elvis Presley and the full cast of 'Riverdance'". :)
First noticed the problem when my oldest was born in 1975 so I always blamed the sleep problem on him - he didn't sleep through the night until he was almost 4 years old so I figured he'd disrupted my sleep pattern. Then, my Dad stayed with us in 1983 and I noticed him up pacing during the night (he even kept an exercise bike next to his bed so he could climb on that and work out the legs problem). Then found out my mother also was a night walker and had been for years. With both my parents doing it, my three sisters and I got to discussing it - all four of us had the same thing so I'm convinced it runs in families.
Just a suggestion. Sounds like a circulatory problem to me. Possibly taking something like Niacin to open blood vessels and help blood nourish the muscles in the legs, and Vitamin E to help with any cramping??
There are nutrional supplements. This was just off the top of my head. I do realize sometimes medicines are helpful, but sometimes, nutrients are problem solvers too.
I know calcium magnesium helps with cramping as well as vit E. just suggestions again.
Know what you mean by bouncing the car around - when my youngest son is in my Toyota 4-Runner it almost looks like it's dancing at stop lights (he's 6'3" and over 200 lbs). He can't sit still while he's awake but it doesn't seem to bother his sleep either - hope it never does.
Good news for Robert Klein. He can finally stop his leg.
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