Log #13 (Finally some sleep)

What a difference in my sleep experience last night. Although I usually dream at night my sleep is interrupted a lot so I don't get much out of my dreams, but last night I really slept for a change and had dreams that were long enough to make sense.

The name of the medication the doctor prescribed yesterday is Klonopin and I'm taking 1mg tablets. It didn't do much for my general achy feeling, but it helped with anxiety and it put me right to sleep. The drawback was that I fell asleep a few times times today when I really shouldn't have. This medication doesn't replace any of my other medications so it's just one more I have to take everyday. Now we'll see if the Pain Management Doctor changes things up even more.

For more information on Klonopin...What is Klonopin

There was a song in the eighties by Huey Lewis called, "I want a new drug." It's a great song and it kind of applies to my situation. It would be nice to have a drug that would do it all and make me feel better. Instead, I find myself saying, "I don't want a new drug." or "Not another one!"

So here is some info on Fibromyalgia from yahoo health:

Daily Log #7 (No Sleep)

It was very quiet around here today. I didn't fall asleep until 2:30am and then my wife's alarm clock went off at 4:30am. Since I had been up most of the night trying to get comfortable enough to sleep, my stomach must have thought it was later in the day so I couldn't go back to sleep without eating something first. I probably should have taken some Ambian to help me sleep, but when I take it I usually feel tired all day anyway. Plus when I lay in bed trying to get comfortable I don't want to get up to take some Ambian and have to start all over again. Usually, by the time I get sick of not being able to sleep it's too late to take Ambian anyway. So, on nights like tonight, when I have already gone a few nights without much sleep, I'll take an Ambian right away and hope it works.

Just because I take something to help me sleep that doesn't mean I'll get any sleep because pain doesn't care about sleeping pills. The sleeping pills usually help me to sleep longer with the pain before I wake up.

I'm very aware of what happened to Heith Ledger, the actor who died from pain pills mixed with sleeping pills so I take a lower dose of sleeeping pills and only when I think I absolutely have to.

Daily Log #1 (Restless Leg and CP)

Well... I guess the best place to begin this is with how well I slept last night. Not good at all!! Before I go to bed at night I take 40mg of Oxycontin, 10/325mg Norco (Most people know it better as Vicodin), and 4mg of Requip. The Oxycontin and Norco are for pain relief so I can fall asleep and the Requip is for a condition called Restless Leg Syndrome or RLS. The RLS causes extreme fatigue in the legs and gives you the sensation like you need to keep your legs moving constantly or you'll go crazy from the discomfort. Some nights I'll take Ambien to help me sleep, but I only take that when I've already gone a few nights with little or no sleep.

Remember those lab experiments you did in high school where you connected a battery to a dead frog's legs and they'd start to twitch and jump? Combine RLS with Sciatic nerve problems and it's like someone zapping my back with current from a nuclear power plant. My legs jump uncontrollably with a feeling of electrical shock striking the center of my low back, just above the hip bone (Technically the L5-S1 joint), and then it streaks down the back of my legs causing them to spasm and shaking the whole bed. The Requip reduces the frequency of these attacks. Some nights, when a bad episode hits, I have to go sleep on the couch or I keep my wife awake all night. Last night, for the first time in a few nights, I was able to escape that ordeal.

Yesterday, I tried to help out around the house by putting some dirty cloths through the washer and dryer. Simple enough, right? Not for me. My whole life I've been warned not to be lazy. It was pounded into my head by my mother when I wouldn't clean my room. So I've worked my butt off since I was 10 years old and started working summers for my dad doing construction. Except for the time around the end of my first marriage and I started going to college, I've worked very hard. Now I have a hard time doing laundry. Here I am, this big man ex-marine and I can't help my wife carry groceries from the car to the kitchen. This is a source of major depression that I'll probably write about later. In any case, I get so frustrated not helping around the house that I go and do a lot more housework than my body can handle and I end up in severe pain for the next few days afterward--regardless of the pain medication.