another sleep problem...unsolved mystery!!
i have had a sleep problem for about seven years now, since i was 16 years old. (i am now 23.) i am relatively healthy, did a half hour run yesterday, will do one again today, would have no problem doing a three mile swim etc. (i'll come back to the point of exercise later.)  
  
i have seen nearly every top sleep specialist in ireland, and a range of other specialties travelling to all corners and spending thousands, but the problem remains unsolved. i have been diagnosed with mild narcolepsy, but have barely any of the symptoms normally associated. the drugs provigil, (modafil) have no effect even when overdosed. i don;t think i have narcolepsy, i had the sleep test, and the first time with one doctor, they said i didn't have it, then the second doctor wanted to do it again, and the person doing the test at the time, said sorry no problem again, but when i got to back to the 2nd doctor, he said sorry you have mild narcolepsy. very strange...there was a time when a sleep specialist was thinking i had sleep apnea, due to an enlarged tonsil, but as they weren't convinced i had to wait two years before i personally convinced an ent surgeon to remove the tonsil (had to pretend it was for another reason). to this date it is the only thing that has improved my problem. worth the fight. i also had a sub-mucous diathermy (removing so some of the lining of the sinus tissue) at the same time as the tonsil, and this could have equally been successful in the improvement.  
  
to describe myself, i have learnt over the years my problem , i fall asleep in stuffy spaces where the air gets to hot, and have a much higher sucepablity than most people. i have never stayed awake during a theatre production, i rarely stay awake in the movie theatre, i go just to see my friends, and i try hard to stay awake every time. no amount of caffeine works, nor provigil to keep me awake.... i have never managed to stay awake in a single college lecture, i went to every one, and fell asleep after about an hour into the lecture. i fall asleep at work..all the time. at least once a day. i can't drive for more than 15 minutes without falling asleep, in the passenger seat...  
  
this is a new job i started, and imbetween jobs i took about 4 months break, (this is when i got my tonsil out as well) anyway, i just went out met friends, did whatever, i had no need to enter the stuffy spaces, and i had no sleep problem, i would go to sleep at 11, and wake up at 8, sometimes i might out to a nightclub...and no problems what so ever... the only exception was the passenger seat in a car...  
  
so what i do know is i do not have the typical thing, narcolepsy, sleep apnea, depression, overweight, etc...  
  
what i am currently thinking is this is 100% respiratory problem, side effect. sleep in bad air. note i sleep perfectly at night.  
  
i have a post nasal drip, and i am constantly swallowing my own flem, an allergy specialist who had a fibre optic camera, was nice enough to show me pictures of inside of my sinus, and said there is still way more tissue than usual, and the aperture of the opening is miniscule to what is normal. like 1/4...however the only recommendation they have is neilmed, which is jala neti, commercialised, basically just salt and warm water circulated through the nasal passage. it works at clearing my nose and does improve me alot, but sometimes towards the middle of the day, i am still falling asleep...  
  
any ideas...  
  
(if you need any extra info please ask)
do you have dry eyes and a really calm disposition?i too fall asleep really easily. i have to drink coffee all the time. i think i should drink more water but i can't seem to do it.breathing problems like what? low breathing?like really calm? thats the only thing i can think of because thats my problem.
A.Insomnia is no joke. Not getting sufficient [sleep](https://psychcentral.com/disorders/sleep/) at any age, but especially as a teen, is serious business. Sleep disorders can cause [depression](https://psychcentral.com/disorders/depression/), [anxiety](https://psychcentral.com/disorders/anxiety/), diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease. According to a poll done in 2005 by Sleep in America, people who were diagnosed with depression or anxiety were more likely to sleep less than six hours at night. A study done in 2007 showed that people with insomnia are 5 times as likely to be depressed as those who got sufficient sleep. At your age “sufficient” means 8 – 9 hours a night.

I urge you to go back to your medical doctor for more tests. I’m alarmed that you were drinking enough but not staying hydrated. There’s more to that than sleep deprivation. I’m also alarmed that apparently you were given a “diagnosis” but not then given a treatment plan to regulate your sleep.

If your primary care physician isn’t able to help you, get a referral to a sleep medicine clinic for a sleep study. Such clinics do a thorough evaluation of how much sleep a person gets and how often and for how long the person is awake. You may be sent home with a monitor to wear. More likely, you will be asked to spend the night at the clinic where they will monitor you throughout the night. You will sleep in a comfortable room in a comfortable bed. You can usually even bring your own pajamas.

Don’t be scared. A sleep study isn’t painful. Doctors or technicians will monitor you while you sleep. Little disks called electrodes will be temporarily glued to your head and attached to an EEG (*electroencephalogram*) machine. This will monitor the electrical impulses in your brain while you sleep and will show the technician how you are moving through the stages of sleep. It will measure possible interruptions in the pattern of your sleep. The technicians will also measure things such as eye movements, oxygen levels in your blood, heart and breathing rates, who much you snore, and how your body moves as you sleep.

The data from your sleep study will be evaluated by your doctor. You will then have a follow up appointment with your doctor to discuss the results and what may need to be done to help you have more regular and restorative sleep.

Please share this response with your parents. I don’t think you are lying or faking. I think you have an untreated medical condition that left untreated will only make things worse.

I wish you well.

Dr. Marie

 

How Do I Get my Parents to Believe I’m Depressed? I think many of us have to depend more on observation and self-study than on diagnoses, given the expense of testing and the ugly fact that nothing short of an autopsy can give certainty. Here’s how we are coping with that uncertainty. Before my Mom came to live with us, she had fallen at night going toward the bathroom in her apartment. It was 3 days before anyone found her, and there was severe dehydration and some brain damage due to oxygen starvation. She recovered some functioning in rehab, but we had also noticed before the fall that there were more and more signs of cognitive decline. We were warned by a friend who is a geriatric psychologist to not accept the overall “Alzheimer’s” diagnosis which was bound to occur, but to be aware that there were dozens of dementias, some of which needed very different approaches from what is advised for Alzheimer’s. After she got out of rehab she went through a very bad AL situation and into a very good one. She had a GP who made housecalls but was not that knowledgeable about dementia. She had begun describing what could only be hallucinations and agitation, so her doctor put her on an anti-psychotic, an anti-anxiety and a depression medication. Wow! What a mess! Mom had rarely even taken an aspirin before that so maybe her body was super-responsive to the invaders. Anyway, it did more damage than good, and once we eliminated the meds, she slept all the time. We decided to move her in with us and her new doctor prescribed Namenda. We started with 10 mg, which was too much and increased her agitation. We cut back to 5 mg. once a day at nighttime and it was like a miracle occurred! Now don’t get me wrong, there’s still dementia and it’s still advancing. But my point is that sometimes when you don’t have a diagnosis, it’s useful to read up on the various kinds of dementias, do a checklist of the symptoms to determine which is the best match to the behaviors you are seeing, then become knowledgeable about the various RX’s physicians are likely to try, and get very good at monitoring the response to each and asking about/suggesting others you’ve read about. (I know, you thought that was what doctors did — me, too! Wrong!). I found that as long as I behaved as a fairly well-informed and non-judgmental problem-solving partner (and not as an over-protective, aggressive, critical, and sometimes hysterical relative), I got the same treatment back from the doctors. (Of course, if I did not get that, I did not hesitate to find a doctor with an attitude that worked better for us.). Over time, the troubles with balance, the hallucinations that occur immediately if she misses a dose of Namenda, the depth perception, the amount of activity and conversation that goes on while she’s “sleeping”, the extreme variability from “almost normal” to “almost unable to function”, etc. convinced me it is LBD. It’s not a formal diagnosis because we can’t afford all that testing either. But it’s enough for me to protect her from getting inappropriate medications. While there may come a time to move her to a memory care unit, I will also be able to be proactive with staff about what works with her LBD that is probably vastly different from what works with some of their ALZ patients. Summary: observe, study, and use your best and most loving judgment, with or without a diagnosis. Respect but don’t worship the doctors who are trying to help. And trust your gut. You spend more time with your LO than anyone else and your observations are valuable. there are a number of possible reasons, but narcolepsy may well be what you have. you need to get a set of sleep tests (it takes about 24 hours in a sleep laboratory). then a proper diagnosis can be made, and all of the conditions can be treated.<br><br>you really need help asap. in many cases it can be treated or managed. first step - a medical consultation to rule out medical conditions, medication, etc. a psychological or psychiatric eval can determine if the insomnia is really part of a treatable psychiatric condition, and practicing good sleep hygiene / working with a psychologist can help. http://cpancf.com/articles\_files/sleephygienehandout.asp. see more... if this is old news, just a bad habit. if new onset, you need to see an ophthalmologist/neurologist to rule out any neurological disease. see more... too funny - i just posted this above - advice from my doc - magnesium &amp; zinc 1 hour before bed - works better than melatonin because it triggers your body to make more of it's own melatonin (at least that's what the doctor told me). knock wood, it has been working for several weeks now! magnesium 250mg and zinc 10-15mg. make sure your daily fluid intake is kept high ( at least 2 litres a day). try drinking a glass of tonic water a day, the quinine in it helps with cramps. adding a magnesium malate supplement to your daily routine should also help to eliminate the problem. epson salts baths is another way of getting magnesium into your body and it also will help relax muscles ( and you). i take one 3/4 times a week straight before bed as its great for helping with sleep. you could also try some gentle stretching exercises to see if it releases it in meantime.

hope this helps and sending gentle hugs xxx dear joy<br><br>i think you are correct in assuming that his adenoids are enlarged. they are situated in the nasopharynx (back of the nose), and would not be visilble though the nose, but what you are describing may be due to very enlarged inferior turbinates. it is impossible to give you an idea regarding the costs in the private sector, because not only does the rate differ from ent to ent, but the hospital costs are calculated seperately. the cost of the anaethetist is also added on. in the public sector you are charged according to your income. <br>the daytime tiredness is due to lack of quality sleep, and could be due to sleep apnoea. this must be addressed. <br><br>regards or erratic sleep can cause these symptoms, try as much as you can to regulate sleep and get enough rest, avoid caffeinated beverages well before before sleep time, also regular healthy diet would help, if no improvement, see your doctor for assessment for possible thyroid gland dysfunction or any other problem, , good luck see more... sounds like sleep apnea. its a condition where u stop breathing during certian sleep patterns. dont stress out too much it can be treated by sleeping with an air mask or other ways but do go see a doc