{"id":412,"date":"2012-09-25T04:05:56","date_gmt":"2012-09-25T11:05:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/2008\/09\/25\/i-slept-nine-hours\/"},"modified":"2018-05-15T09:58:20","modified_gmt":"2018-05-15T16:58:20","slug":"bipolar-disorder-and-sleep-i-slept-eight-hours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/bipolar-disorder-and-sleep-i-slept-eight-hours\/","title":{"rendered":"Bipolar Disorder and sleep: I slept eight hours!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Well,\u00a0eight hours of sleep is so amazing for me. I actually woke up and wanted to do a little jig. I’m what I call an undersleeper. I was actually talking with my friend Kristin yesterday- she’s the author of Bipolar and Pregnant,<\/em> and we spent a long time talking about bipolar disorder and sleep. Here are all the ways bipolar and meds affect our sleep:<\/span><\/p>\n

#1. Kristin talked about problems with Topamax. She has no idea if it affects sleep- but she’s pretty sure it affects memory. Kristin uses Lunesta to sleep.<\/span><\/p>\n

#2. When I’m depressed, I have agitated sleep which means my brain doesn’t shut down at night. Bother! I now use Ativan to sleep. <\/span><\/p>\n

#3. Of course, mania is the biggest problem. I rapid cycle a lot, so on the nights I can actually fall asleep normally and get 7-8 hours of rest is pretty great. Unfortunately, falling asleep without sleep meds is very rare for me. <\/span><\/p>\n

#4 . Excessive tiredness from medications- especially some anti depressants. Whew, I used to get so tired my lips got numb and I slept 14 hours a day. I’m now on Lithium.\u00a0 The tiredness is tough and I sometimes have to take a few 30 minute naps during the day. <\/span><\/p>\n

My coauthor Dr. John Preston says that regulating sleep is the #1 way to manage the illness. How is your sleep?<\/span><\/p>\n

It”s ok to take sleep meds if you need them. I had a real struggle with my ativan until I realized I wasn’t sleeping enough unless I used it.\u00a0 So I use it.<\/p>\n

Julie<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Well, eight hours of sleep is so amazing for me. I actually woke up and wanted to do a little jig. I’m what I call an undersleeper. I was actually talking with my friend Kristin yesterday- she’s the author of Bipolar and Pregnant, and we spent a long time talking about bipolar disorder and sleep. Here are all the ways bipolar and meds affect our sleep:<\/p>\n

#1. Kristin talked about problems with Topamax. She has no idea if it affects sleep- but she’s pretty sure it affects memory. Kristin uses Lunesta to sleep.<\/p>\n

#2. When I’m depressed, I have agitated sleep which means my brain doesn’t shut down at night. Bother! I now use Ativan to sleep. <\/p>\n

#3. Of course, mania is the biggest problem. I rapid cycle a lot, so on the nights I can actually fall asleep normally and [ Read More ]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11468,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions\/11468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bipolarhappens.com\/bhblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}