Is Lack of Sleep a Major Health Concern?.......I say Yes

I did the 72 hour days for 14 months. ended up after number of VA doctors they found out i had fibromyalgia, two autoimmune diseases castlemans disease, and sarcoidosis with neurosarcoidosis.
plus add in sleep apnea.

One of the most common problems in the medical forums for people with both with both fibromyalgia and/or sarcoidosis is sleep disorders.

The real strange part was i never felt tired even after being up 72 hours.

I still have a sleep disorder that has me on 32 to 34 hour days.
all i have ever got for the sleep disorders was sent to a sleep disorder clinic run by a Psychologist.

I went once. first they never looked at my medical history and they wanted me to come to there weekly sleep clinic at 9 in the morning.
This meant i had to get up at 3 in the morning to drive for a hour then catch the train and city bus to be there at 9
And at the same time they wanted me to go to bed at the same time and get up at the same time every morning sleep or not.
Since i am disabled and do not work i just take 2 benadryl after being awake 24 hours.
i may sleep anytime and be awake at anytime of day.
right now its 2.51 in the morning and i got up 7 yesterday morning

Anyone with sleep problems should have a sleep study done.
Over time untreated Sleep apnea can kill you.

i have been on a C-PAP machine every night for over 10 years since my heart attack caused by the sleep apnea.
www.sciencedaily.com...

Well it's 530 and I'm up maybe 22 hours now.

I may have sleep apnea but not getting on the machine. Think this through. You die out one day no matter what. You die out in your sleep is grand! You have a machine shooting air in your lungs for some 10-20 years just to go through more of this meaningless existence we call life?

Nah.

I play it naturally, die out when I do. Try to have good years by staying active, eat healthy, drink tea, but no friggin' respirator at nite. You gotta have a machine to keep me going, I'm done. Pull the plug, and be done with this corpse. I'll be okay with my ashes consumed as a lame spice by my friends. Ash in most foods, anyways.

Good riddance.

a reply to: Aural

How could something like staying up so long even be allowed in the military? Were you mearly restless or did they make you work a lot? They expect people to fullfil tasks but tiredness and hallucinating is an obvious hinderance to that.

During gunnery you might have to drive/load/shoot/TC for multiple tanks/crews.

Gunnery is always at least a month, it's not like they forbid you from sleeping but when you're going going going and you want to do good at your job sometimes sleep just gets in the way.

Plus when you get deployed and occasionally have RPG/mortars fired at you and sometimes people shoot at you sleep then becomes something that can get you and your buddies killed.

a reply to: glend

If I was you I'd be looking for a sleep clinic to try diagnose the problem.

Yeah, its not so easy when you are disabled and have no insurance.

I'm lucky I have LSU which has a cancer center folks that are on disability can go to for free treatment. Still, just keeping up with that is quite enough.

I can't imagine there are any sleep clinics around me that would work for free.

there is a system that you can put on at home that can tell if you have sleep apnea.
www.sleepeducation.com...

because it does not record brain waves as a hospital lab does it does not tell you if you have other sleep disorders.

originally posted by: pl3bscheese
Well it's 530 and I'm up maybe 22 hours now.

I may have sleep apnea but not getting on the machine. Think this through. You die out one day no matter what. You die out in your sleep is grand! You have a machine shooting air in your lungs for some 10-20 years just to go through more of this meaningless existence we call life?

Nah.

I play it naturally, die out when I do. Try to have good years by staying active, eat healthy, drink tea, but no friggin' respirator at nite. You gotta have a machine to keep me going, I'm done. Pull the plug, and be done with this corpse. I'll be okay with my ashes consumed as a lame spice by my friends. Ash in most foods, anyways.

Good riddance.

Great you likely will die in your sleep while everyone else in your car dies screaming.
Give up your Drivers License before you kill someone and I as a EMT have to fit you and everyone else you kill for a body bag.

One common cause of auto wreaks is falling asleep at the wheel and many of these people have untreated sleep apnea.

a reply to: ANNED

Why would sleep apnea cause me to lose consciousness while I drive? Why would there be a car full of people? Why would they die?

[snipped]

There's not a chance in %^*# that I ever fall asleep while driving.

Paranoid fear-mongering in that post!

How many people with sleep apnea are there out there? How many of them kill a car full of people after they fall asleep at the wheel?

You see, I know how people can shape contexts to convey a sense of likelyhood where it's VERY REMOTE in reality.

Not going to fall for your NONSENSE.

I don't drive. [snipped]

a reply to: SecretKnowledge

Days 3 and 4 i started hallucinating mildly, seeing shadows out the corners of my eyes,

Ditto for me too, thanks for posting what happened to you.
Regards, Iwinder

a reply to: Cancerwarrior so I guess alternating people in shifts doesnt happen? I havent been in military but just seems like making sure people have a good way to sleep would be helpful.

originally posted by: pl3bscheese
a reply to: ANNED

Why would sleep apnea cause me to lose consciousness while I drive? Why would there be a car full of people? Why would they die

There's not a chance in %^*# that I ever fall asleep while driving.

How many people with sleep apnea are there out there? How many of them kill a car full of people after they fall asleep at the wheel?
Not going to fall for your NONSENSE.

I don't drive. [snipped]

Car accidents. Daytime grogginess can put people with sleep apnea at increased risk of falling asleep behind the wheel. People with sleep apnea are up to five times more likely than normal sleepers to have traffic accidents.
www.webmd.com...
www.sleepeducation.com...
www.roadandtrack.com...

I frequently get deprived of sleep. Let me explain my situation. I work nights, 00-08 or longer if I do a double because for some reason I am the only person at my work man enough to do a double. Now add in my second job during the day and my 2 year old...oh and school. I function (mostly) on about 7 hours of sleep a week, or less. Here is what I tend to experience:

Lack of energy
Hyperactivity
Manic state
Depression
Thinking slower
A "Foggy" mind
Increased Stutter
Hypersensitivity (sound, smells)
Easily Agitated
Hallucinations
and more!

It is definitely a health risk. Especially when you add in weight gain to the mix because I have no energy and feel depressed.

Sleep deprivation IS a health risk.

Lack of sleep is terrible.

I'll be very honest, I haven't stayed up for more than two days straight. But if I stay up for about 24 hours, I start acting odd (as if I were drunk) or cranky, I twitch a lot and I hear voices.

And that's just one day. I cannot imagine going through that very often.

I am posting to thank everyone for the posts and comments, very interesting that what happened to me seems to be the "Norm" for anyone who is sleep deprived.

Please keep the posts and comments coming!
Many thanks

Regards, Iwinder

I finally set myself a bed time, and make sure one way or another I get 8 hours sleep. Now I seem to be doing much better than I was. I've had trouble sleeping for the longest time, and did everything I could to get as much time out of a day as I could. It was rare I'd get 8 hours sleep, and 6 was a lucky night. I've been suffering severe depression, near suicides, and debilitating anxiety attacks.

Now that I've started making sure I sleep every night, and get a full nights rest, I have yet to suffer any of the above. Knock on wood, I hope it continues to stay that way. I'm surprised how much this one little change seems to be improving my life and my ability to handle problems.

I will never underestimate the need for sleep again. If this continues I may be able to finally get my life in order.

GO SLEEP!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So yes, I think lack of sleep is a major health crisis, since our lives often make getting good sleep impossible.

Years ago when I worked on offshore oil rigs, I was often required to work up to 40 hours with no sleep with a six hour break then another 24 to 36 hours. This usually occurred when preparing for a move to a new drilling sight.

My experience was irritability and aggressiveness mainly because I didn't like the situation, I wanted that sleep.

I found it hard to finally get to sleep once I got the chance. Probably because it took some time for the adrenaline to get out of the system.

Being sleep deprived while driving is a nightmare. Once the sleep starts taking over, its very difficult to snap out of it. Best to stop somewhere for awhile for a short rest before continuing.

Update time, We had an appointment with my Specialist last week and he tweaked my meds and re-introduced Digioxn
to my list of meds.
I took that the next day and I slept like a dead person........I was so happy but afraid that it was just a fluke.
Well now I have slept 4 nights in a row and I feel much better for sure.

The past four days is the "day the music died" in my head.
Regards, Iwinder

a reply to: eManym

My experience was irritability and aggressiveness mainly because I didn't like the situation, I wanted that sleep.

I could not agree more with the above statement, thanks very much for taking the time to add to this thread.
I would not trust myself to drive so the wife was doing all the driving and I am sure it was and still is a pain in the
arse for her.

Regards, Iwinder

I will never underestimate the need for sleep again. If this continues I may be able to finally get my life in order. GO SLEEP!!!!!!!!!!!!!

a reply to: Puppylove

Well said my friend, "you don't know what you got till its gone" comes to mind.

Thanks for your wisdom and personal story.

Regards, Iwinder

originally posted by: Divin3F3nrus
I frequently get deprived of sleep. Let me explain my situation. I work nights, 00-08 or longer if I do a double because for some reason I am the only person at my work man enough to do a double. Now add in my second job during the day and my 2 year old...oh and school. I function (mostly) on about 7 hours of sleep a week, or less. Here is what I tend to experience:

Lack of energy
Hyperactivity
Manic state
Depression
Thinking slower
A "Foggy" mind
Increased Stutter
Hypersensitivity (sound, smells)
Easily Agitated
Hallucinations
and more!

It is definitely a health risk. Especially when you add in weight gain to the mix because I have no energy and feel depressed.

Sleep deprivation IS a health risk.

Thanks for sharing that information with us, I suffered from all of the above except for the stutter....and I want to mention that I am by legal definition deaf and your mentioning Hypersensitivity (sound) makes me wonder now if I was hearing things that were not there or......hearing things that I could not hear before?

Either way great post my friend.
Regards, Iwinder