Advocacy for Life
In August 2026, I was placed on Doxepin for help with sleep. It worked wonders until one day, I noticed irritation in response to nothing. Over a short period of time, my irritation grew to daily intense agitation.
In the final week of August, I did not accept this agitation side effect and impact on my brain's baseline, so I did not take my last dose of the 14-day prescription of Doxepin. While the side effect went away, so too did the concept of sleep. By early September, I had less than 6 hours of sleep in I think now 5 days. My mental health took a devastating toll and my physical health was poor.
I spent two weeks in a psychiatric facility trying to iron out what other sleep specific medication would work on top of my other mental health medicines. Ironically, I ended back on Doxepin with a contingent medication, Zyprexa, which would work on the agitation. (I am familiar with Zyprexa from a 21-year epilepsy diagnosis that was ruled out in August 2025.)
I had success after my discharge in mid-September and going into early October...until my agitation wasn't getting better, my OCD symptoms weren't being addressed, and my sleep was ultimately failing.
Prozac was finally suggested and you can go from there with that one.
After half of my adult life, Zyprexa wasn't responding to me anymore, which meant is wasn't responding to the Doxepin.
In mid-October, my doctor considered Seroquel IR (Immediate Release) and I have been a slowly increasing dose since.
My review of Seroquel - To call it a sleep aid is a joke. I wake up every morning in the 1am hour simply because the half-life has quit. This takes a toll after awhile. I experience temporary irritation. My daytime energy and better adjusted baseline are safe but at what cost? I'm not really sleeping. I am now nervous for bedtime knowing I will get little sleep and overnight restoration. I gave Seroquel XR (Extended Release) one night. This version should not exist in the pharmaceutical world. Mandated empty stomach or light meal under 300 calories to take the medicine. Peak timing is between 5 and 6 hours, which means I wouldn't fall asleep until either midnight or well into the early morning hours (3 or 4). When someone has a nightmare experience of insomnia and hospital stay as a result, not falling asleep until the next morning is not actually sleeping.
I continue with Seroquel IR only because I do not experience side effects.
I have no intention in continuing with sleep specific medication the rest of my life because my natural ability to sleep represents my strongest mental self.
In my case, I need to overhaul my current mental health diagnosis and regimen to keep Prozac and bring in new medication that will have sedative side effect, not specific sleep aid. (In other words, the medication has better things to consider and if I happen to fall asleep after my nighttime medicine, so be it.)
I had a horrific nightmare last night. A demon came to me in the form of my late grandfather. He passed before I was born but I love him very much and call him my hero because his spirit wanted to meet me shortly after I was born. My father's father was alive when I was born and through much of my life and could care less that I existed. Biologically, he was family. That's it. He has since passed. My late grandfather is not biological to me yet through family stories, I feel close to him like we were blood related. I will not discuss the content of the nightmare but just know that the demon did things my grandpa never would. The demon's purpose was merely to test my baseline reaction today.
The joke is on the demon. I am advocating for myself yet again.
I need to permanently get off sleep specific medication and take back my natural ability to sleep (fall asleep and stay asleep, including going back to sleep if awake in the middle of the night). The constant worry of agitation, getting any sleep at all, and paranoia of potential insomnia once off has got to go. My calm baseline is back but sleep fears are far from gone. No human brain deserves what mine went through. I just wanted help with sleep, not help falling into hell.
In 2004, I was diagnosed with Temporal Lobe Seizure Disorder out of possibly false MRI results. In 2025, with upgrades in technology and specific research in what the neurologist was looking for, my agitation symptoms could not be linked to Temporal Lobe Seizure Disorder. After 21 years of a diagnosis that disrupted my life, a lot of medication and experiences called it quits and I was overjoyed.
In 2003, I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. I have lived with that since. I believe I am Bipolar because no psychiatrist since has argued it. Yet come to think of the symptoms, I am always more on the depression end. I experienced one classic episode of mania in college. I have had brief symptoms since, namely racing thoughts and rapid speech. I say brief as in rare. Genuine depression and depression from life events, including reactions to nightmares, affect my mental health the most. This, then, would mean Clinical Depression (Major Depressive Disorder) would make more sense in treatment. If I have to say goodbye to Bipolar Disorder in favor of a diagnosis that is far less complicated, I am okay with that now.
Prozac treatment (a win for OCD) and Bipolar medications are not friendly with each other. Lithium is common to Bipolar but especially mania. Lithium and Prozac are not best friends in working together. I take Valium originally for Panic Disorder (diagnosed in 2011). I now experience anxiety, not agoraphobia or intense panic. Valium and Prozac are not best friends in working together.
If Bipolar Disorder is discontinued and Clinical Depression is brought on, there are antidepressants that treat depression and anxiety with natural sedative qualities not meant to be sleep specific and are friendly to Prozac. My natural ability to sleep would be back because such medication would have better things to focus on and I can just fall asleep. I can stay asleep. I can wake up at a proper time with clear purpose for the day ahead.
Purpose and nightmares. With all of this said, I am taking back a life I never should have lost. I am okay with mental health medicine because I am mentally ill. I am not okay with medicine that has complicated the fragility of my brain over the years. Advocacy for life - purpose. Purpose realized out of a nightmare.
In this edition of Set List Happy Friday, I am (perhaps once again) featuring Duran Duran's "Lonely In Your Nightmare" but this time not out of company during the nightmare lows in life but in just real nightmares that instill the want of false fear. Advocate emotions over nightmares to pull through.
