Hi,
I have a big problem that I couldn't solve for 5 months and it's just getting worse and worse...
I was at the psychiatry and got quetiapine/seroquel for sleep and took it for about 7 days or so and then stopped....
I had a severe reaction to it but didn't think that it was the medication causing it at first as I got told these drugs are perfectly safe.... I also took mirtazapine there a few times there and a few days before which I didn't tolerate either...
Anyway I developed something called akathisia... where I was restlest 24/7...
The biggest problem though is that my sleep/rest/wakefulness/relaxation switch completely broke from there on...
Basically I was for 10 days at the psychiatry and sleep just didn't happen... it was like I was aware of my sleep or lying there but not falling asleep but neither being totally awake... but I just wouldn't sleep... or maybe dream for like a few hours or something,,,
When I discharged myself this would go on but become even more extreme... that's when the akathisia really started and the homeostatic broke switch was totally broken to this point...
It's been 5 months btw since I took my last dose of any of the medication... so it all started around octobre. (I maybe had 15 tablets mirtazapine in total and 7 Tablets Quetiapine & quit cold turkey)
I already had chronic fatigue syndrome and I was already fucked when I'd just get 3 or 4 hours of sleep... man...
I haven't slept for an entire month... I thought how is this even possible... i was lying in bed and I was "aware" or my brain was awake all the time... I was just lying there and nothing happened... I would lie in bed the whole night and when morning came... I just got out of bed... ate breakfast & went crazy.... as you'd imagine I'd become completely psychotic after a while...
Well... I started using baclofen... finally slept every second night kind of... or at least had some dreams...
I couldn't understand how my body could keep me so awake... especially when I've had been experiencing severe fatigue before... like I couldn't understand...
Anyway... I was extremely suicidal at this point...
As you can imagine my body would spend all this energy... but there was no way to recuperate...
After a month or two I could suddenly "sleep" every night... but it wasn't the kind of of homeostatic sleep where you go to bed and you wake up in the morning and feel "alright, another day...." it was more "sleep" because of complete exhaustion... I would fall into a kind of coma mixed with dreams and stuff but most likely no deep sleep stages whatsoever.... like I was still kind of aware of being asleep or my brain was just "on" somehow...
There are no words to describe how you feel after a month of not sleeping... you basically go completely psychotic but you kind of adjust to being that way...
If you'd see me somewhere or if you'd talk to me you wouldn't notice anything wrong about me...
Anyway... I could "sleep" at night or "lie in a coma" with some dreams... but there was no homeostasis... and my brain was still extremely awake during the day...
Before that I needed to take lots of naps during the day which recharged my energy so I could do stuff again... That completely dissapeared... I forgot what it felt like to recharge...
I tried to lie down after doing something and I would just lie there with my brain wide awake... not getting into deeper relaxation in order to recharge...
Or when I would get my "sleep"... and say instead of laying there for 8 hours I layed there for 4 hours... it wasn't like I could make up for that in any way... I would have something to eat... and then later in the day... I would want to "catch" with a nap & relaxation for the "sleep loss"... but that wouldn't happen...
I would just lie there with my brain spending more and more energy instead of giving me some rest...
The homeostasis between rest/relax/sleep/wake/activity/etc.... was simply broken... my brain would alwaays spend more energy/waste energy just like that... and I couldn't catch up...
Well I upped my dosage of baclofen & later changed to a benzodiazepine for sleep but that didn't help much either....
Whenever I'd do something... and I'd try to recuperate... nothing would happen except my brain spending more energy than I'm making...
So how did this all progress???
I started "sleeping" every day... but it was not homeostatic... my awareness gradually started to diminish over a period of time... and I mean DRAMATICALLY....
I was probably on of the most aware people I know in my environment.. I would notice everything and anything around me and I'd feel every sensation in my body & was attentive to everybodies needs around me if I felt something was "off".... like I was very present naturally without doing anything...
Well, that gradually changed...
After being "kept" awake unnaturally for so long... that space or awareness started to drastically reduce... I wouldn't know when my blood sugar dropped... I've lost social intelligence and any kind of inhibition...in a negative way.. I wouldn't care about my appearance... Wouldn't care about making jokes or stupid comments... couldn't make any connections... basically anything that requires awareness... went down the toilet...
When I use the laptop... it's like I am only aware of the laptop and me... instead of everything else that is going on in that room... (maybe that's how most people feel, idk, lol.)
Or if I have a conversation in a group... I'd only be able to concentrate on one conversation at the time... if there was more going on... I would almost feel like going unconscious....
So my body kept me awake... but instead I'm only 1/4 conscious than normal... it continues up to this point... where I'm simply losing more and more energy than I'm making because the homeostasis is broken....
The last few months I've been lying in bed more... I'd sleep or lie there for 11-12 hours instead of 8-10... because completely exhausted... and now I'm also able to do naps & close my eyes... but again... it's because I've lost so much energy so quickly that my body is just completely exhausted... when I do naps at this point I feel like I'm not even aware or almost unconscious... yet still kind of awake... completely different, than a normal nap... where you just get up and everything is normal again... my "naps" feel psychotic because I'm barely aware and everything feels far away...
Like I'm being kept aware/Awake at a threshold that shouldn't actually be possible... the body should actually seek homeostasis & keep me in a state where I'm lying in bed completely exhausted & let me sleep/relax but have "normal" awareness of things if you know what I mean...
Instead I'm awake with 1/4 of my awareness where I feel extremely stupid compared to how I was before because most stuff just doesn't register... it's quite a psychotic state to be in but nobody notices...
It gets worse and worse and I'm losing energy at a rate of 10% a week... it's been like that for 5 months... it just got worse while my function within that state got better because I adapted to this state... but seriously... I have no idea how to reverse this... I just realize that the more time passes the more awareness I seem to lose... where people talk and I can't even proccess anything or remember something because I'm barely aware & being kept awake with so little energy that it's completely absurd...
My brain just wastes away energy because something is broken... I'm losing more than I'm making and it is very noticable week after week... that there's no homeostasis which keeps things in balance...
I've posted about my problem in antidepressant withdrawal forums but the only thing I get as an advice is "wait it it out... your nervous system is going haywire and only time can heal it etc..." but I'm not too happy with that answer as I feel like in a life or death situation every day I wake up because things deteriorate so quickly at this point and I always fear a point of no return...
The biggest problem is that it's turned my life upside down completely... but at the same time it is mostly invisible to other people... like "what do you mean you are less aware or you're losing awareness"...
Again my body keeps me awake at a threshold you couldn't be awake at with normal homeostatic control... For me... every day feels like I haven't slept in 10 days or something... I've been saying that 2 months ago... now I feel it's probably more like 20? You're completely and utterly exhausted and you're barely able to comprehend anything yet at the same time you're awake...
Do you have any idea on how to reverse this? It's runining my life like I couldn't have ever imagined.
I guess I've spent all todays energy in writing this post.... hope somebody can help me out...
Maybe it's a gene/drug interaction related problem... (I have COMT++ & a serotonin transporter problem & some other problem in drug detox pathways) but again... it's been 5 months since I took the last dose... and that problem hasn't left me & it's driving me insane nearly every minute of the day since I haven't found a simple solution to it...
