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Sleep Attacks? Insomnia? Seizures?

Wed, 01/17/2007 - 23:05
I was reading this under the comorbid section, about sleep disorders: "Sleep disorders (e.g., sleepwalking, nocturnal panic disorder, sleep attacks due to excessive daytime sleepiness) may mimic epileptic seizures. " Anyone know what sleep attacks are exactly? I have major sleep problems, have most of my life. There are times during the day, esp. if I've gone a long time with little to no sleep, where I simply fall asleep on my feet. I'm trying to think what the difference is, I think it might be time. When I have a seizure I get hit with the fatigue afterwards. Whereas when it's sleep, I get hit before and sleep longer before waking up. Is that a sleep attack? But that sudden need for sleep probably doesn't fall under excessive daytime sleepiness does it? More like overall sleep deprivation..... I know my insomnia contributes to my seizures, and they're both getting pretty bad lately. I have three conditions fueling each other, I just don't know if the insomnia is it's own, or the result of the others.

Comments

Re: Sleep Attacks? Insomnia? Seizures?

Submitted by spiz on Thu, 2007-01-18 - 05:49
Gina Marie, The best advice I can give you is for your doctor to treat the insomia on it's own. I have nocturnal seizures, asthma, and am bipolar. With the bipolar I go through extreme sleep modes from alot of sleep to very little. When it gets too many days of extreme not sleeping, my neuro treats the sleep deprivation. Have a heart to heart with your neuro if you haven't already and see what he can do to help you. Going in for a sleep study may benefit you also. It can help determine what type or types of sleep disorder(s) you may have. This can help the doc aide you also. Wishing you the best! -Spiz

Re: Re: Sleep Attacks? Insomnia? Seizures?

Submitted by Gina Marie on Thu, 2007-01-18 - 11:34
Thank You Spiz. I'll definately bring it up again. My psychiatrist had been trying to find a medication to make or help me sleep, but so far they either do nothing for me, or knock me out for long periods of time, like 14-18 hours long. Neither of which are very helpful. Somedays I wish I could call a conference of all of my doctors and have them sit down and make some decisions about what would be helpful. Anyways, thanks:)

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