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Lamictal Insomnia
Tue, 09/16/2014 - 11:38My 8 year old son's seizures (mostly nighttime) are being controlled by Lamictal. He takes 37.5mg (1 1/2 tablets) in the morning and 400mg (4 tablets) at night. Unfortunately he has terrible insomnia on Lamictal. He tosses and turns until about 1 or 1:30 am. Then he wakes up around 4 or 5 am and is restless until about 6 am. And then he has to be up for the day by 7 am.
His growth rate used to be affected by seizures and spikes at night that were disrupting his sleep and preventing the release of growth hormones. Now, the seizures are more rare, but the medicine is preventing him from sleeping. His pediatrician is becoming very concerned about his lack of growth. It also affects him cognitively and emotionally.
We tried giving him melatonin, but he's very sensitive and even .25mg was stopping his breathing. And as soon as the melatonin wears off a couple hours later, he's WIDE AWAKE and unable to fall back to sleep. We have a night time routine of bath time and reading, but he's too hyper to wind down.
I've been moving his night time dose earlier and earlier in the day. Currently, I'm giving it to him at 5:30 in the evening. How early can a night dose be given and still be effective? Has anyone ever overcome Lamictal insomnia?
Thank you for your help!!!
Wow, that is a major impact!
Submitted by Anonymous on Tue, 2014-09-16 - 14:06
Wow, that is a major impact! Did they go slowly up on the night time dose to find the lowest amount needed to control the seizures? What does the neurologist say about the adverse health effects? Can they switch to extended release forms or try another approach (single drug or multiple drug) to improve things? (for the record, my child takes lamotrigine but hasn't had any hyperness on it, tho' the epilepsy nurses warned me about it, and my child isn't taking anywhere near what your child takes - 37.5mg/25mg and going up by half 25mg pills every two weeks currently).obviously you would need more on the pharmacology than below (because understanding that could help you know if there might be a better setup), but I don't have any good reference that helps me, post something if you find something that helps...http://reference.medscape.com/drug/lamictal-lamotrigine-343012#10