Lack of Seroquel and lack of sleep

New member here, I've got questions about two of my medicines, so splitting my questions into two posts.

Has anyone experienced not being able to sleep when reducing or stopping Seroquel? If I skip a day, I'm not sleeping that night. I've gone 40 hours without sleep when I miss one night and then have to stay up the next day instead of taking it 12 hours late and sleeping all day. 2 years ago I lost insurance and therefore lost my medicine and I did not sleep for a month straight, after that 4 hours broken sleep a night until I got insurance back after a three month lapse. My new psychiatrist recently reduced my dose from 500 mg to 300 mg and I was sleeping only half the night. Melatonin has given me back sleep, but after two months on melatonin I tried going from 5 mg to 2.5 mg and the second night I woke up after only a few hours.

Whenever I try to google Seroquel and sleep problems, all I can find is using Seroquel to fix sleep problems. Nothing about long term inability to sleep after stopping or drastically reducing it.

I take it all at once at night because the sleepy side effect is really, really strong for me. I've been on Geodon and Risperdal in the past, they also made me beyond groggy/sleepy and I couldn't sleep if I missed a night. I do not know about discontinuation as with both a different atypical antipsychotic replaced it immediately and that prevented disrupted sleep. Also my dose was never reduced with either, so I don't know about disrupted sleep from a lower dose.

What causes the long term sleep disruption? And what can permanently fix it?

Since you have had luck sleeping with antipsychotic meds, which tend to be sedating, and do not sleep without them, I wonder if there is an underlying sleeping issue/sleep disorder?

I cannot sleep without some form of medication. I like to limit my exposure to the antipsychotic meds, so my pdoc prescribes temazepam, which is a benzodiazepine. Not all pdocs will prescribe benzos. I actually have sleep terrors, from C-PTSD.

Sleep can be disturbed for a number of reasons. Sometimes, it is mood-related (as in hypomania, for example.) Yet, other times, it could be for a myriad of reasons.

Have you ever thought of seeing a sleep specialist?

I hope you find answers and, most of all, sleep!


WC

I may try a sleep specialist, see if they have some magic in their toolkit. I honestly didn't think of it as separate from the whole bipolar disorder/medication thing.

Yeah - I'm on Seroquel, not for sleep, that's just a side bonus. But if I run out, and miss a dose, then I don't sleep, but I usually get back to normal sleep pretty quickly.

splitimage