My experience of zopiclone (down the rabbit hole)

Hi guys

Just a quick question has anyone suffered from

Heartburn/tummy issues since taking Zopiclone

I ve been off them for 4 weeks now and going ok

Not much sleep but am coping ok however have been

Have some heartburn and tummy issues at the moment

Regards

Gurd

To Shiloh and everyone, to us,

my daughter forwarded me a link to an article about sleep which i find really interesting, I'll paste the link below. it discusses research showing that it's natural for people to wake from sleep after something like 4 hours and not to feel like going back to sleep right away--that this is not pathological but natural. It's an idea that not "being able" to go back to sleep has to do with nature and that trying to go back to sleep when the body doesn't tend toward doing that may not be healthy. Clearly, as we all know, they say that the anxiety a lot of people feel about "not getting enough sleep" is unhealthy--perhaps more unhealthy than not sleeping a lot.

i know that for me, when i wake after 3 or 4 hours, or whenever my body decides to wake up, i often feel pretty good and feel like doing things, but a learned voice in my head tells me not to, "don't wake yourself up," etc. and i am telling myself, "This is not good, I am tired," when maybe i'm not that tired. I know that one thing i tell myself repeatedly, depressingly, is "if i don't get back to sleep now, if i just get up after 4 hours of sleep, i will feel awful tomorrow. I won't be able to function." My mind can point to examples when that has happened. But what i screen out is all the times i've gotten a short amount of sleep and felt fine, functioned fine and forgot about how much sleep i got the night before. I definitely have had bad days where i feel tired when i don't get 6 or more hours of sleep, but i don't seem to be able to absorb the fact that there may be as many times when i am not tired, whatever this variety of experience means. If i grasped the reality of how often i don't feel tired, i think i would have a lot less anxiety, and i know for a fact, I WOULD NOT BE TAKING SO MANY SLEEPING PILLS!!! i also know, but don't absorb it as part of my picture of reality, that when i do get "enough" sleep, i am sometimes feeling tired or not like functioning anyway.

Last night, i woke after around 4 hours of sleep and i was wide awake, as usual. I felt pretty good. The only thing that didn't feel good was that i might be feeling really tired or bad during the day LATER, even though i don't know that for sure. I was up for a while doing something that i felt like doing at the time, i got really into it.

then, i began debating with myself about whether i should take 7.5 mg of zolpidem, my usual "morning" dose that i take to get more sleep, or whether i should just stay up. It was getting near 7am.

i have been taking Zoplclone each night, cut down to 3/4 of a pill, over the past 7 or 8 nights. I am at the point where i was going to cut down to half but i had a couple of days, Wednesday and Thursday nights maybe, when i didn't sleep as well as i had been and thought maybe the withdrawal symptoms were starting, so then one day, i think it was Thursday morning, i took the remaining 1/4 zopiclone in the morning, along with the zolpidem and did fall asleep, and then thought about doing alternate days of 3/4 and 4/4 zopiclone. But Friday night, i slept fine on 3/4, so am continuing but haven't cut down to 1/2, yet. Thinking about it. This morning at around 7, i took 7.5mg zolpidem, which is like 3/4 of a zopiclone. i went back to sleep. i poisoned myself, when i could've done without it. i'm just trying to look at this. Being on both medications freaks me out. It seems complicated. But a lot of this is a head trip. Louise Hay rox.

So, this article was interesting to me.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16964783

Gurd - I'm (unfortunately) still on zopiclone, have cut down to 3/4, and don't know if this is effecting me. i haven't had any heartburn. I have had some mild nausea that is cleared up with a little peppermint oil, and it's not something i normally have, ever, so i wondered if it was related to cutting down the zopiclone. I also have had almost daily headaches, some mild, some less mild, i take butalbital fr that, it works. But i wondered if that was related to cutting down zopiclone. I do get days in a row of headaches sometimes over the years, but i don't know whether that is my body reacting to fluctuations in my sleep meds or something else (over the years).

Have you found any safe remedies for the symptoms you're having? i don't have experience with heartburn and can only say for nausea, mild nausea anyway, over many years, a tiny bit of peppermint oil works excellently. I can't recommend peppermint oil to anyone because it's really strong. It comes in a bottle that drips through a small spout. I drip one drop on my little finger and the i touch my tongue to my finger, and just that tiny amount is really strong, powerful, and the scent fills the air, and i don't take any more than that. I do not know how safe it is but it's an ancient folk remedy of some kind. When i first started taking it, i would put a couple of drops in some hot water and drink it like a tea, but later i found it was easier and faster (and portable) to just put a drop on my finger and then barely touch it with my tongue. When i do that, i need to wash it off my finger so i don't accidentally put my finger in my eye.

Dean - glad to hear you're getting some decent sleep. it sounds like the mirtazapine is doing what it's supposed to. I know you probably already explained this but i would like to be more clear, did you stop the zopiclone you were taking? Was that when the doctor wouldn't renew your prescription?That was really a bad thing to do, sorry to hear it. Probably that's why you're having the cardiac and neuro symptoms, i'm not clear about how long it's been since that happened.

i sure hope the alpha-stim is helpful. I know it has more research behind it than things like Chinese medicine. When i went off of Valium cold turkey in 1993 (up to 2.5 to 3 pills 10mg a night for a few weeks, total tolerance, it was having no effect on me & i ran out of them), i was getting Chinese herbs from a Chinese doctor, and at the time, i never knew if it was helping or not, if it was, it wasn't that clear, but i always felt that the withdrawal experience was not so bad, most of it was over in less than 4 days, sleep remained irregular for a couple of years, but that's how i was without the Valium, that's why i was taking it--and then, i went on the zolpidem ) But one thing, maybe it was just a coincidence, but on my 4th day of withdrawals/no Valium, it was getting pretty intense, irritability, some twitching muscles, seeing bugs out of the corners of my eyes, and SWEATING, and i was drinking chrysanthemum tea (Chinese) and during while i was drinking it, the sweating stopped and that was a turning point, after that, i didn't have the other symptoms with such intensity, they fell away over the next week and were not bothering me as they had been up to that point.

Anyway, in the US, the US military uses the Alpha-stim to treat injured veterans who have brain/neurological problems and insomnia, and PTSD, and they can't get funds for something like that unless it has some substantial scientific rational.

Of course it's not your fault you got strung out!!! geez, a bad motorcycle accident and melanoma! bummer, i think we've all been well intentioned, taking the meds for some good reasons, and on trusted medical advice.

Sorry you need to try to manage what sounds like protracted withdrawal from Zop with other problematic meds. I expect i would need to do the same thing if in that position. A lot of conundrums. Again, i sure hope to hear that the Alpha-Stim helps, not just in the short term.

The doctor hasnt completely refused me zopiclone as of yet.I got a new doc last year and he does not like giving this medicene out,everytime he tells me,'' you do know these are addictive dont you dean?'',yes i reply,but its a bit late to keep telling me this doctor seeing as i've been on and off them since june 2000.

I have told him i'm not taking them for the sake of it but what else can i do,without medication i get no sleep whatsoever,NONE,period,now for someone who's never been through this its hard to understand and they dont believe me.I run my own convenience store which is hard enough,but without sleep its a disaster.Having no sleep leaves me knackered out and irritable,as well as trembling sensations in my arms mainly but also in my abdomen.

Anyway,back in december he said lets try the mirtazapine,which at the time on its own didnt give me any sleep,so we went to a half dose zopiclone 3.75mg and i went from there after a week or two to halving those,then it was a half dose every other day,now its a half if i've gone a few days without any sleep.these half doses are took at night with a regular mirtazapine dose.

I think my main problem is having the anxiety symptoms constantly,like i've said as soon as i sit down and try and put my feet up i feel my heart pounding and i have trembling in my limbs(my arms in particular).

Yes i've had major things happen in my life,but in all fairness these are a long time ago and now things are reasonably smooth.Theres just no let up in the symtoms,no tablets have worked and neither has other remedies.

I honestly dont know what to do about it,i do think if i found a cure for this i'd be able to get some sleep.

I try not to think about it but after all these years its impossible,having these symptoms especially the physical ones without having any real cause is a nightmare.

Hi Dean.I also have the same symptoms that you mentioned,as well as breathlessness when I wake up sometimes.I try to reduce the Zopiclone by a half to 3,75,and although I fall asleep,it is never for long enough,so I end up taking the other half.I have also bee prescribed Mirtazepine for anxiety and have been told that it could help my appetite as I am too thin.My problem is that I am totally phobic about taking new medication as I live alone and it scares me to think that I might get side effects,be ill,and that no one would know.If there was

someone here to monitor me it might help.The only time I get any respite from this anxiety is when am

aslep,and in my case it seems to be a vicious circle,but I am sure I would manage it all better if I were not

living alone with no back up in an emergency.I live in fear if being taken to A and E and not looked after

properly and with no one to call in an emergency.I have hardly been anywhere since Christmas as I am too scared to venture out too far as I cannot manage the panic attacks,although admittedly they are not so bad as I DO take one Bisoprolol a day which was prescribed for my 'adrenalin overload'.My life seems to be

governed by fear,but I MUST sleep,even though the physical symptoms are unpleasant and worrying.

.

Hi to all

Rina, Colette, Jaw how you going with your tapering reduction of zopiclone?

It is now 44 days since my last 1/4 tab and I am feeling great, and have well and truly left the dependency behind. Wish I had done it years ago, my way (tapering down dose) not like the GP encouraged cold turkey. Apart from initial headaches and sleeplessness for about 6 days, I really didn't suffer any other withdrawl effects. It feels so good not to feel panicky about everything and have that deep anxious feeling, - zopiclone was definitely responsible for that in my case.

Best wishes to you all

Hi Shiloh

So good to hear that you are doing so well and that you are not addicted to any sleeping aid of any kind ! I say this to all my family and friends that I would not be where I am today , had it not been for you and this site that offered me practical advice and all the support needed to get off the zops!

I'm now taking 1/4 zop + one tablet of 10 mg of melatonin at night. In another 3 weeks I will be off the zops . I'm managing OK with small rests during the day if needed. But it's been not too bad over all.

Went to ER the other day for a bladder infection and of course had to disclose the meds that I was on. As soon as I said zopiclone , the dr said immediately that they do affect memory and I said yes that is why I'm getting off them and he said ....good . It was another affirmation to keep on doing what I'm doing .

I'm getting there slowly ... how is everyone else doing?

Warm regards

Colette

Hi everyone

thank you Colette for your kind words, - I have in fact you to thank for the final step of me stopping the 1/4 zop, as your post back on 4 Dec telling me to stick to my plan of stopping after my christmas visitors left, made me think and decide to just get on with it, bit the bullet and stop. Once I'd flushed the remaining pills down the toilet there WAS no going back.

That last step of stopping the final dose is a little daunting psychologically, so I say to you Colette, keep up the excellent effort and stick to plan, and when times up for getting off the 1/4 tab, don't delay, get rid of the remaining zopiclone (down the toilet where they belong!) and that way you are not tempted to take any more. Proud of your effort, girl!

Like you, and many other on this site, - this site helped me enormously to get off the medication. The advice and support was priceless, thank you all

kind regards

Shiloh

Hi Shiloh,

I commend your patience and bravery, unfortunately i am still trying to find mine. I have fallen back into taking a whole 7.5mg tablet again just to get sleep i tell myself it is too keep away the migraines which are a torture when i am trying to cope with the day... well that is what i have tuned myself to believe, however i do get these awful headaches that curl me up in a fetal position at times so i take my codeine to get rid of the pain then i look forward to the night where i can take my zopie to put me to sleep,my sister say's "I am weak!" but to hell with her, i said. But deep down she is right i will give it another go to cut down.

I will keep in touch on my progress...you go girl keep up the excellent work.

Regards

Rina

hi everybody, so good to hear from you. shiloh, really happy to hear that you are feeling so much better. That's what i'm hoping for and perhaps fearing it will be the opposite, but such an irrational fear.

I have not made more progress on tapering off of zopliclone. I did reduce it by 1/4 and was very pleased that doing this didn't affect my sleep at all that i could tell--but i am also taking 10mg zolpidem and 6.25mg zolpidem extended release with that so it's hard to feel very good about the progress of going down 1/4 zopiclone. i do feel good about it though, less is better than the same or more. But when i cut down to 1/2 after a couple of weeks on 3/4, i didn't fall asleep on my other meds and 1/2 zop, so i went back up to 3/4 zop. i don't feel good about that.

The thing is, obviously i'm not ready. If you're ready, you accept that you will have less sleep for at least a little while. i do not know why i'm dragging my feet on this, i'm at a loss to say what i'm afraid of because my fears are irrational. i have a call in to try to make an appointment with a cognitive behavioral therapist to help me sort out my thoughts and think more positively and more realistically. It's not realistic to be so afraid to experience the side effects of stopping the medication. Unlike Rina, i don't get bad headaches if i don't sleep. My daughter gets migraines when she doesn't sleep enough and she tapered herself off zolpidem last year.

I have a slightly more complicated situation because i'm on both medications, but not THAT complicated. My plan is first to get off the zopiclone, i want to be off it by a month from now. i can increase the zolpidem extended release, that is what i'm going to try. That's how i got on zopiclone in the first place. I was taking the zolp extended release along with some regular zolpidem as occasional supplement, and the extended release one wasn't having that much of an extended effect on me anymore, and i decided to try the old zope i had in my drawer, so i switched them. i took the zop and stopped the zolp extended release, and i found that i did sleep longer on the zop and that's how it started. I later added back in a half dose of the zolp extended release, that was much later.

At first i didn't take the zop on work days, only on weekends, because it made me groggy during the day, zolpidem does not. But eventually i started taking it every day, which eventually brought me to where i am now. And after a year and a half on zopiclone, it still makes me groggy during the day. So that is one of the main things i look forward to when i get off it--having a clearer head throughout the day. The way it is now, in late afternoon or evening, my head starts clearing up, it feels much better. And then bedtime comes and i have to put that stuff in my body again and start the whole groggy thing over again, it's crazy. I didn't want to have a short night's sleep originally because i didn't want to feel tired during the day, so i started taking the zolpidem. Then, later, i added the zopilclone and now i'm tired during the day even if i get a lot of sleep--from the ZOPICLONE!! crazy.

i don't know why i am not just taking steps to get off, what is stopping me? If i could just get off the zopiclone, that would be such a huge step along the way of getting off all of it. I just came from the pharmacy today, and i am embarrassed because i have three different prescriptions for sleeping medication and i know they have reacted to that, i've been told before that i can't have all of those medications together, but then they apparently clarified it with my doctor and now they don't say anything. i feel like such an idiot when i go there to get the medication. If i just was down to only getting the zolpidem, i would feel like much less of an idiot, not mixing the two drugs. My doctor writes on the prescription for zopiclone, "not to be taken with zolpidem," and they type that on the prescription bottle. But of course i take them together, that's why i get refills every month for 30 pills each..

well, i am rambling on and on. This is the main thing i think about every day. i am obsessed with it, yet i am not moving forward. i'm hoping that if i can start working with the therapist about it, that will shake things loose. On his description on the insurance webpage it says in his specialties include cognitive behavioral therapy, chemical dependency and sleep disorders. So that sounds promising.

it's not like getting "enough" sleep is have such a great effect on my life. OK??? (talking to myself)(i do that a lot)

It's very encouraging to hear from you guys who have found their way out of the morass.

Colette, you have really come a long way, and you are almost completely free! That's really good news. I admire and envy you and shiloh, that you could take the step out of being stuck in the 'dependence,' and started moving forward, toward regular life. If it wasn't for you guys doing this, it would seem a lot harder than it is. good luck with the grande finale. i am eager to hear reports from the other side, how you feel, is your memory improving? do others get the groggy feeling i have during the day from taking this stuff? does it go away? anyway, hearing of your progress makes me smile, thanks

i think the longer you are on this zopiclone, the worse your memory problems will become. It could even be permanent damage. I was only on it for about 9 months. Have been off it since late June last year. I was going really well until recently. For a few weeks, maybe a month or so, over Christmas & New Year, I found I was having a return of sleeping problems & memory issues. It even got to the stage that my GP referred me to a Cognitive Dementia & Memory Service (CDAMS), with an appt booked for next month. When I researched Zopiclone last year, I read that memory & sleeping problems can return, months or even years down the track. I'm just hoping that it isn't too late & that the steps I took to get off this medication, have saved me from permanent damage to my neurotransmitter functions. I will say, since making the appt to see the CDAMS specialist, my memory has improved again & I'm sleeping much better again now, too. I've followed the advice on improving the function of & re-balancing the neurotransmitters in the brain, by reading my books I have, on all this sort of thing. So, hopefully the relatively short period of those memory & sleeping issues I experienced, are resolving with time. I'm eating & taking the recommended supps to improve neurotransmitter function. Seems to be working anyway. When I look back to how I was when on zopiclone, i was a jittery wreck the next day, exhausted, irritable & depressed. Everything was an effort & my head was so foggy. Stopping it cold turkey was the best thing I ever did! I'm quite happy nowadays, no longer anxious & jittery, my head is clearer once again (after those few weeks of symptoms returning) I'm more motivated & enthusiastic about life. 'Normal'; I suppose you could say, haha!

Good luck all! Bite the bullet, suffer a few sleepless nights, some anxiety, but look forward to improved sleep, clearer thinking & more energy! The sleeplessness & extra anxiety will pass. You can ease these symptoms if you make sure you eat well, & take calming herbs, calcium & magnesium & other supps recommended above in other posts. It's so worth it!

I have gone 2 nights cold turkey-I have been taking half to one tab at night for 5 years-had no idea that this was the common denominator of all my mental and physical issues-new doctor told me I must come off but didn't say how-started research and found this sight-I think it is what will get me thru-I ache everywhere but did while taking it-I am hoping that will improve the longer I am off-it is reading everyone else's experience that is enlightening for me--Thankyou to all for putting me on this journey!

Hi mary---it sounds like you are making it! at least you've taken what for me is the hardest step, deciding that you're ready to do what you have to do to get off the medication. That's great! I think one of the most important things is what you realized--that you are feeling bad on the medication so if you're feeling bad while going off it. it doesn't make a difference, taking it again won't solve any problems, it will just keep the problems going.

The half life of zopiclone is pretty short, about 5 or 6 hours, so you can google it and find out how to calculate how long it will be in your blood, i think half life refers to plasma, whatever that means, like after 6 hours, half of what was there is gone, and then in six more hours, half of that half is gone, and so on for a few days until it's all gone. it does give some idea of how long it takes for it to be eliminated from circulation in the body, which is wonderful, to know that each day, each hour, it's getting less and less, that amount is going down, whatever the last dose was, it's being eliminated.

I read somewhere else, i hope i bookmarked it or can find the same information again, that substances remain stored in various body tissues for longer amounts of time, and that would explain fluctuation in symptoms over time, like Christine was talking about, it can be released from tissue like bone and organs in an irregular pattern. But over time, it's still going out, not in, and it's getting less and less and LESS!! i think most people, once they get through the first week or two, are pretty much back to normal, unless they have other things going on.

We all ingest a lot of things into our bodies in the course of a lifetime. My plan is, after i get off the medication, at some point, when i feel strong enough, i'm going to do some fasting, not extreme or severe fasting, but i will try having nothing but water for a day, if i can. i did that twice when i had routine colonoscopies, i had to fast to prepare for it, and i felt really awful on the first day of that with a bad headache, other than the headache i was ok, but the next day, i felt better and better as time went on, and i felt better permanently after that, i was really impressed, never forgot that experience.

So i believe in the way the body can be cleansed by things like fasting, just avoiding not only sleeping pills but other toxic things too, you can't avoid everything completely but i want to just minimize what i can. Hang in there, i would love to hear back from you on your progress and how you're doing, whatever happens.

Christine, it is so true what you said about feeling less jittery , less foggy and just more normal . That is the way that I'm feeling already ! I still have 2 weeks to go on 1/4 and then I'll be done for good as well ! I used to be scared to death of this but now I just can't wait for my body to be clean and not have this drug lurking about !

Mary , did you have rebound insomnia? Good for you to be able to quit cold turkey like that. I'm curious to know what your doctor said about the drug . It seems like more and more docs are not too happy to be prescribing this particular pill. My mom is 86 and takes 1.5 of the 7.5 every nite. Her doctor would prefer she not take it as well but she promised him that she would be a good girl and never take more than 1.5 a nite. That seems to satisfy him so she continually gets the zops refilled.

Jaw, your information is always so good and always helps to boost my determination in quitting. Your time will come as well ....when you are ready ...you can do it !!!

Shiloh , so happy that I had a small part in helping you...you were the main leader here and I so applaud you.! I'm not decided what to do with the remaining 20 or so pills that I'll have left. I was thinking of giving them to my husband and if in dire need at some point in the future he would have the control over them. Good or bad idea?

Warm regards to everyone

Colette