Quote:
Originally Posted by Happy Canuk
Well, I have to say, that when I don't sleep well, my FM flares, but I don't have a sleep disorder.
Unless you've had a sleep study, you could easily have an undiagnosed sleep disorder. Many sleep disorders are impossible to diagnose without a sleep study that includes an EEG (just testing for apnea, or for RLS isn't enough - you have to test for apnea, RLS/PLMD, and sleep stage disorders).
Sleep disorders are so common in fibromyalgia (up to 80%), most especially the alpha EEG anomoly, that more and more they're considered most likely a cause rather than a symptom (because if you artificially induce such a sleep disorder, you would get symptoms identical to fibromyalgia).
Before I had my first sleep study (before I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, in the process of trying to find a diagnosis for my strange symptoms), I would have told you that I didn't have a sleep disorder either (at least until I was sleeping far more than normal). As it turns out I had several (and now have one less as the sleep apnea disappeared after I lost only about 35 lbs), and probably had most of them for years before I had any inclination that my sleep wasn't normal.
Lucid dreaming for example, I've had in some form for as long as I can remember. As a child I had no idea that my dreams were any different than anyone else's. In lucid dreaming a person is aware or at some point in the dream becomes aware that they are dreaming and can control, to some extent, the events of the dream - or may be able to choose to wake up. I was rarely afraid of nightmares as a child, because in the dream I would choose to alter the course of the dream when it got scary - or reassure myself in the dream that it wasn't really scary because it was a dream, and if all else failed I could choose to wake up.
Waking from a (seemingly) normal 7 to 10 hours of sleep, feeling less-than-refreshed was probably an early sign of one or more of the sleep disorders. That was a problem since high school (when fibro symptoms also started to appear, though I wouldn't have a fibro diagnosis for another 25 years). I always attributed the morning (and later constant) fatigue to my over achievement (I graduated high school and college early, and always took extra class loads and took as much work-study and paid work as I could (often swing shift work). After graduate school, I also usually worked two jobs, often swing-shift work, until the worsening fibro symptoms made that impossible).
Both a rheumatologist and a neurologist told me that my years of burning-the-candle-at-both-ends, may have triggered the sleep disorders/fibro - as they've also recently found a link between swing-shift and double-shift workers and fibromyalgia and sleep disorders.
Anyway the sleep disorders my sleep study found:
Sleep Apnea I wa having 90 episodes of apnea per hour. I was prescribed a CPAP machine, which greatly reduced the fatigue and even the severity and frequency of pain flares. The sleep apnea disappeared after I lost about 35 lbs. I no longer use a CPAP, although (now that my husband knows what apnea sounds like) I do periodically have flares of the sleep apnea if I have a severe respiratory infection (when I've had bronchitis or pneumonia).
Restless Leg Syndrome and Periodic Limb Movement Disorder, which is considered one diagnosis or two depending upon which doctor you talk to. PLMD is a more severe form of rls where the whole body, not just the legs are affected. Basically if I'm not taking my medication for it, my husband will wake up with bruises from my thrashing around. (Very common to fibromyalgia, but not nearly as much so as the alpha EEG anomoly).
Alpha EEG Anomaly Alpha EEG anomaly occurs when sudden bursts of brain activity occur during a time when the brain should be in deep sleep. This is the most common of sleep disorders in fibromyalgia (in most studies looking for it, it's been found in more than half - sometimes much more than half of fibro patients studied).
This can take two forms (again one diagnosis or two? I have both)
1. Brain waves associated with "awake states" intrude and interupt deep. My sleep study revealed that I spend nearly no time in deep, restorative sleep. I wake or return to shallow stages of sleep almost immediately upon entering REM (as a result, I spend nearly no time in deep restorative sleep).
2. Brain waves associated with "awake states" occur simultaneously during deep (REM) sleep. A person can seem to be both awake and asleep simultaneously
Two examples of what I believe to be manifestations of #2, which I experience frequently are sleep paralysis, and lucid dreaming (being aware that one is dreaming, during a dream, and being able to a degree to control the dream - one type that I have that is very unpleasant is knowing that I am dreaming, but being unable to wake up, sometimes dreaming that I am waking repeatedly only to find it yet another dream. I can panic in the dream, feeling I will not be able to awaken).