Kiss the Trazadone Goodbye!

Insomnia: Part 2

A follow up to my Oct 4th post - Bye Bye Insomnia - finds me drug free. After taking a commonly prescribed sleep-aid called Trazadone for over 5 years I am finally sleeping through the night without it. However, the journey to get here was a tough road that came with a few unexpected bumps.

I was so eager to stop taking medication to sleep that it did not occur to me that going cold turkey might have consequences. For me, the major side effect was depression. In fact, it wasn’t until recently that I was able to open up to a friend about my dark state that she reminded me that Trazadone was initially prescribed to people as an antidepressant.

Also, after completing my 10 day Chinese herbal remedy, I slept soundly for several nights and then started heading back into the torturous cycle of sleeplessness. I was not in Lake County near the herbalogist and was extremely reluctant to take any Trazadone but a call to Rory lead me to try Anmien Pien (another Chinese herbal remedy that thankfully came in a convenient pill form and did not require an hour and a half of cooking). It did the trick. After a few days I was able to stop taking it and sleep without any aid.

And I have turned the corner on both my insomnia and short bout of depression so the report on the Chinese herbal remedy is still very positive.

Bye, Bye Insomnia

Having a 5-year bought with insomnia and having to rely on a nightly prescriptive sleep-aid (Trazadone) to sleep, I began to feel like the pharmaceutical companies had one up on me. Deciding to change my fate, I made an appointment with Rory of the local Herbal Collective in Middletown, CA to see what could be done.

Rory did some tests, including checking the moss on my tongue, which was hard to figure since I brush my tongue so diligently, there should be none left. But anyway, after a series of pulse counts, questionnaire filling, and poking here and there I was instructed that my herbs would be ready the next day for pick-up.

Five days later, as you can see from the photos, I am drinking an assortment of cooked and strained herbs. What’s in them? Don’t know. Rory is a terse British guy and other than the written herb-cooking instructions which were: ½ hour boil, simmer then strain followed by ¾ hour boil, simmer and strain, there was nothing else. So I cook up each bag of herbs (he gave me 5 bags to last 10-days), each one lasts for 2 days, drinking 2x each day between meals.

An insomnia cure? So far, so good, I've been sleeping without the use of Trazadone for over 2 weeks now. Stay tuned!