hypersomnolence

[cosmic mouse]

I have this same problem - I often sleep through my alarms, and on weekends I can easily sleep for 10-12 hours per night.

This caught my attention:


I've been being treated for the last ten years for hemachromatosis, which is an excess of iron being stored in the liver. My ferritin was measured at about 980 nanograms/millilitre when I was first diagnosed (it's now around 115 or so). The interesting thing about this condition is that it's often misdiagnosed as anemia.

In my specific case, mind you, they're not 100% sure that I actually have hemachromatosis, because when they were treating me weekly (the treatment is phlebotomies - basically, they take half a litre of blood out of you), my hemoglobin was also dropping. So right now I'm on a once-every-month-to-three-months treatment schedule, to make sure that they don't make me anemic. (I actually have a bloodwork appointment in the morning - between the requisition from my family doctor and the one from the specialist, they want to test me for 14 different things.)

Well, when my serum ferritin was at its lowest is was 9 (on a scale that ranged from 11-300), and I was having definite anemia symptoms (fatigue, shortness of breath, dizziness, etc). Now I have most of that without the shortness of breath and last time my ferritin was checked (January) it was ~70. So I think my iron is probably now okay. I stopped taking supplements a couple of years ago since I had heard about the condition for which you are being treated (sounds more complicated lowering iron than raising it for sure!)

I hope you feel better soon, TorontoTrekker... and thanks for your thoughts.

 

[publiusr]

All the best.

 

[TrickyDickie]

My advice to everyone is to have the test (stool sample) for the H Pylori bacteria at least once a year, even if you seem perfectly healthy. That can be dormant and lurk for a very long time. When it pops up it can cause all kinds of other problems. They are only just beginning to compile a list of what it can bring about. Some are:

Irritable bowel syndrome
Peptic ulcers
Incontinence
Interstitial cystitis
Asthma
Chronic fatigue syndrome
Sinus problems
Cancer

My wife and I both have it and we have combinations of everything on that list except for cancer so far.

It's very difficult, if not impossible, to get rid of at this point.

Mainstream medicine had been hitting it with antibiotic cocktails of 3 in combination. Now they are up to 4. Plus proton pump inhibitors. That is utter foolishness and harmful, because the bacteria already significantly reduces stomach acid. All those antibiotics strip away friendly bacteria. That is badly messing up a lot of people. My wife and I flatly refuse to go that route. The antibiotics involved also have a lot of other nasty side effects that can bring about long-term problems.

I am being the guinea pig with a daily regimen of raw cabbage for a month. If that doesn't work, the next thing I will try is Vitamin D-3 for a month. Some studies out of China have been showing some initial promise with that. If that also fails, I will probably just treat the asthma if it gets bad enough and deal with the rest as best I can, as I have been doing for quite a number of years. For me, I don't know where the legacy of Accutane that I was prescribed for severe acne back in the mid 80s leaves off and the H Pylori begins. My stomach has been quite a mess for almost 35 years. I couldn't join the class-action lawsuit against Accutane, because all of my old medical records were destroyed. I had been going to a gastroenterologist who was not helping me at all, so I quit. I was not aware that after 6 or 7 years of dormancy they can destroy every record that you ever had.

With scoliosis, degenerative disc disease, and the onset of spinal stenosis thrown into the mix with everything else, it makes for 'interesting times', as the old curse goes. The good news is that so far I am not on any kind of drugs. An extra-strength Tylenol once in a great while, just to take the very worst of the edge off pain. Toughing out all the rest. I also have strong cancer resistance in my family genes on both sides. One of my great aunts lived to be 103. I don't worry about myself. I worry about my wife. Cancer runs in her family.

 

[cosmic mouse]

Since this got bumped I'll update...

...my hypersomnolence appears to be waning (now I'm just back to my regular, intermittent insomnia, but that's "normal" for me). At the beginning of June I had a bout of vertigo and nausea (can't recall if I mentioned that here), which I went to the Doc for and then the physical therapist, who did the Eppley Maneuver on me and that basically cured the vertigo/nausea. The crystals were loose in my inner ear and that put them back in place. The lagging fatigue must have been due to that somehow I'm guessing, since it took another 2 weeks, but I basically feel back to normal. Never have had that happen before, but it was a weird experience ( both the vertigo and the cure).