What a long strange Ambien Trip it has been...

One of the crappier parts of taking Betaseron is that it can cause extreme insomnia. I have no idea whose bright idea it was to design a drug that causes insomnia to patients with extreme fatigue issues... but figuring out a drug company's motivation is roughly equivalent to trying to figure out the good Congress does for the American people. (I do know what both have in common though. The Answer: Screw the American people. But that was only if you were wondering...) Political aside aside, doctors can prescribe a sleeping aid to help counteract that side effect. I was first prescribed Lunesta, which was fantastic, if its purpose was to get me to jump on my bed like a four-year old who just had their first pixie stick. So I asked my doctor for something else. He prescribed me Ambien. I LOVED LOVED LOVED Ambien. At first it only had the one small side effect of making me talk in in my pre-falling asleep haze. Nine times out of ten, I do not even remember that I do this. The only reason that I know that I do this is that my hubby provides me with a little good natured ribbing the morning. I have asked him to tell me some of his "favorites" for your entertainment. They are as follows:

"Strawberry shortcake needs a haircut. That shit is out of control."
"Where did all these marshmallows come from?"

"Are you enjoying your soup Bears? The secret ingredient is love... and poison!"

In addition to simple phrases, I have also tried to get him to help me train the dog, and, more often then not, attempted to get intimate (with my husband, not the dog). If any of these things happen, he will ask me if I have taken an Ambien. If I respond by saying, "You've taken an Ambien," he knows that I have. After all of this, I am quite surprised that he still sleeps in the same bed as me (or more importantly, why he still eats the soup that I make for him). I never Tiger Woodsed anything or stood up on a plane screaming, so I figured a little talking in my sleep never really did any harm. I did not take it too often and if anything it gave Andrew and I a good laugh, so really no harm no foul. That was until last week. Last week Ambien and I officially ended our professional relationship, well unless I go to a laser light show or find a place to get glow sticks wholesale.

I had never heard that some people hallucinate on Ambien. If I had, I don't know if that would have changed my mind on taking the drug. So many of my medications have such terrible side effects that the possibility of a six foot bunny would not have scared me off. That was before I knew that my hallucinations were going to be more Donnie Darko and the man in the bunny costume, and not so much Jimmy Stewart and Harvey the friendly pooka. But before I get into that let me tell you about my bathroom rug.

In our bathroom we have this shaggy thick beige rug. I was standing in there brushing my teeth, I started to notice that the rug was really dirty. I mean really dirty, as it seemed to be covered in black dots. As I began to look closer, those black dots started to move. My first thought was oh great, Emma has got fleas and she brought them into the house. That was until the rug turned a shiny blue and red color and started growing around my feet. At this point, a sane human being would probably start freaking out or at the very least stop staring at their rug. But I am not so I did not. In fact, I did not even know how much time had passed until my husband asked me if I was going to take another ten minutes. When you take into account my vision problems, list of medications and their side effects, and my spotty MRI, hallucinations could be attributed to almost any single thing or a combination of a few things. As I had taken all of the drugs many times before, I chalked it up to a one off experience brought on by exhaustion. As they say, if I only knew then what I know now.

A couple of nights later, after several hours of tossing and turning, I decided that an Ambien was in order. I took one and attempted to drift off; but that is when the baby started crying. We don't have a baby. Weird yes, but we live on a busy path in Oxford City Center... so probably someone just walking their crying child... outside... at 3AM. I have seen Toddlers & Tiaras, so I can believe that someone would consider that good parenting. I poked my head out the window in the hope that it would.at least cause them to move on to a new locale so I could get some sleep. No inept parent holding a screaming infant or anyone else for that matter, but the crying continued. Our house was built on the land that had once been a part of The Rewely Abby. All that remains of this 13t century abbey is the wall lines the path outside our house. Hmmm... Ghost Baby? ah... What harm can a ghost baby do, really? It was not until the light on TV turned into the two glowing red eyes of a floating tissue monster that I started to freak the fuck out.

As the tissue monster kept telling me that sleep was not option, I decided to go watch TV in our living room. I would like to say that the hallucinations stopped as soon as I got into a well lit room, but luck is rarely on my side. Here is a few of my greatest hits from that night:

~Andrew's back pack started to shake like it had a great secret to share with me. Because I did not open it to discover its secret, it started to grow brown shaggy hair in anger.

~Remember Chairry from Pee-Wee's Playhouse? Well, her cousin spent about 45 minutes trying to talk to me. On the bright side I was not hallucinating the entire chair, it was just our blue arm chair trying talk using the cushion and seat as its mouth. The hallucinating the entire chair... well that would have been just insane.

~My dog Emma's duck toy came to life. It only got so far as to lift its head and flap its wings a little. Thank God it did not talk, but it was able to look into my eyes to telepathically plead with me to never use it to play fetch with her again.

Although, it is not unusual to talk in your sleep and have very vivid dreams, hallucinations on Ambien do occur in roughly less than 1% of those that take it. I found that information out as I was aggressively googling in between hallucinations. One woman even saw elephants hiding in her closet, another thought she saw a volcano erupting in her backyard; so at least I am not alone in my visions. Armed with that information, I was able to go back into my bed tell the baby to shut up, the tissue monster to flush itself, and finally drift off to sleep. I do remember the last thing to cross my mind right before I fell asleep, "I can't believe that this shit is legal and pot is not..."