"REM drunk"

Just wondering if anyone had heard of, or experienced something called "REM drunk" in the early stages of therapy? (Fogginess from REM rebound after going on CPAP, usually after sleeping 8+ hrs.)

cwaddell wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:11 am

Just wondering if anyone had heard of, or experienced something called "REM drunk" in the early stages of therapy?

If you want to know if others have experienced "REM drunk", you really should make a bit of an effort describing what it is instead of some obscure name that doesn't yield much search results.

I think that you're describing what I felt the first morning after. Actually, the first morning after titration and again the first morning using CPAP at home (four days later). This was back in July 1999, which means it's just over 20 years ago!

I felt somewhat lightheaded and just "weird," but I did notice that I didn't feel like nodding off to the extent that I had become accustomed to. The second morning I was just "wide awake" like I never remembered. It was a somewhat exaggerated wakefulness, as I had a very elevated red blood cell count at the time.

Is it anything like rum drunk? I've been there before.

There is a term called REM Rebound. You might research it and see if you think that might explain whatever symptoms you are having that you called REM drunk.
I have never heard of REM drunk and since we have zero idea what it is you are experiencing it's impossible to know if we have experienced it or not.

To my knowledge I don't know of any way that having REM sleep can cause intoxication of any sort....real or not.

I found this post from 2010, on here.....maybe it will explain. I was asking for info, because I had none, had just heard the term.



jonquiljo Posts: 477Joined: Mon Aug 30, 2010 7:22 pmLocation: SF Bay area (Marin)Contact:
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Rem rebound????
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Post by jonquiljo » Wed Nov 17, 2010 4:46 am

I have been using CPAP faithfully for about 3 months now and originally I felt a lot better. About a month ago, by fatigue level got worse - not as bad as pre-CPAP - but enough for me to doubt what is going on. I am tired and unmotivated inthe day - almost as if I never wake up fully or are still "perturbed" fromt he strange REM world I now seem to be experiencing.

Now my AHI's read about 0.5 down to 0.0 - no events. I sleep like I am drugged! I have never REM'd like this ever before! Now I don't remember my dreams, but wake up as if I came from this nightmare torture chamber (no sex dreams yet - or I wouldn't mind so much)! Pre-CPAP I didn't REM or dream much at all. I guess I have been doing this for at least 30 years - so the change may take some time to get used to.

Now if I get REM rebound right - my body (and mind) are not used to this new life. I am hard to wake up and feel out-of-it for a while until I can get my coffee down in the AM. This is awfully strange! Any insights - and will it get better? I seem to have traded one problem for another. BTW - oximeter data confirms my lack of AHI - no desats to speak of. "technically all looks good. Its the "feel good" part that is not quite right. Any ideas??


_________________

Mask: Mirage™ SoftGel Nasal CPAP Mask with Headgear

I belueve somebody once mentioned converting their reservoir into a bong.
Maybe that's it.

cwaddell wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:11 am

Just wondering if anyone had heard of, or experienced something called "REM drunk" in the early stages of therapy? (Fogginess from REM rebound after going on CPAP, usually after sleeping 8+ hrs.)

Sounds more like you're being waked up (by your alarm?) during a deep sleep (not REM) stage.

palerider wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 11:41 pm

cwaddell wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:11 am

Just wondering if anyone had heard of, or experienced something called "REM drunk" in the early stages of therapy? (Fogginess from REM rebound after going on CPAP, usually after sleeping 8+ hrs.)

Sounds more like you're being waked up (by your alarm?) during a deep sleep (not REM) stage.

Now that sounds familiar to me. It is why I use the snooze alarm. If the first alarm goes off while I am in deep sleep, I may not even remember hearing it or turning it off. By intentionally using a snooze alarm, I will not be in deep sleep when I actually have to get out of bed.

If somebody has to wake me, and I do have to get up with that first awakening, I can be really confused and feel drugged.

Another issue I have had is having to get up after only 2-4 hours of sleep. I will often be very cold. As in, teeth chattering cold in the middle of July. It can take me a good half hour to warm up and feel more normal. Fortunately, I haven't had to do that in a long time.

These are seem to be due to not enough sleep and/or what stage I was in when awakened. Nothing to do with REM that I can tell. And nothing to do with cpap.

I've noticed that, once I finally got my machine dialed in to control my apnea, I wake up *MUCH* groggier than before xPAP. And I think it's because I'm sleeping so much better/deeper to where when the alarm goes off, it catches me by surprise. Whereas before xPAP, I was almost, if not already awake when the alarm went off and had no need to pause for a moment to fully wake up.

So if you're describing that morning grogginess like a sleep "hangover", then I can grok "REM-Drunk".

-JD

I vote for "sleep inertia"

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=91348&hilit=cpap+basics_

To the OP:

Can you please describe exactly what you felt.

I already posted what I think you might be alluding to. However, since you left no first hand description (only somebody else's old posting), we can only guess.

Also, was this in the first few days, or sometime into therapy?

A couple of weeks into my therapy, after sleeping 8+ hours the night before, I woke up , felt fine. After geting to work, I started feeling VERY drowsy, like I had taken a sleeping pill. This lasted all day. It has happened several times, all after sleeping 8+ hours. Has since stopped. (2 months into therapy). I was told by someone who worked in a sleep study unit that "REM drunk" was what I was probably feeling. He said your brain was craving more REM sleep, since it had been deprived of it for so long, and it would go away eventually. I was just curious as to if anyone had had this, or ever heard of it. I could not find any info documented info about it, so I thought it might just ba a term used in sleep labs. I really was serious about the inquiry, only I didn't know if it was really "a thing". Thanks for all the replies. (Mostly)

It's not a common term used in general.
Maybe a made up term by the person in the sleep lab that you talked to.
I have been around for over 10 years now and know several people who work in the sleep labs and I have never heard of it...and there's nothing available from real sources if we search for it.

I think just one person's made up term for something else that was made up. I have never heard of the brain craving REM either.

There is also the possibility that the daytime sleepiness has absolutely nothing to do with sleep...or it might be a symptom of poor sleep quality in general. You might want to do some detective work in terms of evaluating your overall sleep quality with the software available and make sure it isn't related to sub optimal therapy. There's more to this therapy than just the AHI.