Ambien and Sleep-Eating

Today's Weight: 144.2
Yesterday's Weight: 147.6


Difference: -2.8
Total Loss Round 3: -2.8


Round 3 VLCD Day 2


I survived yesterday! I took it easy during derby practice and barely skated. Exercise makes me hungry and Dr. S is pretty clear about it in his protocol, just don't do it. It's difficult for me not to though. I love it. I did give up my physical fitness bootcamp 3x a week.


I didn't sleep eat last night either. I took my sleeping pill (Ambien) and went to sleep... it seems. I didn't find any evidence of refrigerator raids. My husband has promised not to let me eat after I've taken my sleeping pill but last two rounds he was not too successful. I would just get more creative at where I was hiding food. I did do some research on Ambien and sleep eating and this was a funny article on CBS News. The makers of ambien are finally admitting that "nocturnal eating may be a side effect of the popular sleep medication, Ambien". 

Ambien May Prompt Sleep-Eating:

Mahowald, who's medical director of the Minnesota Regional Sleep Disorders Center in Minneapolis, tells Blackstone, "We've had people eat very inappropriate things that they would never eat while awake. Some example would be buttered cigarettes, salt sandwiches, raw bacon."

And sleep-binging could leave its mark – on waistlines.

"I put on over 100 pounds since I've been on Ambien," says Brenda Pobre, who couldn't figure out why she was gaining so much weight.

"I would wake up in the morning and there would be candy wrappers all around the bed," she says. "There would be crumbs in the bed. There would be all kinds of evidence that someone had been eating in the bed. But I had absolutely no recollection of it."

Pobre adds, "There would be a big mess in the kitchen. There would be wrappers on the floor, popsicle sticks on the floor. I would accuse my sons of making the mess and they would say they didn't, and they would say they had seen me doing it and, of course, I thought they were lying."

Mahowald points out that, "Sleep and wakefulness can occur simultaneously. Everybody thinks the brain is either all awake or all asleep, and that's not true. The brain can be literally half awake and half asleep."


In a way I'm relieved it wasn't just me who was the moron that kept eating everything in the house and chewing through boxes to get to the melba toast! 


So Ambien and HCG dieters BEWARE.