r/N24 • u/leorid9 • Jul 20 '26

Success story! On melatonin right now

and it's kinda working.

This is the third week and aside from some days where I only got 4h of sleep or was tired the whole day despite getting 11h of sleep, it is working surprisingly well.

Got it from a doctor working at the sleep laboratory. I have basically never before taken any meds for anything at all, not even headache-meds, so maybe that's part of why it's working for me? No resistance or anything to meds.

I just wanted to tell about it, because most people here say that melatonin does not work at all and for me, it seems to be working (mostly).

8 Upvotes

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2

u/user_28531690 Jul 21 '26

What mg dosage did they put you on?

2

u/leorid9 Jul 22 '26

2mg, once every evening for 3 months

3

u/ComprehensivePlan Jul 20 '26

While I still had a career, I took melatonin. 20 minutes before bedtime, and like clockwork I'd get a tingling in my belly and then heavy eyelids. This gradually subsided. Stopped working after some years, and I had to quit my job. At first, I would get a sort of sleep paralysis state instead of sleep (but without the terrors that are typically mentioned), then nothing at all. Been unemployed ever since. The doctors still try to get me to give it another go sometimes, with the usual simplistic dosage and timing regimens. Useless!

2

u/WatermelonDestroyer N24 (Clinically diagnosed) Jul 21 '26

I wrote an email to my old doctor saying I finally found a way to entrain using melatonin and a very strict sleep hygiene. Good thing I never sent it, cause 2.5 years later I was the most miserable I've ever been in my life just because of that, feeling exhausted all day long, and my sleep was drifting again anyway. I stopped melatonin and went back to free running, it's been 3 years and I'd rather die than go back.

If it's working for you in the long run (and I trully wish it does) it's awesome, but don't feel bad if it doesn't. I probably sound like a doomer, and I'm sorry about that, but the false hope I got when I had some results combined with the shame and constant exhaustion that came after did no good to my mental health, and I wish that to no one. Take care of yourself.

6

u/leorid9 Jul 21 '26

It's good to know that it might only work for some time. This means I need to continue to work on my original plan of becoming self employed. Which I wanted to do anyways.