Ambien and amnesia

I've beentaking Ambien for several years and haven't had any terrible adverse effects. I've had some amnesia after drinking alcohol and taking Ambien, but my memory usually returns by the next day. I've also had muscle twitches and weakness & went to a neurologist for testing, but they found nothing wrong. I figured it was probably the Ambien. I stopped it for 2 weeks, once, but still had some of the symptoms. I've thought about trying to stop again, but I need to weigh the pros and cons. I actually sleep now, and generally have a lot more energy than in the past. I'm on a regular sleep schedule and can get 6-8 hours of sleep per night. I think I'll just deal with the side effects.

I have MS and have been taking Ambien for a few months now to help me sleep. My husband and daughter told me this morning that last night I got up from bed and was completely naked and walked out into the living room. They said I looked very wasted and was looking all around the house for some soda and them went back to bed. I can't remember any of this. It scares me. what if they were not home, would I of drove to the store naked looking for soda? This is a very dangerous side effect. It only happened one othere time when I got up and was surfing the TV channels looking for a TV program. Again, I don't remeber it happening. I also It is making my MS symptoms worse, I am having more stiffness and spasms along with blurred vision.

I've been taking it on and off for many years. I split the 10mg pills in half and only take it sun-thurs so it gets out of my system on the weekends. I have experienced amnesia, doing things that I don't remember on a couple of occasions. I don't take it until I get into bed but if it doesn't put me to sleep soon I'll get up and do things and then have memory problems. Otherwise, no other side effects.

I have administered Ambien to patients during hospital stays and I have seen more than approximately 90% of instances where very undesirable and dangerous side effects occured. In my patients the usual pattern is complete amnesia once the med has taken effect or after a short course of 1 or 2 hours of "drop dead" sleep. People experience complete disconnection with their immediate reality they have no idea what is going on usually becoming argumentative and at the least very suspicious of what is going on. Disoriented to place, time, situation. Become angry, often uncooperative and occasionally violent. Always with paranoid ideations and dellusions of persecution. Many times these drug induced symptoms take up to 6 hours to abate and then a persistent mild paranoia may plague the person for hours after.

I took Ambien for about 8 months and in the beginning it was great. I would sleep for 3 to 4 hours at a time uninterrupted (unheard of for me). However after a while I noticed some very unpleasant and embarrassing side effects that include: amnesia, sleep walking, apnea (felt oxygen deprived), headaches, would sometimes wake after sleeping for a while and try to make telephone calls and fall asleep while talking to my son (I can only imagine what he thought), I would have sex with my husband while hallucinating that he was wearing purple capes and had multiple sex organs, I didn't remember these events, I was told the next morning. I only kept taking it 3/4's of a 10 mg. tablet, because I needed to sleep but since I woke up feeling anything but rested I wondered how much I really slept. The most serious side effect happened 2 weeks ago. I woke to use the restroom 3 hours after taking & fell asleep on the toilet for almost an hour. I don't remember getting up but when I did I walked a few feet and collapsed, hit my nose & went into what appeared to my husband to be a seizure when it was most likely brought on by low oxygen intake due to AMBIEN. He thought I stopped breathing and called 911. I know that Ambien caused this and I destroyed all of my prescription and will never take it again. I had no problem stopping it as it almost killed me. I am back to my old self, not sleeping but that's better than permanent sleep. The makers of Ambien must know that this is happening to people but don't disclose it or they feel that advertising 7-10 days of treatment is recommended gets them off the hook. Long term Ambien use is extremely dangerous and may build up toxic levels in your blood but why aren't we told that. I had no addiction to this drug and all of you can stop too. Your just addicted to sleep and I don't blame you. Sleeps a problem for me too now but I will be too scared to ever take anything for it again. Good luck to you all!

I have been taking Ambien for 5 months. I started realizing last week that my attention has become impaired. I will be listening with great interest to someone and all of a sudden I am gone. I realize what's happened to me by the end of what they are saying but have no idea what they just said. I am normally very sharp and love conversation, but I can't carry a conversation on right now. Also, while I am aware of the conversation, at first and discuss, I can't remember the conversation details by the next day. I also have drastic jerking movements for an hour or so after taking. And, if amnesia of anything that goes on in the evenings after I have taken it.