Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards | Re: Sleep, K, Valerian, Melatonin

I can't take Valarian. I've always been a little afraid of it since a friend I had was so addicted to Valium. Then someone told me Valerian is what Valium comes from. Now that might not be true, but then a lot of drugs we pay lots of money for come from simple things. Anyway, Valerian relaxes me, but doesn't put me to sleep.

As for melatonin, it doesn't do much for me sleeping.. I have to use a sleeping med like Ambien or Lunesta, neither of which works for a whole night. More like 5 hours. Anything that relaxes the body is going to make the intestines relax too and be a possible cause of more C. I find that as long as I have plenty of fiber (Heather's Acacia -about 3 tbsp/day- and ground flax seed -another 2 tbsp added to oatmeal in the morning starts my day) then the relaxants at bedtime don't seem to bother either the C end or the D end, when I'm in that faze.

I am experimenting with lack of minerals and vitamins as a possible cause to loss of sleep. I know that low K (potassium) will cause my heart to beat faster, make me tired feeling but wired and unable to sleep. Last night I got out of bed and ate a banana at 12:30 am and then finally went to sleep. I am also looking at the possible loss of B vitamins on the energy line. Etc. Maybe someone has some ideas about vitamin and mineral loss, which must be especially prevalent in the D end of this disease.

For me, I know I dove into part 1 of Heather's Cheat Sheet only last Jan., in a frantic effort to get my GI tract under control. Then I was almost afraid to eat anything else, and your body does need other things. So now I'm adding more vegetables in the broccoli, and green end and a little more fat. Not much, just choosing where I want to have that fat. Just baby steps back into all those loved other foods and seeing what I can and cannot tolerate.

I don't get time to post often on here, but I'm sure glad you're all here. Thank you for all advice. Some I will definitely try and then post my own personal reactions.
Barb

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