Prior to diagnosis and treatment I was beginning to wake up up pretty much every 60-90 minutes through the night and then I'd do the only thing that helped at the time which is smoke some cannabis, fall back asleep, wake up 90 mins later, rinse repeat until dawn. I always woke up exhausted, even if i managed to only awake a few times through the night. Muscle pain and severe cognitive deficiency
Basically with my disorder (Periodic Limb Movement Disorder or PLMD) it's categorized by episodes of 100s of rhythmic body movements which will sometimes wake me up, but even if they don't I wake up very tired from the movements.
The current treatment has been nightly diazepam (aka valium). The first-line medication for PLMD in the US is actually a dopamine agonist called Mirapex that is often used to treat parkinson's disease. The American Scholar published a piece about Mirapex in September titled "The Degradation Drug," [https://theamericanscholar.org/the-degradation-drug/] It's a medication known to cause dramatic personality changes and life altering compulsions like gambling and even child pornography. Evidence of efficacy for this specific condition is so thin it absolutely blows my mind this medication is handed out thoughtlessly (they really just want to delay prescribing a heavy sedative), I've told my neurologist I will never touch a dopamine agonist again and caution others to do plenty of reading before going on one
Basically with my disorder (Periodic Limb Movement Disorder or PLMD) it's categorized by episodes of 100s of rhythmic body movements which will sometimes wake me up, but even if they don't I wake up very tired from the movements.
The current treatment has been nightly diazepam (aka valium). The first-line medication for PLMD in the US is actually a dopamine agonist called Mirapex that is often used to treat parkinson's disease. The American Scholar published a piece about Mirapex in September titled "The Degradation Drug," [https://theamericanscholar.org/the-degradation-drug/] It's a medication known to cause dramatic personality changes and life altering compulsions like gambling and even child pornography. Evidence of efficacy for this specific condition is so thin it absolutely blows my mind this medication is handed out thoughtlessly (they really just want to delay prescribing a heavy sedative), I've told my neurologist I will never touch a dopamine agonist again and caution others to do plenty of reading before going on one