Anyone have side effects from Melatonin?

Marie5656

Marie5656

Well-known Member
Location
Batavia, NY
I have tried taking melatonin as a sleeping aide, as I would rather not use sleeping pills. Technically it does work, and I sleep OK. The drawback is I often have unusually vivid, and sometimes disturbing dreams when I take it. Some, so disturbing I have woke up yelling out, or very anxious. Kind of negates the "positive" effect of the supplement. I broke down and gave the remainder of the bottle I bought to my husband, as it does not have the same dream effect on him. I am wondering if taking it along with my anti anxiety medication is causing this outcome?

I have heard people here mention magnesium. Is that to help with sleeplessness?
 

I have taken melatonin for the last 20 years, and with no problems. I think that it might sometimes cause more vivid dreams, but as long as I am not having a nightmare, that is not a problem for me.
Melatonin is a natural hormone that our bodies all produce, not just people, but also most animals. It usually starts working when it gets around twilight, so that people/animals would be sleepy by nighttime.
Mothers also produce it in their milk, and it helps the baby/animal to sleep better.

As we get older, our body produces less and less of this hormone, but it is also an anti-aging hormone, and has other benefits for our body and our health.
There is a book called “The Melatonin Miracle” that totally explains all of the benefits of melatonin. Like many other things, some people require more and some require less of this hormone, probably also depending on your age, as well as how much your body naturally makes on its own, and maybe even how much light you have on in your house at night, since light inhibits melatonin.

I started out with 3 mg after I read the book, mostly because I wanted the anti-aging and health benefits, as well as the sleep.
I gradually increased the amount that I take over the years, and I now take 10 mg about a half hour before i go to bed at night, and then I usually fall right asleep when I go to bed.

I think that it is mostly a matter of balancing the amount you need to help you fall asleep, with not having more vivid dreams than you want to have.
I also take magnesium, and it helps you to sleep better, too, although I take it to help keep my heart in the right sinus rhythm.
 
Marie, what dosage and brand of Melatonin were you using? Melatonin doesn't cause nightmares, but it does make dreams more vivid, the good ones and the bad ones. Years ago I started with a high dose of 6mg, thinking it was going to be like a 'knock out' sleeping pill, but it doesn't work that way. I quickly went down to 3mg doses. Now, in my retirement years, I just use a 1mg sublingual that you melt under your tongue before bed. My husband uses that dose too, although there are nights he'll get up in the middle of the night and take an additional half, we have a pill splitter, so he has some ready.

712uoTN-SyL._SY679_.jpg


What kind of anti anxiety drug are you using? I never heard of Melatonin interacting with such thing, but it's possible. I've always been a vivid dreamer even before melatonin came around, my dreams are colorful and full of details....my husband seldom remembers his dreams, so I think it's similar to you and your hubby.

Magnesium is relaxing, I use Magnesium Citrate daily, it relaxes the muscles in the body. An Epsom salts bath can be taken in the late evening for relaxing and muscle stress. Also, magnesium oil can be rubbed into the skin topically to get into the system. Years ago when I had bad Plantar Fasciitis, it saved me, I rubbed it on the bottom of my foot in the morning before the workday, I was on my feet all day on cement floors, climbing metal staircases, jumping on and off forklifts, etc. It can give you an itchy feel if you use it on you back, if that happens you can put some lotion over it.
 
I have a sleep combo. It starts at 8:30PM

1mg Source Natural Melatonin

About 9:30PM

500mg Inositol
500mg Gaba
500mg Tryptophan
50mg P5P (B6)

The last two were added a few months ago as I would wake up at wee hours and could not get back to sleep and now I get right back. A friend told me about this.

Sleep a good 8-10 hrs commencing about 10:30PM with some bathroom runs during the night but back to sleep.

I have dreams, some vivid but none that will keep me from the good sleep I get. I take no A/D drugs.

I take magnesium thru the day.
 
Never heard that one. How can you be sure it's melatonin. I have very light age spots and I'm 80 but I know grape seed extract has kept the spots to a minimum. You might want to look at that grape supplement.
 
Marie5656 said:
I have tried taking melatonin as a sleeping aide, as I would rather not use sleeping pills. Technically it does work, and I sleep OK. The drawback is I often have unusually vivid, and sometimes disturbing dreams when I take it. Some, so disturbing I have woke up yelling out, or very anxious. Kind of negates the "positive" effect of the supplement. I broke down and gave the remainder of the bottle I bought to my husband, as it does not have the same dream effect on him. I am wondering if taking it along with my anti anxiety medication is causing this outcome?

I have heard people here mention magnesium. Is that to help with sleeplessness?
Click to expand...

I tried melatonin once and had the same reaction -- very vivid and terrifying dreams, and woke myself up hollering. I never took it again. It was worse than lying awake.
 
I use Low Dose and started yrs ago with 1/4mg tab, then a couple yrs later 1/2mg and now I'm at 1mg...tab. Buy the source naturals tab and break it off as I can gauge the dose. But I do take the other aids that I mention above. I had a doozie last night early in my sleep but it didn't wake me up and I know it's a dream. My sleep is too important for it recuperative powers.
 
My husband had a bad fall about 6 years ago and had 4 surgeries within 10 weeks. He could not sleep and has struggled ever since then. He took Ambien for 6 years and just recently found out the doctor could not prescribe it any more. He wrote a Rx for something else but I didn't want him to put any more drugs into his system (besides our co-pay would have been almost $200/mo!!) so after reading several posts on here about natural sleeping aids, I convinced him to try OCT "drugs". It's been a little trial and error because he had to be weened off Ambien, but we finally found a good combination for him.

We started out with melatonin and magnesium. He didn't sleep very well with melatonin but I think he was taking too big a dose. The pharmacist recommended 10mg. I did some research, including the Mayo Clinic article, and decided he was not taking that either.

What's working for him is a combination of magnesium, L-Tryptophan and a sleep aid I order from Amazon that has L-theanine, 3 mg melatonin, camomile flower extract, passion flower extract, and lemon balm leaf extract.
 
It's true many take TOO much melatonin. Just hearing an MD on the radio that I hear every weekend on PRP/Stem Cells and he went on and on about the importance of SLEEP....we do not heal if we do not sleep.

He's not big on drugs nor am I and I'd never consider ambien but he did mention Trazadone and I only mention this as I just heard him mention it a little while ago.

We have to work with combinations so so much as I've mentioned in mine. Tryptophan is my most recent addition and this one gets me back to sleep after my bathroom runs in wee hours. Before I found it, I could lay awake for a couple hrs and not get back to sleep.

Get to sleep people. Oh I have Lemon Balm in my drawer too. My nightstand is loaded but I do sleep. jam
 
Some interesting comments and a solid link (thank you, Don M) detailing some of the "murkier" aspects of Melatonin. Thank you, all. I've been taking Melatonin for over a year--a variety of brands, different dosages, with overall spotty results. For any who would be interested, I'll be doing a blog post measuring the combined effects of Melatonin and the results I obtain from my FitBit sleep analysis on my sleep deprivation. (You read that seemingly awkward sentence right. The results of scrutinizing my sleep analysis has a negative impact on my sleep.) It should be an interesting post.

I'm still gathering data, so it's several weeks out. I'll announce the blog's posting on the Forum, but if anyone's interested, and afraid he or she will miss the announcement, you can go to SeptuagenarianJourney and subscribe to my blog. That way you'll be notified of each new post.

I'll be following the rest of this with interest.

Jay
 
I've taken melatonin in the past, but no more. It's been months now, but I still remember the very bad strange nightmares that started, and I couldn't shake them off when I woke up. So odd ... like I was someone else, because the nightmares didn't relate to me or anything in my life that I could figure out, past or present.
But they scared me enough to throw the bottle out! ... haven't had a nightmare since.
 
Last edited:
A dear friend recommended melatonin to me during the eight weeks that my 94 yr old mother was in hospice care and I was in painful anguish and my sleep was disrupted. She's been gone for six months now and I'm still taking a 10 mg dosage before bedtime. My dreams were accelerated into vivid strangeness too but I kind of like that. However, after reading some of these posts here I'm not so sure I'll keep taking it. I'll look into it more. Thanks for the info, people!
 


Back
Top