Ambien CR vs. Lunesta

* Note that the following is the opinion of a crazy person and not a doctor. I advise you check with a professional before considering any medications.

Normally I take Lunesta for sleep. Been doing it for years. It most closely resembles Zopiclone, in Canada, which I was familiar with from when I lived there. I actually preferring Zopicone for its lack of hangover but for whatever reason, it isn't available in the US.

Lunesta is a fast acting sleep inducer with a short half-life meaning that it should get you to sleep, but likely won't keep you asleep. The good news about this is that it will tend to produce fewer hangover effects, however, if you problem is waking up at 3 am, it might not help you too much.

No matter what the commercials tell you, Lunesta is entirely addictive. You have to take more and more of it to get the same effect, which, in my book, means it's addictive. If you stop taking it, you will have trouble sleeping while your body attempts to adjust to no longer having it to lean on. This isn't considered a "dangerous" addiction, but it's there, don't fool yourself into thinking it isn't. You can try to prevent this effect by very slowly tapering down the dose you use for sleep and only using more when you truly cannot sleep. It takes effort and discipline on your part, but it can be done. (Not that your doctor will ever tell you any of that. Doctors rather suck that way.)

Ambien CR, on the other hand is a controlled release medication (theoretically) where some medication is release to put you to sleep and then more medication is release throughout the sleep cycle to keep you asleep. My doctor said that few people find it to actually work that way. People who tend to wake up at 3 am still wake up at 3 am on it, and personally, I don't think it's as good as inducing sleep initially either. I assume Ambien has the same addictive properties as Lunesta, but I haven't tried it long enough to find out. Ambien has a longer half-life (naturally) which means there is greater chance of a hangover in the morning.

When I wake up from Lunesta, even fairly large dosages, I don't find it causes any appreciable hangover symptoms. It has the odd side-effect of leaving this horrible, bitter taste in my mouth when I wake, but other than that it seems to be hangover-free. That is a wonderous property in a sleep medication, but of course, your experience may differ.

Ambien, on the other hand, definitely results in a hangover. It effects balance, cognition speeds, reaction time, and just generally makes you feel like you still having a sleeping pill in your brain. It's not terrible, but operating a motor vehicle right after waking might not be advisable.

My choice, not surprisingly, is Lunesta, although for anyone using whatever works makes the most sense. Other than being warey of its addictive properties, it seems to be a fairly innocuous medicaiton, again, something I almost never say. I'd definitely say try it first, if you're shopping around.

Note that while these two meds are specifically for sleep, doctors will sometimes perscribe antidepressants, mood stabilizers, or other medications to help with sleep. Personally, I never enjoyed that much as that seems to cause more interaction with the medications you're already taking. Your doctor might be hoping the medication will aid in fighting depression, or stabilizing your mood, but I never found these meds to act as such. Generally, if it was likely to work for your mood, they would have put you on it in the first place.