During the first few months of this year, Kate’s sleep pattern has changed. She is still going to bed about the same time as always, between 8:00 and 9:00, but the time she gets up has been more erratic. I generally let her sleep as long as she wants, but several times I’ve had to wake her. She has slept until noon or shortly thereafter a couple of times and 10:30 or later more times. In between those late sleeping days, she has gotten up as early as 7:30, but more often 9:00 or a little later. Prior to taking Trazadone, she had difficulty sleeping at night. Trazadone changed that. That’s been a good thing. She has slept beautifully since then.
My personal problem, not hers, is that I am particularly interested in her getting up earlier on days when we have a sitter. Early would be 9:00. That way she can get showered and dressed leisurely which normally takes up to an hour and a half. Then we can have lunch without being rushed. It also gives me more time with her. A number of times over the past few weeks, we have rushed to lunch and back to meet the sitter. Neither of us likes being rushed.
During the past ten days, I have not given her Trazadone the night before the sitter comes. That seems to have worked. She hasn’t gotten up too early, and it allows us a comfortable amount of time in the morning before I have to leave.
This change seemed to have worked until this past Thursday when she slept until noon. She had taken Trazadone the night before. By the time she was ready for lunch, it was almost 1:30. That wasn’t a day for the sitter, but I still felt that requires a greater change in our days than I am ready for right now.
I have also begun to wonder if taking less Trazadone could relate to her unusually good mood over the past week. Her moodiness has always been limited to the early morning. She is slow to get going. That was true before Alzheimer’s. She sleeps later than I do, and she is not ready for conversation until she is fully awake. For that reason, I don’t ever recall our having breakfast together in our 55 years of marriage except when we are traveling. Even that is extremely rare. What has been different the past week is that she has been more cheerful when she gets up than I have seen in quite a while.
That is leading me to consider dropping the Trazadone altogether. I plan to explore that with her doctor in the coming week. He had opened the door to our eliminating some of her medications in one of Kate’s recent visits. I think Trazadone could be a good place to start.
