Coffee at 2am!

[Lapsedrunner]

I’ve seen people posting that this can help, so tried it when I was wriggly at 2am...next thing I knew it was 6.20am!!

[LotteM]

Good to read that! I tried the other night as well, but couldn’t tell, as I also took a second oxycodon.

[MaryJohan]

That’s great! Worth keeping in mind. 👍😴

[Eryl]

As long as they take coffee without sugar, otherwise they could just be prolonging the agony. Basically any liquid will help as they cause you to urinate, and flush the triggers from your blood.

[Lapsedrunner in reply to Eryl]

No, I think there’s something about the caffeine, apparently involved with dopamine release...I don’t get the same effect from drinking water

[RLSgirl in reply to Lapsedrunner]

If I remember this right, the theory is that caffeine blocks the receptors telling your brain that your tired and need to go to sleep. thus whatever it is that triggers rls when your body goes into resting mode is overridden.

[Vinyard in reply to Eryl]

Hi. I'd like to to know more about triggers and flushing them from your blood please. It's the first I have read about this. Thanks

[Eryl in reply to Vinyard]

Much of rls is due to food triggers. What you eat during the day builds up in the blood, and that's why most people notice it in the evenings or when they go to bed, but when they get up in the mornings, they have no symptoms. If you drink more liquids, the kidneys work harder, and remove some of the toxins along with the fluid. The trouble is that you have to get up in the middle of the night to urinate.

I believe that the most common trigger is sugar in all its forms, including lactose, so although the coffee may help, drinking late with sugar will just make the rls worse. I'm also sensitive to the food preservative potassium sorbate. There may be others like glutamate which is a neurotransmitter.

[Lapsedrunner]

Fickle RLS! Tried it again tonight...no help!!

[Hidden in reply to Lapsedrunner]

I think it does work for me. It seems to give me a longer time between episodes during the night. It doesn't take it away completely and some nights if it's a particularly bad one - one of these every 45 - 60 min ones - it doesn't help.

I doesn't seem to overcome the triggers etc ie still don't dare take any sugar and somehow you have to judge how much to drink - too much and you're too awake - and often need to add in my usual hot bath to get the full effect but I do think that for me it has some sort of beneficial effect most of the times I try it which is currently most nights.

I'm not taking anything else at present and haven't for almost a couple of years.

... and oh crikey, maybe it does augment as per auntiesioux below, hadn't thought of that. I always have a coffee in the morning as I'm so very tired I just can't function without it but maybe it's the wrong thing to do, who knows.

[auntiesioux]

OMG, I posted the same 3 months ago and had 25 replies. Of course my doctor still professes for me to,"no caffeine Obviously he does not have RLS. I think most agreed not to do coffee in anticipation. Need to wait until dance time. My suggestion is try not to do this too too often. Not sure but may also augment with too often coffee ' treatment.'

Glad for you, Auntie Sioux

[Lapsedrunner in reply to auntiesioux]

Didn’t work 2nd night

[Hidden in reply to auntiesioux]

I would think you would become tolerant to taking the coffee all the time, dont know how you can augment on it. ?

[tom137]

science.howstuffworks.com/c...

[peterfromlondon]

Really ?? How odd