Posted by BC on September 03, 2010 at 04:03:16:In Reply to: Re: Personality..lower iq..sleepeffects posted by worstinsomniaever on September 02, 2010 at 05:07:34:
No, I didn't get your level of symptoms, either in terms of how much sleep I got or with respect to side-effects from sleepiness. I was very sleepy, even falling asleep in business meetings. I found that things I normally would have enjoyed, such as seminars, seemed boring, and I stopped attending them because I wasn't getting anything out of them, and was sometimes falling asleep.
I didn't have a marked drop in productivity; I generally was fine as long as I faced a challenging task, but might have to read something multiple times if it wasn't demanding. I found that I could solve my Sudoku puzzles more quickly after my sleep improved. So there was some loss of concentration and reduction in my speed of thinking. But I wouldn't say there was a change of personality other than that I was probably less interested and less interesting. Maybe I had less tolerance for frustration.
I may have had a somewhat lowered resistance to illness, but that's not clear.
I'm not in a position to know whether your greater symptoms are due to your greater sleep problems. They could be a logical extension of what I experienced, magnified by a greater sleep deficit, but that is why I mentioned depression as well. Some of your symptoms sound like depression. People can get depression without a particular cause, or they can get depression because of facing difficulties such as illness (or sleeplessness). I'd suggest a complete physical if you haven't had one.
Take care.