Lay Off The Sleeping Pills, Ladies!

Modern women, are you constantly feeling “drunk” even when you’ve had a break from drinking — perhaps during the six-hour break from alcohol known as bedtime? The latest problem you have may be more than a recycling bin full of wine bottles. The quack doctor who always writes those no-questions-asked ‘scrips (recommended by the quack psychiatrist who keeps your amphetamine jar filled) may be double-dosing you with Ambien, the wildly popular sleeping pill that suffocates your nightly mental battle with the bug-eyed entities grandma called “demons” and your parents called “aliens” and your college friends called “machine elves” and your dog just barks at insanely, night after night. Why do you have a dog in such a little apartment, anyway? Would you keep a pet rabbit in a coffee pot?

The government agency will now require the recommended dose for women to be cut in half, from ten milligrams to five milligrams, and suggests that doctors consider doing the same for men. New studies indicate that women metabolize the drug differently and the drug stays in their system longer. Patients can face a higher risk of injury due to morning drowsiness. An estimated 40 million Americans regularly use prescription sleep aids.

Dr. Carol Ash, the Medical Director of Sleep Medicine at Meridian Health in New Jersey, warned that routine activities, like driving to work, can be seriously impaired the morning after taking a sleep aid at the previously recommended dose. “It’s essentially like driving drunk,” she said Friday on “CBS This Morning.”

Essentially! Good thing you live in the city and don’t drive a car very often. What with the dangerous boozebag activity and the crippling addiction to Rx pills, experts say the safest choice for most gals today is habitual smoking of medical marijuana. As long as you’re wearing your office clothes, people will just assume it’s the copy-machine repairman who reeks of dope every morning.

Photo by makler0008, via Shutterstock.