Flying

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I'm an aspie, and I have trouble with flying. I'm sure many others understand - far too many people in a crowded area, too much noise, etc.

I also will be flying to China next year - a 16 or so hour flight. I'm extremely concerned about this. I would love to be able to take a sedative for the flight to calm me down, or even just knock me out for a while, but unfortunately, I have the aspie proclivity for resistence/strange effects from drugs; sleeping pills do not work on me.
During a few month long bout of insomnia, I tried sonata, ambien, the other kind of ambien, melatonin, lunesta, and one or two others, and none of them worked. I also am immune to every pain medicine I've tried save motrin(which was rather unpleasant when I severely damaged my knee one time. Vicodin makes me very sick for a day and half), and sedatives that my doctor has proscribed have all failed, leading him to rule that the entire family of benzo's does not affect me. We never really got into other families of drugs. Does anyone have any recommendations?
any brilliant ideas of sedatives that tend to work on aspies? or other non-medication related solutions that have worked for you?

Sleeping pills don't work on me, either. Have you tried tranquilizers like valium or xanax? Those anti anxiety meds were the only thing that ever knocked me out - probably just cause they shut down the overactive part of my brain that was causing the insomnia. Be cautious on the dosage though, because a little bit can go a long way at first. The idea is calmness, not unconsciousness (usually).

Thank you for the reply.

I've found that many aspies do seem to have strange responses to drugs. I have not tried Xanax, but I have tried Valium, and it absolutely did not work for me. I once had a prescription for it to take if I began to overstimulate. I tried this one time, and it didn't help.

Knowing of my high resistance to drugs, I took some more. It still didn't work, and I overstimulated, badly. I ended up, through my confusion and lack of good sense, taking 27 of them. This landed me in the hospital, but did not significantly calm me down or make me particularly sleepy. I dozed briefly at the hospital, and then went home with my mother.

basically, the valium didn't work for me. I believe Valium is a benzo though. I have come to the conclusion that I don't need to carry my own meds of that type(I will be flying with my fiance, who can do that for me).

Xanax works wonders.

I suppose I could try Xanax. Does anyone have any good non-medication hints?

Having looked up Xanax, I've found that it is a benzodiazepine. I have tried several drugs from that category, and they all failed, leading my doctor to conclude that the entire family of drugs does not work for me.

Well, the best way would be to get rid of your fear of flying. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear_of_flying#Treatment

I thank everyone for their replies. I don't wish to seem to be brushing aside proffered advice, but it is not that I have a fear of flying, I simply cannot operate long with that many people around me. the noise and presence of that many people in a small area is too much for me, and it is not fear based, I simply overstimulate.

I am quite skilled with meditation, though in such situations I have always had trouble applying it, however, I cannot meditate for a 16 hour flight.

A small help might be to take along a new book on your special interest (if you have one) and to read it on the plane. Seems that a lot of people on the spectrum find that kind of thing relaxing and that it helps them to be less aware of their surroundings.

On a more personal note, I would keep some dark chocolate at hand. It makes the body release serotonine which makes people feel more relaxed. I know that it is mostly a placebo effect with me, but it still works. Rule of thumb: the darker the chocolate, the more serotonine it will make your body release and the less sugar it holds.

This is could be very bad advice for some people, but many flights sell wine and beer, and there are often bars in the airports to get a drink or three before the flight.

I will keep those in mind, although I don't think alcohol would really help - it basically doesn't effect me until I drink enough to get sick.

Try wearing those eye cover things, and plug your ear into an Ipod or walkman, so you get the sensory overload shut out.

planes are usually fairly silent considering the amount of people...

When I used to live in Australia, getting to and from there would be the hard part, first problem is the jet lag, which is the reason I would not recommend sedatives, alcohol etc. Jet lag is bad in the first place, and just gets worse when you apply drugs.

If there are entertainment options on board (like individual backseeat monitors), you may be able to cut out noise simply by watching movies, listening to music, or if the plane has it, play some videogames.

back when I used to live in Australia, my parents and I used to fly with Singapore Airlines, and they used to have a good assortment of movies and SNES games to choose from... and at least those caught my attention fairly well

I don't know if you've been on a long international flight before. During the night, the lights are low and the plane is usually very quiet as people are sleeping or reading. During the day, I usually feel detached enough from what else is going on by simply looking out the window at the land or clouds. Is it possible for you to get a window seat?

I don't have any advice as far as meds, since I could only recommend the ones you already mentioned, that don't work for you.

just wait till you get to china to worry about crowds. i was there for about 6 weeks in 1985 and it was just bizarre, human wise. all the rubbing up against one another and pushing. normal for chinese, bad for us. way too many humans, east coast much worse than interior.

the only drug that i could use for sleep is a muscle relaxer called flexeril. i had tried soma, valium, zanax. various pain meds---oxycontin, morphine, methadone---would only help in high doses, too high for me.

i was in pretty severe pain and couldn't sleep but about 2-3 hours/day for months. the flexeril just knocked me out. left me dizzy the next day, but wore off after about 18 hours.

so......do not just try this just before your flight......try way before you're scheduled to leave, weeks,months. do not try to get off street. way to dangerous. only from your doctors/pharmacy with a legit prescription. that goes for any drug you might want to try to help you. don't mean to lecture, just saying to be careful with new medications.

have a great trip. hope you get to see the terra-cotta army in xian. just too cool.