A slight change in your sleeping schedule could mean a whole day wasted the next day because the sleeping disorder is the enemy of normalcy. And this normalcy is most treasured by those who are deprived of normal life due to insomnia or popularly known as sleeping disorder. There are unfortunate few out there who face insomnia everyday even after trying hard to get sleep by normal mode like physical exercise and following a good eating schedule. For those unfortunate few, fortunately, we have sleeping pills to take care of their dilemma. Sleeping pills, like Ambien, are a boon for the insomniac. Suddenly, they have found their lives back on track after suffering uncertainty for so long.

Ambien drug is perhaps the most popular sleeping pill in the world. Ambien is prescribes as a short-term prescription drug used to treat insomnia. Ambien has been shown to decrease sleep latency and increase the duration of sleep for up to 35 days in controlled clinical studies. Of course, there are some side effects to Ambien also. Almost every drug manufactured in the world has some kind of side effect and Ambien should not be seen as any different just because it is extremely popular. Ambien side effects are known to be moderate but of late, we are witnessing a peculiar side effect to this drug. Sleep eating is being seen as another offshoot of Ambien side effects.

Michael H. Silber, MD, and co-director of the Mayo Clinic Sleep Disorder Center first reported this strange phenomenon in 2002. According to Silber, "What happens is the patients get out of bed, walk to the kitchen, prepare food - often sloppily, and often with strange, high-calorie ingredients. They have microwave food sometimes. They eat in a very sloppy way, either in the kitchen or after taking the food back to bed. And they have no memory of it. They wake to find a mess in the kitchen or crumbs in the bed." The acuteness of the situation could vary from patient to patient. Nocturnal eating disorder is closely associated with this phenomenon. Normally, it is not injurious, but if left untreated, it could play havoc with the natural eating schedule and natural movements of the body organs could go haywire.

Sleep walking and sleep eating could be amusing to normal persons, but this is certainly not a laughing matter for the patients and they must seek medical help as soon as possible to get rid of the problem.