Everyone has lain in bed tossing and turning. Some toss and turn every night with their mind racing through a thousand seemingly random thoughts. Others fall asleep but find themselves wide awake in three or four hours and can’t get back to sleep. If these are chronic they are considered insomnia. There are simple changes in behavior that will fix the problem for most people. For others there’s professional help.
Here’s the basic rules for sleeping effectively:
- Avoid sleeping pills whether prescription or over-the-counter. These should only be used in unusual, short term, problems. Long-term use of sleeping pills will actually cause sleep problems.
- Avoid alcohol at night—it really doesn’t help. It may produce unconsciousness but it doesn’t produce effective sleep.
- Avoid coffee, tea or other stimulants in the evening. Each person needs to learn how these affect them and take stimulants early enough in the day that their effect has waned by bedtime.
- Avoid eating for five hours before lying down for the night. This will give the digestive system time to work and a rumbling stomach won’t disturb the sleep.
- Avoid drinking anything for two hours before lying down. There’ll be less chance of waking up during the night to urinate.
- Avoid TV or movies that increase adrenaline. Violent or frightening movies will disturb your sleep by keeping parts of the mind and body active for hours.
- Get the children and pets quiet, hopefully sleeping, two hours before the adults go to sleep. Then the adults will have time to relax themselves.
- Actively relax during the last two hours before bedtime. The best method of relaxation will be different for each person. It may be meditation, breathing, music, reading, massages with their partner, sex or funny movies. Consider Yoga Nidra, a remarkable yoga technique that puts the mind’s attention on various parts of the body to reach profound relaxation.
If you still can’t fall asleep quickly
If all the good things above haven’t worked and all the bad things have been avoided, consider a low dose of melatonin (1 to 3 mg) 30 minutes before going to bed. This is a chemical that the brain produces that induces sleep. For some of us, a little extra melatonin does the trick. A study on melatonin funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found that melatonin helped people fall asleep by as much as 17 minutes faster. The safety of long-term use of melatonin is unclear so it’s best to limit its use to a few weeks.
How to sleep all through the night
If sleep lasts only a few hours and sleep doesn’t seem to happen after that, learn a meditation technique such as yoga nidra, breath-mindfulness, or muscle relaxation. The benefit is that they can be done lying in bed with the lights off. Simply focusing the mind on the feeling of the cool air entering the nostrils followed by the feeling of warmth as the air is breathed out can be very relaxing.
If muscle tension is present, learn to tense and release one area at a time, e.g. tighten the right fist, then release, tighten the right forearm, then release. Continue tightening and releasing each arm and leg, the upper and lower torso, the shoulders, the neck, the face. Somewhere in that process you should find yourself asleep.
If sleep still doesn’t come then it’s best to get up and move around. Do some gentle activity until you feel sleepy again.
Summary
All of us have trouble falling asleep occasionally but chronic insomnia can affect your health and happiness. Avoiding the many things that create sleeplessness is usually sufficient for getting a good night’s sleep. Adding meditation and other techniques can help you fall asleep faster and stay asleep. For those who still have trouble, professional help is available. There are doctors in every area that specialize in sleep disorders.
References:
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Melatonin for Treatment of Sleep Disorders.
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