Insomnia – an often used word in our day to day life. Even if you are not a sufferer from insomnia, you must confront a person who is so. Sleep consisting of comfort and peace is a very basic need of human being to conduct a healthy and fruitful life. I myself was an insomnia patient once, and thank god I recovered myself from that miserable situation.
For this reason, I often get questioned by people; can insomnia be cured? How do you get rid of insomnia? How can I treat insomnia at home? Well, to answer all that question, I prepared this writing not quite a long time ago mixing up some different things like different types of insomnia and concurring them with the remedy of insomnia.
Insomnia: What should you do if you can’t fall asleep or stay asleep?
First things first, insomnia or sleeplessness is not a thing which you’ll overcome overnight. You’ll have to be patient enough to deal with it. And to do that, you’ll have to move forward slowly and by planning wisely.
You will have to know the common types of insomnia, deduct that you are affected by which and then conduct your whole life following a pattern to prevent this special type of insomnia. Yes, you’ve heard me right, insomnia itself is a problem very closely related to ruining your life totally, and to save your life and cure insomnia – you’ll have to change your current lifestyle I’m afraid.
Insomnia causes:
Most of the time insomnia itself is not a standalone problem in one’s life. It is a reflection of other problems. For the intense tension built inside your mind, maybe you are always bragging about those problems inside your head and cannot sleep.
Anyway, this is not always the case and there is a very good chance that your sleeplessness is provoked by nothing and you are a true insomnia sufferer. Well, if you cannot sleep for any reason, that is obviously called insomnia; but if you cannot sleep for no reason, I am calling that state ‘true insomnia’.
Was talking about different reasons for insomnia in the earlier segment. There are different reasons and based on this fact, there are some types of insomnia. The most important types from these are
- Comorbid insomnia: Insomnia triggered by other life condition, most of the time it is anxiety.
- Chronic insomnia: Long-term difficulty with sleeping. People affected by chronic insomnia have trouble sleeping for many days, and most of the time it is triggered by no mentionable reasons.
There are other types of insomnia but they are nothing but different forms of chronic insomnia.
Anyway, now you have known the type of insomnia, you should go ahead and figure out you are a sufferer of which. Above 85% time, people labor under comorbid insomnia. And if you are a patient of comorbid insomnia, you will be happy to know that it is very much curable. And for this reason, I will be mainly focusing on comorbid insomnia while giving suggestions. Chronic insomnia patients are very much welcome to apply the methods I will be saying below and the success rate is appealing here also. But anyway, if you are one of that little portion who cannot get rid of insomnia naturally, I suggest you consult a doctor.
Insomnia remedies: How to deal with insomnia naturally without medication
People often ask me, why can’t I sleep even though I’m tired? Or – I’m exhausted or tired but can’t sleep. Or they have been telling that I don’t fall asleep, I’ve been up all night but no sleep. Most of the time it is because you are affected by comorbid insomnia. You have been through a lot whole day that should make you tired and you should fall asleep under any condition, but you cannot because you are too much anxious about something. So my first suggestion would be to get rid of it. I know it is not quite possible to give up all the tension overnight but you have to try, and with practice, you can do it. Getting too much anxious which do not do any good, is not a good thing. Get rid of it.
Now, let’s move onto the next part. Here you will face a thorough walk through for reducing other little things that might strafe your sound sleep.
1. Try To Maintain The Same Sleeping Schedule
The most effective way to deal with insomnia is to build a nice and consistent sleeping pattern. By default,the human body wants to be a part of punctuality. And by practicing this very good practice, your body is getting entitled to a routine. Ever wondered even your tummy is almost full, why do you crave food when it is time for dinner or launch? It’s because your body is familiar with consuming food at certain times and it wants food then.
You will have to try to develop your sleep like this. No matter how tired you are or not, no matter what did you do today, your body will seek sleep if you can build this sleeping schedule successfully.
2. Exercise If Not Properly Tired – Not Too Late
Exercising is another key activity that makes life and body healthy. But in this case, while sleeping is the main fact to discuss, you do not always have to exercise. If you feel inside that you are not tired enough, if your job and lifestyle do not allow you to get tired and you feel this urge inside you that I am not tired enough for a sweet sound sleep, Exercise!!!
However, if you feel that you are very much tired without exercising additionally; you already do a lot of work throughout the day that makes you tired but still you cannot sleep, I suggest you focus onto other key things described here and will be described here before exercising. I am not opposing exercising in any way, exercising is great and you just cannot conduct a healthy life without exercising but if you are experiencing sleeplessness and tiredness won’t help you in terms of sleeping, I think exercising won’t help.
A quick tip to those who have decided to exercise to get rid of insomnia, do not work out at a late hour at night. Exercising increase the blood circulation rate, it affects the blood flow into your brain and this will prevent you from sleeping.
3. Comfort Is A Key – Ensure Comfort
Comfort and sleep, both are very closely related to each other. If you want to sleep, you should create a very comfortable surrounding for a nice, cozy sleep. Make sure you are surrounded by the adequate amount of pillows or blankets or whatever that helps you to sleep. This ‘adequacy’ might differ from person to person. Some people love to be surrounded by a plenty of pillows and blankets, some are not. Ornament your bed with things you’ll be needing for sleeping.
4. Try To Consume Almost None to Very Low Caffeine
To all tea, coffee or any kind of caffeine-enriched drinks lover, this can be the toughest job to do for you. But admit it that it has to be done. Caffeine is known as one of the most stimulation generating drink. It prevents sleep, resulting in sleeplessness which you never wanted. I know it is very hard but here’s a simple tip for you, you may reduce caffeine intake starting by shutting down that one closest to your bedtime. Say you regularly drink tea or coffee at 10pm when you go to bet at eleven. Put aside other caffeine intakes. Stop this one right now. Stop other gradually at a later time, but stopping this one is a must to deal with your insomnia.
5. Do Not Smoke
Cigarettes are another stimulant just like caffeine. Nicotine is even stronger stimulant than caffeine. Nicotine keeps a person aware more than he should or he would, and this will keep you awake.
I saw person passing whole night without sleep puffing away cigarettes one after another. Such you will never be able to deal with your insomnia.
6. Do Not Leave Your Dinner Too Close To Your Bed Time
Consider this as a bad habit. Eating dinner late is not good. As soon as you finish your meal, your body starts processing the food and this keeps your body busy. How can you expect a good sleep while your digestion is going with a full throttle?
Moreover, if you build a habit of eating late; your body will make this a routine work and you won’t be able to sleep for sudden food craving. It is better that you finish all of your eating before 8pm.
7. Have To Drink Something? Drink Something Without Caffeine Instead
If you really have to drink anything before going to bed, I have some good news for you. There are teas like chamomile which are made to help you get to sleep. But never ever drink something that contains caffeine like green tea or others.
8. Do Something Before Sleep Just For Relaxation
Most co-morbid insomnia sufferers going under the perception of sleeplessness, experience insomnia for anxiety. Life can be full of stressful activities and this might trigger acute anxiety into one.
So, if you ask how to deal with insomnia due to anxiety? The answer is ‘Do something that relaxes you’.
I am not telling you to give up all anxiety overnight. That is not possible if you live in a human world, but what you can do to suppress the feeling is doing what you love the most. It can be anything. Some love gardening. If you are one of them, go out. Spend some time in your garden. It will help you to sleep relatively well.
9. Close Your Eyelids Beset With A Healthy, Sleep-friendly environment
If the adjacent environment is not sleep-friendly, even if you are not an insomnia sufferer; you will face problem sleeping. Uneven bedding, a dirty room full of tiny dirt particles, noise etc. can be considered as a non-sleep friendly environment.
You will have to change the scenario upside down as you are a troubled sleeper. Here’s what you can do. Fill the room with things you like while sleeping. Discover what persuade you to sleep. For example, music did a great job here when I had trouble sleeping. I had my very own personal relaxing and ear-soothing music playlist. And those were bull’s eye. At first, I had to go through all the music but gradually, I fall asleep after two or three songs.
You do what helps you the most. Maybe it is a very dim light, or comfy pillows and mattress, or music – like myself. Figure out what helps you the most for sleeping and start adopting that right now, right away! Sleep will come.
Well, that’d be all. I think your co-morbid insomnia will be gone if you properly follow the nurture given up above.
If you still get trouble sleeping, here are some weird ideas that might help you to get going. Well, confessing first, these are weird but trust me; I have seen people getting helped by these weird methods.
10. If There Is Not A Single Trace Of Sleep In Miles, Get Up!
It’s already two in the morning and still no sleep? Neither a very slight glimpse of it? Get up. Do something. Sleep is not gonna come this way. The best thing is to sacrifice the sleep and try to sleep the next night.
11. Wear Sunglasses While Watching TV Or Staying In Front of a monitor
Weird, isn’t it? But it helps. TVs and monitors emit bad lights that mess with your eyes and circadian rhythm. Circadian rhythm means the invisible clock inside your body which decides when to eat when to sleep. Try watching TV putting your sunglass on. It might not be a great TV watching experience, but your eyes will be into a great comfort zone that leads to sleep.
While watching TVs, your brain knows that this is going to be a bad experience for your eyes and your brain tries to create a counter measurement for your eyes. While you watch TV with your sunglass one, this will surprises you along with your brain and your mind and give you a very relaxing circumstance.
12. Never Ever Sleep Late In The Next Morning
Sleep is a very basic need for your body. Whether you can sleep or not, your body requires sleep and without you are in a very bad insomniac condition (which is rare), you will sleep but not in a healthy time.
Say you sleep late and wake up late. This is going to be a very bad sleep cycle for you. If you make this a habit, say goodbye to good night sleeps. You are going to live the rest of your life by getting awake all night and sleeping in the morning late.
If the night has passed without sleep, do a tad more arduous work and do not sleep the next day. Sleep will automatically come to you in the next night.
I am not offering that these methods will help every trouble sleeper living silently with agony out there, I am just suggesting that try this method. Maybe your insomniac condition will be gone.
How to deal with insomnia due to anxiety
You may begetting trouble while trying to sleep for any reason. But in my research, I have seen most of the time it is due to anxiety. That is why I think I should include a special segment in this article regarding this issue, and I have a very special remedy for this too. Try out, maybe you will be helped.
I have discussed what you should do to deal with your regular anxiety earlier in this article, I am not going to repeat all those again. The special treatment I was going to tell you about, is something called a weighted blanket. Weighted blankets are widely known to deal with insomnia and anxiety. Use a weighted blanket and see if the condition improves.
Another thing to mention, you just cannot go ahead and buy a weighted blanket. There are some measurements related to your body weight and the weighted blanket’s weight. Check it and apply one. Things might get better.
The points told above are gathered from real life experiences with real life insomniac patients. Hope one of these will help you to get your that long craving sleep too. Good luck!
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