Insomnia - what really works?

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I've managed to gradually get off antidepressants after many years of taking a low 'maintenance' dose - which I'm not sure I acually needed, as now I'm off them my mood is stable and has been for months. My problem now is insomnia. My GP is not helpful, he wants to give me a different type of anti-depressant but I don't want to go down that route as I'm not actually depressed, and being drug-free after many years feels pretty good

I'm worried though, as I think insomnia for a long period can cause depression, and I don't want to go back to square one.

I'd like to try melatonin, but it's not available in the UK. I do the usual re bedroom temperature, light, time of going to bed, not being stressed etc but I still only manage 4 or 5 hours and I'm dog-tired most days.

I'd like to try natural cures. So far I've tried diffusing lavender essential oil, that helps a bit. Does anyone know of anything that really works?

I suffer from insomnia too, all my life, so i've tried just about everything.
Most recently, i got some mugwart (herbal) leaves and put them under my pillow and have slept like a baby ever since. Of course, this could just be a placebo effect.

Not to be crude or anything, but you could try *cough* "pleasuring yourself" at bedtime. Works for a lot of people.

Staying awake until you fall asleep? I've been guilty of collapsing in my computer chair more than once.

I'm a natural night owl. On vacations, I do well on a schedule of sleeping from about 5AM-3PM. During the school year, I find melatonin works well for helping make my sleep cycle more in tune with the real world. I'm still a poor sleeper though.

I'm getting to sleep fairly quickly these days (within an hour... that's good for me), but I'm also completely CRASHING at around 9:00, to the point where it's painful to force myself to be up any longer. I usually do try to stay up until 10:00, but it's hard.

Then, I wake up in the middle of the night. IF I get back to sleep, I usually wake up again around 5:00, and can't get back to sleep...


I know that I need 8 hours of sleep, since I'm usually very 'out of it' and require multiple naps on normal days, but on the rare occasions that I get the full 8 hours, I feel dramatically better.


At least I'm out of CA, and am living in a place where the environment isn't much of a factor. I wish it were darker, but it's good otherwise.

Well, you seem pretty proud of being drug free, so I won't make my usual suggestion. One thing that is supposed to work is eating turkey(seriously). It contains tryptophan which helps your body produce serotonin, which in turn helps you to sleep. I personally haven't found it to work for me. But the science is there, and it works for lots of other people. Also, if you have a tendency to stay up late on your computer, that could also make it difficult to sleep. Try doing something else(something less interactive) for a couple hours when you want to go to sleep. Some people find reading to help, I find watching movies(in a dark room) to help.

My problem with falling asleep is that I can't "silence" my thoughts, sort of, I think very intense thoughts and that prevents me from relaxing properly.

Night-time tea, and a "natural medicine" called "Valerina Forte" has had some effect, I think.

In an ADD book I read, Driven to Distraction, the drs suggest a cup of warm milk with a tsp of honey and a tsp of vanilla. It tastes like a milkshake, and I've had it warm and cold and it's just as good.

It's supposed to temporarily raise serotonin levels and "sleepy chemicals" (I don't remember what those were lol) and it works for me.

If your mind is whirling around preventing you from sleeping it is possible to slow it down or even bore/sooth it to sleep. I use a couple of techniques:

1. It is a bit like meditation: Keep bringing your attention to the darkness at the back of your closed eye-lids. See the darkness. Your mind will keep wandering off and thinking about something else, but keep gently bringing your attention back to the blackness every time your realise it has wandered. Don't get annoyed with yourself for losing attention, just relax and keep going back to the blackness. Repeat, repeat and repeat and before you know it you are asleep.

2. Think of a subject that is soothing to the extent of being boring. As above keep returning your restless mind back to the boring subject and picture the boring thing. I like to garden so my boring object is the compost heap. I picture all the little microbes breaking down the vegetable waste into mulch for the garden...... Yawn. I'm feeling sleepy already.

Thanks everyone, for your replies.

I'll definitely try the turkey as I've heard that does help from someone else, and maybe the mugwort too - I like the idea of herbal things. I've heard that hops help too, they give off a smell (oil?) that is supposed to help you sleep. The milk, I've tried that as I heard it works but it gave me indigestion. I like milk but it doesn't like me, lol.

It's not so much that my mind is over-active, although I've had that in the past so I know what you mean. At the moment it's more like the pre-sleep drowsy feeling takes hours to happen, even though I'm relaxed and very tired. I was reading a doors catalogue last night to bore myself but that didn't work. I will try the meditation though, maybe the doors were too exciting.

Starr,

I live in the UK and I recently purchased melatonin from this web-site
http://www.biovea.net/
I have used melatonin for years, and although it can help, there are two main side-effects. First, it makes me dream a lot, but this is okay so long as the dreams are pleasant. Second, it can result in "rebound insomnia", by which I mean that the insomnia returns the next night (unless I take something). How bad this is depends a lot on how much melatonin I took the night before. In general, I find that it is better to stick to rather low doses of melatonin (about 1mg) so as to minimise any rebound insomnia. Unfortunately, lower doses are less effective at putting me to sleep.

Over the years, I have tried a variety of prescription and non-prescription pharmacological methods. This is an entertaining piece about some of the non-prescription drugs:
"To Sleep: Perchance To Take Lots of Pills. Testing over-the-counter sleep aids, herbal and non."
http://www.slate.com/id/2062791/

For chronic insomnia, I recommend not taking the same pills two nights in a row. I find that varying the drugs varies the side effects, and reduces the amount of tolerance.

Someone else mentioned eating turkey. The theory behind this is that turkey contains the amino acid tryptophan, which your body converts into serotonin and/or melatonin. You can find out more about this on wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tryptophan
You can find tryptophan and/or 5-Hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP) for sale at some heath food stores/ web-sites and/ or e-bay.

Another informative web-site:
"BBC: Science & Nature - How to sleep better"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/tvradio/programmes/sleep/

Finally, what has been most helpful in reducing my insomnia was changing my life-style. In particular, I now work part-time, during the afternoons and evenings. The job involves very little interaction with other people and is not very stressful. The main down-side to this is my annual salary is now about one-third of what it was two years ago. I make just enough money to get by, but that is about it. C'est la vie.

Sweet dreams.

Thanks for the useful links Logan5!

I think this is a long-term thing, trying different things, what suits and what doesn't. I'm glad I can get melatonin, and I'll give tryptophan a try too. It could have been coincidental but we had turkey for dinner last night and I actually got a full eight hours sleep - can't remember the last time that happened - bliss!

Money's not everything is it, so long as you can get by. I 'burnt out' about 15 years ago and got off the treadmill. I drive an old banger now, but I don't have meltdowns, and have time to stare at the sea. It was worth it

I've battled sleep problems for most of my life. The times it has been most manageable is when I've played hockey regularly combined with a heavy regimen at the gym. Basically, I can sleep if I exhaust myself, lol.

I've had it all my life, though while I tend to have a lot of thoughts going through my head it tends to be more or less that I can only keep my mind empty for so long while I lay there *not* sleeping.

About the only thing that's worked for me without making me regret it the next day is trazadone, I started that recently not even believing it would work but for the most part it seems like its had a fairly positive impact.

I would just like to mention that melatonin really helps me because I suffer from both insomnia and waking up all hours of the night..

RE: Meltatonin-

It gave me headaches for about a week or two when I first tried it, on a small dose. The first time I tried it I also had really bad nightmares but these eventually went away, also. I still have more vivid dreams though. So basically keep trying it if you get headaches or whatnot.

Hello Starr. I hope I can help you as it is not fun to lie in bed awake trying to go to sleep. Here is what I do when I cannot fall asleep. I enjoy writing. I am working on a novel. I try to envision my novel playing out in my mind as a movie. This often makes me fall asleep. Sounds like a boring novel doesn't it? But seriously---it is relaxing for me. Now, a novel may not be your thing, but most of us on the autistic spectrum have interests that are a bit intense. Take one of those interests and daydream about it while lying in bed. If the interest is pleasurable, it should relax you.

Something else I do that almost always gets me relaxed enough to go to sleep is play solitaire on my computer. Usually after four or five games, I am quite relaxed. Also, listening to peaceful music can help.

I do hope you find something that will work without having to take medication. Good luck.