In the past year, I’ve fallen asleep with no problem. But about four hours later, I’ll take a bathroom break and then the trouble starts. Even though I’m tired, it sometimes takes me an hour to fall back to sleep. Very annoying! So I decided to try taking a melatonin tablet to help me get back to sleep more quickly. Melatonin is a natural hormone that is part of the sleep process. I’ve been taking melatonin all summer long and I find I’m falling back to sleep more quickly. You mileage may differ. But if you’re experiencing this problem too, you might want to give melatonin a try. It’s inexpensive and I’ve experienced no side-effects.
This just in–Kelley moves all of his investments to Melatonin. That is all.
Bob, many of my friends who travel a lot swear by melatonin. So far, it’s working for me.
BTW, I sleep the sleep of the just for my heart is pure and I have the strength of ten.
Bob, I fall asleep fast, but after my night wake-up I hated to be looking at the ceiling for an hour waiting for sleep to find me again. Melatonin seems to be solving that problem.
Can’t get to sleep, can’t stay asleep. I hate everything about sleep.
Patti, the best sleep I ever experienced was when I was in Rehab recovering from my total knee replacement surgery and they had me on Lortabs. Slept like a baby.
George, sometimes I come awake in the middle of the night and fall asleep after a while. At such times I practice a form of yoga where you lie flat on your back, arms and legs akimbo, and relax every part and muscle in your body starting with the feet and moving all the way up to your head. This and deep breathing works like magic.
Prashant, I’ll give your yoga suggestion a try!
Jackie’s problem is more like Patti’s – falling asleep in the first place. Lately she has started reading a little in bed and seems to help somewhat, but whereas I tend to fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow (usually within 5-10 minutes) she still has issues. She sleeps best later in the night until 8:30 or so. I find the later I wake up (say, between 3 and 4 am) – if I do, which does not always happen by any means – the longer it takes me to get back to sleep.
Jeff, that 3-4 A.M. wake-up was when I’d have problems falling back to sleep despite being tired. Melatonin works to get me back to sleep faster. Diane sometimes has trouble falling asleep at night and waking up too early (5 A.M.) and not being able to fall back to sleep. In both cases, Diane says, “I can’t turn my mind off.”
Exactly. I can’t turn my mind off. It’s not always that I am worrying, it’s just that I can’t stop thinking. It sometimes helps to think of cities for me. Buffalo, for instance and then a city beginning with O like Oberlin. And then New York and on and on. It’s mindless enough to help but not always. And i do take klonopin to get to sleep so that worries me too. If I can get six hours I am very happy but often it is more like 4-5.
Patti, you and Diane seem to have similar sleeping difficulties. I rarely “think” when I trying to go to sleep. I just try to get relaxed and I’m usually off in the Land of Nod pretty quickly. I just assume my recent sleep problem is due to “the aging process.”
I sleep pretty well, and already take enough pills, so no Melatonin for me, thanks. We go to bed around 10 and get up at 6, and when I wake up at night I fall back asleep pretty quickly unless the cat thinks it’s play time.
Rick, no pets here to disturb our sleep. My friends who travel a lot say melatonin works great to combat jet-lag.
I’ve always been an early to bed, early to rise person and rarely have sleep problems. My poor Dad, on the other hand, has always been plagued by insomnia. I doubt that even now, at almost 80, he gets more than about four hours of sleep total per night.
I do know that some doctors recommend melatonin (along with seratonin, which I believe is by prescription and I may have misspelled it) for autistic children because they often have sleep difficulties.
Deb, I developed sleep apnea in my 40s, but I was fortunate enough to have a great Ears-Nose-Throat doctor who diagnosed it. I’ve been sleeping with a CPAP (Continuous Positive Air Pressure) machine for 20 years. This new sleep problem–not being able to fall back to sleep for an hour–was annoying. But melatonin seems to have solved it. Some people (including autistic children) don’t produce enough serotonin. You’re right about people needing a prescription for serotonin. As we age, our bodies don’t produce enough melatonin which results in sleep problems.
Patti, I’ve done that too – make lists in my head. Airports we’ve been to, cities in England, dead people I knew (don’t ask), the players on various Yankees teams, you name it. It has gotten better over the years but occasionally it does happen. Once in a while I’ll take a Tylenol or benadryl.
Jeff, I know plenty of people who take benadryl (or NyQuil PM whose active ingredient is benadryl) to sleep each night. Benadryl’s chief side-effect is drowsiness.
Your problem describes mine to a tee. I’ll give this a try.