Insomnia Ruins Your Nights And Wrecks Your Days
Sleeplessness is so common that it can be considered normal for many people to think they suffer from insomnia. In most cases poor sleep is due to bad pre-bedtime habits or normal changes in our bodies as we age.
You don’t have to dread the nights and struggle through the days feeling like your head is in a fog with your body so tired all you want to do is hide some where quiet and sleep.
Changes To Sleeping Habits Are Often Normal
Some people seem to have a genetic background that predisposes them to be poor sleepers. This might have been a good trait if you slept in a cave and hungry Saber tooth tigers were on the prowl.
Unfortunately insufficient sleep usually leaves us feeling jaded, grumpy and unable to energetically participate in our work and play. Whatever the cause or effect, insomnia is not a useful trait in modern post cave dwelling life. Everybody of every age needs plenty of good undisturbed sleep.
Your Sleep Cycle Changes As You Age
Many people of any age also feel as though they haven’t had enough sleep when they first wake but once they’re up and about they usually realise that they are in fact well rested. People in their sixties, although mentally alert and functioning extremely well in other aspects of their lives may find that they want to go to sleep earlier in the evening and get up earlier in the morning than they used to.
If you find yourself troubled by a change in sleeping habits and there are no other health issues that might be responsible then the best thing you can do is try and accept the change, adjust your life to suit and get on with living.
It’s Common To Wake During The Night
Often mature adults will wake about once an hour for a good part of the night. These people find this both annoying and worrying but they usually drop back off to sleep within a relatively short time after waking and they usually end up getting enough sleep overall.
Apart from the common natural shift in sleeping patterns as people age other factors can disturb the sleep cycle. These can be stress, anxiety or worry, busyness or excitement, coffee consumed late in the day, smoking, alcohol consumption or health issues such as pain, discomfort, restless legs and so on. Other factors may be as simple as being too hot or cold in bed, having a restless or snoring partner or even a bladder problem that wakes you at night.
Teach Yourself To Sleep Well
Apart from taking drugs to make you sleep there are a lot of things you can do to make better quality sleep for yourself.
- Unwind in the evenings and make sure you go to bed happy, relaxed and ready to sleep. If you have to work late try and fit in a ‘chill out’ period before you crawl between the sheets.
- Set yourself regular bedtimes and rise in the morning at about the same time as usual every day.
- Stay in bed for the allotted time – try and avoid getting up during the night to deal with problems and try and avoid shift work if you are prone to being a bad sleeper. If you have to break your usual sleep pattern try and re-establish it as soon as possible, particularly if you go overseas and end up in a different time zone. Go to bed at night and get up in the morning as usual even if your body is telling you it is all wrong.
- Don’t turn your bedroom into an entertainment centre. Bedrooms are for sleeping, not places to watch TV, eat, study or work.
- Don’t drink coffee after lunch time.
- Drinking alcohol in the evening can disturb your sleep pattern and smoking can stimulate your senses too and is best avoided of an evening.
- If you get tired during the day just have a quick nap. Even dozing in a chair for 10 minutes can charge your batteries enough to get you through the rest of the afternoon with renewed energy.
- If you cannot drop off to sleep after a reasonable time in bed I’d suggest getting up for while and leave the room. Do something relaxing like reading or some other quiet calming activity until you feel sleepy again. Do not reward yourself with food or drink as you will find you may lay in bed of an evening thinking about getting up for a snack instead of just lying there comfortably drifting off into sleep.
- Get fit. Exercise will tune your body up and is very likely to get your sleep pattern more in line with your lifestyle expectations.
De-Stress Yourself Each Evening
Don’t stress if you have a few nights where you don’t seem to be sleeping well. Relax; these periods of poor sleeping usually don’t last very long. Try and re-establish your bedtime routine, make sure you are in good health, physically fit and happy. Good sleep will be yours again even if your sleeping patterns turn out to be different than they used to be. An occasional brief bout of insomnia will do you no harm.
Feeling tired does not necessarily mean you have insomnia. Just try getting enough bed time for a few nights and you will feel remarkably better.
About the Author
For several years I have been concerned about the increase of lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and cancers.
I am also concerned about an increasing number of unfit people in modern western societies. I decided to write about health and wellness matters as I feel very strongly that we, as a society, are going to facing huge problems in future years dealing with a bulge of health problems that will strain our health services to breaking point.
I have had some work experience in the health field but I also do a lot of research which I combine with some pretty pragmatic down to earth life experiences to produce readable commonsense health information.
I have a blog health site, www.ClearSkyHealth.com, where I publish my articles. I look forward to readers feedback and welcome suggestions for future topics. If you have a question I will endeavor to answer it for you.
Tiger is snoring 
