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| Image : Habib M’henni@wikimedia commons |
Why do people wake up during the night?
Lots of reasons explain why people are awakened at night such a snoring, problems with their legs or they need to go the loo. Before knowing how to overcome insomnia, you have to focus on the issues which are interfering with your sleep. If you fear not being able to sleep when you go to bed, your worries will come true and you will find it difficult to get back to sleep.
What to avoid before going to bed?
If you do find difficulty to get back to sleep, then you shouldn’t go to sleep with a full bladder and move to another room. Probably you can do something like listening to slow music or reading a short story in bed with a dim light.
What to do to have a good night’s sleep?
If you don’t know how to stop insomnia, you should first know what are other causes of it
You should avoid taking naps during the day because it will keep you still ‘fresh’ at night. Next, don’t keep checking the clock during the night. You’d better get up and do something else.
Then, food or drink may help you sleep well. In your diet, think about more milk, eggs, chicken and fish – which contain amino acid tryptothan – to induce your sleep. Don’t take alcohol because when it is metabolized your brain will give reaction and wake you up.
When explaining how to beat insomnia, a sleep specialist Dr Guy Meadows from The Sleep School said that it is better to stay away from phone. He also suggests to “brush your teeth, pack your bag for the next day and get ready for bed- get into a routine so that you will have the right frame of mind for sleep.”
Does heredity play a role here?
According to experts genes are involved with how much sleep you need, and it is predicted that there are more than six types of genes-related insomnia. One week sleep deprivation affects the function of 711 different genes. This kind of disruption will throw off circadian rhytm, that tells your body when to sleep. Not only that, it will also disturb body metabolism, stress and immune response.
What are the effects of insomnia?
The increasing stress, worries will also increase the likelihood of poor sleep and will drive insomnia. As mentioned above, poor sleep can interrupt the normal function of your genes and eventually leave many people in a vicious circle of sleep deprivation. According to Terry Cralle, a consultant for the American Sleep Apnea Association in Texas, insufficient sleep can disrupt normal gene activity.
Is there any suggestion as for how many hours people with insomnia have to sleep?
Find your optimal amount of sleep. Most people have eight hours a sleep a day, but if you find you can sleep between 5 – 7 hours per night don’t try to go to bed more than that.
After you know it, go to bed and get up at the same time every day, and don’t try to stay in bed later or make up for “lost” sleep. By doing that, you will throw off your body’s natural clock so that in the end you will find it more difficult to get to sleep that particular night.
