I'm the nervous, jittery, high strung sort who can certainly relate to sleep deprivation and it's related maladies. But since I don't know the topic starter's situation in it's entirety, I can only relate what works for the Enlightened Misanthrope. Generally speaking, I become off-kilter (I mean, more so than usual) when schedule changes or interruptions to my normal routine disrupt my insanely fragile sensibilities.

My personal philosophy is this: Man thrives when he adheres to the Great Architect's preordained laws and withers under random chaos. The heavens, and the entities which guide them, follow a preset course, schedule, or "natural law," if you will. The sun and moon wax and wane with such certainty that should they falter, life as we know it would cease to be. Is man so vain to think he can buck nature's tide and not suffer the consequences?

So, gentle topic starter - get thee a schedule and stick to it! Make a point of waking around the same time every morning and eating meals on some semblance of a schedule. And while you're at it, work in a nightly routine to help yourself wind down in the evening. Avoid physical activity several hours before sleep and take up calming, introspective pursuits. Turn off the idiot tube and ditch the pharmaceuticals. When ready to retire, lounge in bed with a book on a spiritual or otherwise lofty topic to rid yourself of the day's mundane concerns, and enjoy a glass (or two) of red wine. Before you know it, sleep will welcome you with open arms. Heck, I get tired just thinking about it.

The ingredients can be bought at bulk barn (its a store that specializes in herbs & spices etc) you can also grow the plants yourself & take the leaves off as needed.

I would have to agree with Lyon2, everyone is pushing the drugs. Maybe it's the drugs that we take that causes these ailments in the first place....how can we possibly know? I'm not a doctor, so I wouldn't tell you to stop taking something for cancer or a serious illness or anything like that, but sleeping is another matter. I must go with the natural or holistic approach with this one. Teas work well, they are meant to calm you down, not to knock you out. If you start drinking a cup of tea about an hour before you go to bed everynight, in no time your body will start reacting to more than just the tea. This will result in falling asleep quicker.
When starting a bedtime ritual, like drinking tea or a warm glass of milk, your body remembers that you do this before sleeping and it begins to calm itself down. So, pretty much, it's not really the tea that is helping you out, it's the ritual. A lot of people don't keep sleeping rituals anymore....and look at how many of them have problems sleeping. When we wire ourselves to be alert and stressed out all of the time, which happens with a lot of people due to the fast pace of life, our bodies have a great way of doing what we tell it to, so when you want to go to sleep your body is just doing what you trained it to...staying alert and stressed out.
Please, whatever you do, don't take sleeping pills.....they may seem like they are helping, but tell me that when you can't sleep at all without them.

I have a friend with a similar problem and nothing has helped, but his insomnia is a life long problem. Sometimes I have problems sleeping too, usually because of stress. When my mind just refuses to settle down and no amount of emptying my mind is helping I go the other direction and set it a problem or task, like calculating prime numbers or imagining every detail of a three dimensional object of my choice (such as a glass sculpture, an apple tree or a rock face). At some point, when the effort of holding all those details in perfect focus becomes too tiring, I slip into sleep without noticing.

OK here's a few freestlye tips I use when it comes to trying to get a good night sleep. They work trust me : D

Don't drink alcohol, under any circumstances. After you get drunk you pass out for a few hours but then when you wake up youll be wide awake for ages. This is not what we want XD

As Mr Hanky says in south park. Wear socks to bed. Feet have bad circulation seen as they're the furthest appendige from the heart they get very cold. Insulate them or youll be able to feel it in your sleep. This doesn't help you get off really but it's the best strategy.

Don't watch TV before bed. If you can help it try to watch it as little as possible. TV makes your brain go at like 100000 miles a second. This is not what you want.

If your feeling really whacky record some white noise and play it on your iPod or something. Actually it's probably better to have it on a CD and have it playing. I started playing it on my iPod but then I started getting incomfortable with them in my ear and m head on my pillow. Just very quiet on a CD can be immensely relaxing.

Even if you closed your eyes you can still get some kind of light seen kinda. Make the room as dark as is physically possible. Get some black out blinds and shut out the harsh sun. It is not your friend.

Get a job. I am convinced the root of you problem is the psychological aspect of not having a job. With your head racing with all these thoughts no wonder you can't get off.

If this still doesn't work here's some more things.

Caffeine is VERY bad. I find if i have a cup of coffee in the afternoon it will affect my sleeping at night. It's THAT bad.

Go to the loo before you go to sleep to minimize probablility of needing the loo. If you lie in bed thinking "..... I need the loo but can't be bothered getting up" that's not gonna go down well at all. Try not to drink too much before bed for the same reason.

Get into a routine. Bathe before bed =D nice hot bathe is a great way to get wound down before bed and have a set bed time and wake up time.


If these don't help I'm sorry I'm useless xD

If you cannot fall asleep, don't force yourself to fall asleep. You will end up getting anxious because you can't sleep, and you will end up not getting sleep. Get up and read a book, or watch some television. Yes I know some people, like Dagoth, feel that tv simulates your brain cells and keeps you awake, but that's under normal circumstances. When you are having insomnia and can't sleep no matter how hard you beg yourself to, you must do something to tire yourself out and you'll be able to fall asleep. This info is from a psychology textbook 'Psychology' by Glenn E. Meyer and Saundra Ciccarelli. I can't vouch if it works on Insomniacs, but I do realize that after playing computer games or watching tv at night, I fall asleep faster than usual because my eyes feel so tired. I guess it's also a reason why people read books in bed.

Don't take drugs that are supposed to help you to fall asleep. Cos' you may grow dependent on them, and also because some drugs plunge you straight into deep sleep. The earlier stages of sleep are where you are just drifting off to sleep, to put it in layman term, it's 'light' sleep. Many sleep drugs cause the person to skip past the stages of light sleep, that's why you fall asleep immediately. But it's bad cos' your body tells you you have missed that stage of sleep and you'll feel tired the next day.

This post has been edited by bishoujo: Feb 23 2008, 12:47 PM