Ask Lemmy

cuddle with big dog

Breathing exercises, actuating that vagal nerve

Imagine a place where you are most cozy and visit it every night when you try to sleep. And then maybe sound machines. And finally, deep breathing. Slowing your heart down through this will physically make your body want to go to sleep (so basically meditiation).

I do all of these in tandem, I have the sound machine going and I settle into my cozy part of my brain and then imagine my lungs as a cup filling up with water to the top while inhaling and then draining out as I exhale. The trick with this is to not stress yourself thinking about if you're doing your breathing right, just try and relax and focus.

Also melatonin. But that isn't effective for every situation.

Good luck.

When I close my eyes and see my demons, I engage them in a staring contest and fall contentedly asleep.

Obviously it's person-dependent. I find what helps me most is turning on audio to something I actually want to listen to. That gets my mind off going to sleep. And I fall asleep instead of listening to the things I want to hear. So I've got a bunch of audiobooks from Audible. I've recently cancelled that, however. I've got so many, and plan to use the phone app Libby in conjunction with my local library. Also, I subscribe to a bunch of podcasts.

When I lie down I just set the timer to 30m or "end of chapter", and I rarely have to extend that.

I agree with what other people have said plus:

The bed should only be used for sleeping, when you wake up get out of bed and don't go back. Don't use your laptop or phone in bed, if you still have a tv - don't watch it in bed.

This helps set the situational subconscious expectation that the bed is for sleeping.

If you have trouble sleeping in general, it might be a bad habits thing. Melatonin supplements can help to get you tired. 1mg before you go to bed is enough, if you try to relax and sleep. They don't do anything if you do stuff that keeps you awake however.

This particularly anything exciting like sports, listening to energetic music, watching tense movies, playing fast or demanding games etc. Avoid any such thing for at least two hours before you try to sleep.

I like to think of nostalgic memories.

Noise canceling headphones plus Brownian noise.

https://archive.org/details/brownnoise_202103

In my case Sennheiser hd450bt.

Turn off phone data, so only regular texts from VIP can break through DND.

Solitaire, crosswords or codewords app to sleep. Voyager with pagination on if you really want to read but have an end page.

Exercise will control your circadian rhythm, set your metabolism on a more consistent routine, and help you sleep better. Endurance based exercises are best; cycling, swimming, running, rowing, etc. You need 1 hour every 3 days at a minimum in my experience. Don't think in terms of a week, just do it somewhere between daily and every 3 days no matter what. Even someone like me that has major chronic health problems from a broken neck and back manages to pull off this one. In fact, I fall apart and turn into a sleepless zombie if I fail to maintain my exercise routine. I'm likely one of the most sleep deprived people here. This works when nothing else does or is possible.

As someone who is disabled my go too is a nice comfortable bed, my service dog by me, a weighted blanket which never new how amazing it helps my sleep. And my CPAP machine.

These help me sleep, oh also I have sleep as android help me track my sleeping patterns and play thunderstorms every night to drown out everything around me so my brain can relax

You know.. ( ͡~ ͜ʖ ͡°)

I went to the doctor and told them I had insomnia. Got diagnosed with depression. So now I take Seroquel and sleep ok. My point is to get a doctor's opinion to rule out a medical condition.

Turn on some video without commercials and something at a more or less constant volume, like Ancient Aliens or How It's Made. Set the sleep timer for 30 min. Turn the screen off if your TV supports it. Set the volume low/moderate. Get comfortable in bed in your favorite position, close your eyes, and listen to the video. I usually don't ever hear the sleep timer turn it off.

My (probably not very healthy) hack is to watch YouTube. My brain focuses on one thing and all the thoughts keeping me up just stay quiet.

If you have persistent sleep problems even after applying all the advice, if you can afford it, consider taking a sleep test/study to learn what's the core issue

5mg melatonin and 200mg L-Theanine works for me. I order from Thorne. I believe they are reputable.

I had sleep issues for years, almost failed high school because of it and then I was late to my own graduation. Now I have a routine that serves me well: Wake up and go to sleep at the same time every day, no caffeine, no sugar at night, nightlight on my monitors at night, listen to boring audiobooks with a sleep timer, don't lay in bed watching TV.

Antiques Roadshow.

I've found that I have to keep my hands off my body, the stimulation of being touched keeps me alert.

Exercise

for me, i find background watching/ listening to history videos really effective. Not sure what the rationale there is, but that's how it goes.

Hammer or perhaps large frying pan

I used to struggle with sleep. It turned out I’m bipolar. Thankfully, it mellows with age and I learned how to manage it. I was probably ~23 when I got diagnosed. Just sharing because it’s useful to know that sometimes there’s a very specific reason why sleep seems elusive.

You can get sleeping pills for such a situation. I also use melatonin gummies. You can get CBD gummies in a lot of places. Meditation might help.

The most important aspect of sleep management for me is keeping a solid routine. I go to bed at the same time every night and get up early even on my days off. Breaking that routine leads to issues, resuming the routine solves them quickly.

1. Daily Exercise
2. Concept Album musics

Two things that helped me in the past year:

• Avoiding caffeine after 10:00AM or so. I cut coffee completely, but I noticed positive effects by just drinking all caffeine before ~10:00AM.
• Sleep mask helped me a ton. Turns out we are super sensitive to the most minute amount of light.
• At least for me, not eating past ~6:00PM makes falling asleep way easier.
• Regular exercise (of any kind) allows you to fall sleep easier. Probably has to do with regulating hormones/biological subsystems.
• NO PHONE on bed. Bed is only for sleep and sex. In my opinion anyway.

Hope this helps!

For me, what works is an ADHD medication along with not trying to fall asleep. Trying to fall asleep causes me something in the area of anxiety and guilt, so I end up frustrating myself awake. If I focus on a mindless task like scrolling through Lemmy or reading a book, I get engaged in that and end up accidentally falling asleep. The funny thing is that I have to keep doing my mindless task until I fall asleep, so many times, I wake up looking like I passed out in the middle of something with my glasses still on and my phone laying around. I'm actually curiously impressed that my glasses or phone haven't broken yet.

I have a lot of them. Sleep and I are in an... enemies to lovers kind of relationship.

There's hate-fucking, is what I'm saying. I hate it so much and it's all I want.

Some of my advice might be bad advice due to my ADHD but I can't tell what might work for you so.

Also, I have left off a lot of stuff that I have done that is... not good. If you need harm reduction options, let me know.

1. I wear an eye-mask. The gentle, soft, cool (not cold!) pressure is a reminder to my brain that it's bed-time.

2. Don't eat too close to bed.

3. Make sure there's nothing uncomfortable (like a tag from the sheets) touching me.

4. Play a TV show I find comforting but that doesn't need my 100% attention, at a low enough volume that I can't quite hear it unless I'm very, very, very quiet. This helps make me some moving/jittering/jiggling. (I play Futurama. Can't get a nightmare from Futurama.)

5. I take l-theanine. It's supposed to make people "alert" and "calm" but my doctor recommended it to me and it's sedating effect is so strong it significantly drops my blood pressure. (Very useful if I have to take stimulant medication.)

6. Which leads to I take prescription medication. It doesn't quite do it, and is hit-or-miss, hence the list.