Insomnia is one of the most common ailments besetting this generation. It is widely attributed to artificial lighting, quick energy fixes, poor diet, lack of exercise, and long and stressful working hours. It is sad because sleep is important in life, and to lose on it is such a big pain for anyone’s mental, emotional, and physical health.
You may be eating healthily and maintaining your weight with regular exercise. However, if you keep on drinking coffee later in the day, exercising before bedtime, and getting stressed with work and family duties all the time, then you are not doing real favors for your body.
You should be employing a holistic approach if you are serious about getting the right sleep-wake cycle. It is not just about nutrition, but also about finding peace mentally and emotionally.
Other people say that supplements can help you achieve good sleep. Melatonin is a common herbal supplement that’s widely used all over the world to help treat insomnia. However, when you think about it is not a solution, but a quick-patch short-fix solution. And melatonin can get addicting to use. When you use it too much, your body will eventually stop producing melatonin, and you will have more problems with your health.
If you must drink melatonin, use it very rarely, and use it only when you desperately need it. You don’t want to risk your body tricking itself into thinking it doesn’t need to produce its melatonin.
What are the habits that have been screwing up your sleep all along? Here are some of them that you may innocently think of as okay:
1. Taking coffee later in the day
Taking up to two cups of coffee a day is okay unless you are pregnant or nursing. However, the timing of when you take it is even more crucial. Has it been a habit to drink a cup during tea break? Do you need coffee for every meal to help you digest? These may seem like innocent habits, but if you do it every day, you may be starving your body from good and quality sleep.
And caffeine is not only found in coffee. A lot of other commercial products including chocolates, tea, and energy drinks have caffeine in them, so you must watch out for your consumption. And caffeine can also be addicting, and it is a difficult habit to kick out, so be careful when overconsuming any food source with caffeine.
2. Stressing out too much about not getting enough sleep
It may sound basic, but it is undermining your goal of wanting to achieve better sleep if you keep on stressing about the idea of having a better sleep. First of all, you should not stress about it since you must be doing something about the problem as soon as you realize it. You cannot expect to go on with your habits and want changes instantly. You must do something, even if that means saying “No” to many of the things that you are comfortable doing like exercising later in the day and drinking too much coffee.
If you stress too much about your lack of sleep, it means you are not doing enough to get out of your sleep debt. Find all the reasons why you are getting insomniac, and figure out how you are going to solve these issues. You alone are the only person who can explain that, and no “magic pill” can find a solution to your problems.
Bad habits lead to bad lifestyles, and sadly, insomnia can also be a lifestyle issue. If you have done everything you can to fix your habits, then it means your insomnia may be due to an underlying medical condition. Have yourself checked immediately and aim for treating the cause of your failure to get good sleep.
