I'm a Systems Reliability and DevOps engineer for Netdata Inc. When not working, I enjoy studying linguistics and history, playing video games, and cooking all kinds of international cuisine.
Go to bed and get up at a consistent time each day. This sounds like stupid advice, but it’s remarkably effective. Just like your habits that have lead to insomnia, this will get your body used to sleeping at certain times, which in turn will make it easier to get to sleep then. For bonus points, figure out what your natural sleep cycle is (that is, how long it takes your brain to cycle through both REM and quiescent sleep, for most humans it’s usually around 90 minutes), and then time your sleep schedule so that it includes roughly 5 cycles with your wake up time timed such that it happens right as you’re coming out of a cycle. This will help significantly with actually waking up on time, because people wake up more readily right at the end of a cycle.
Try lowering the ambient air temperature of your bedroom. Most people sleep most comfortably when the room feels slightly cold (try about 20°C as a starting point if your room is normally warmer than that, otherwise I’d suggest trying about 18°C) and they can lay comfortably under a blanket. Additionally, some people have trouble sleeping if their feet are cold, so just wearing a pair of socks may also help.
Lower your stress levels wherever possible. High stress throughout the day makes insomnia flare up more readily due to the neurochemistry of sleep and stress. For a decent percentage of people who suffer insomnia, stress is a major factor why.
Minimize light exposure (especially artificial lights, and even more so lights with a higher color temperature (bluer)) after sunset. Light exposure, even just ambient light on skin, negatively impacts the neurochemistry involved in getting to sleep and staying asleep. This is ultimately an evolutionary artifact of humans being primarily diurnal animals.
Avoid late night snacks just before bed, and consider eating your evening meal earlier. Blood sugar levels have an impact on how well most people can get to sleep, and avoiding heightened blood sugar levels can help significantly in getting to sleep more reliably.
Try cutting back on caffeine and other stimulants later in the day. Sounds obvious, but a lot of people don’t think of this. Alternatively, if this makes things worse, you probably have an atypically fast metabolism (like I do) and may find that a (small) amount of caffeine a few hours before bed actually helps you sleep.
Melatonin. Probably the ‘easiest’ option. Melatonin levels are directly tied to the human sleep cycle. You can get melatonin supplements in many parts of the world over-the-counter for a reasonably inexpensive price. Obviously talk to a doctor about this if possible before hand, and pay careful attention to your health as there are quite a few potential side-effects (most mostly harmless, some potentially nasty though). Long-term use is generally a bad idea (you’re likely to become dependent, and the risk of the nasty side-effects increases), but short-term it can be helpful to reinforce the habits mentioned above.
When I was younger, I had serious insomnia (bad enough that I was lucky to get more than 3 hours of sleep a night). Ultimately, what helped me was a combination of all of the above. The key is to actively commit to doing it, there’s no other way to break habits and form new ones.
An ever-smiling full-stack developer, specializing in the rapid development of custom web applications. Always eager to learn new technologies and concepts and share knowledge.
Completely cured? No, not really.
Mitigated significantly? Definitely.
Suggestions for mitigating it:
When I was younger, I had serious insomnia (bad enough that I was lucky to get more than 3 hours of sleep a night). Ultimately, what helped me was a combination of all of the above. The key is to actively commit to doing it, there’s no other way to break habits and form new ones.
Thank you so much Austin. I knew I would get such a nice and helpful response here.