Why, oh why, can I be physically and mentally exhausted all evening, yet as soon as I go to bed my mind starts whirring? That was nearly two hours ago.
Even as I'm writing this, I am struggling to keep my eyes open, as my brain once again says 'go to sleeeeep....' yet I know that as soon as I turn out the light and lie down, it all starts again.
I've tried several 'brain-numbing' tricks, including finding boys' names for every letter of the alphabet. I couldn't get 'Y', until seconds ago when I was typing this, and I thought of 'Youssef'. I've done an A-Z of drugs (geek...). I've tried breathing. I've tried not breathing. I've tried warm milk. I would take a sleeping tablet, but I'm on-call.
Please comment with your best tips on getting a good night's sleep.
SG
8 comments:
i find exercise works for me... I can't sleep unless sometime I've done exercise that day.
No help on the sleeping here, cause i kind of suck at it too.
But once i met a kid named Yo. Yep. That was his entire name, not short for anything. Yo.
In the army they told us to open our eyes as we breathe in and close them when we breathe out, the concentration stops you thinking about anything else.
Another one is to use your concentration to stop thinking about anything at all, when you start to think about something stop it. I find that one quite painful. A variation is to get comfortable and then don't move at all while not allowing your mind to wander
I hate to say this, it hurts me to say it, really. But no coffee after midday works for me.
I am a mother of a 7 month old and I was hitting the hay and lying there, waking again, lying there, getting up and reading, finally falling asleep just as my baby was ready to get up.
I cut coffee for a day and endured the headaches, the took a reaaaally weak latte and am back to normal.
You will miss it at first but trust me, it will work.
You know all those sermons on cassette tape and CD that you inevitably collect over the years? Last year, I started playing them as I was heading off to bed. Generally, I don't make it much past the first ten or twenty minutes or so before I'm fast asleep. The one side effect of this brilliant cure for insomnia is that now, when I'm sitting in church on Sundays, I instinctively find myself having to fight the urge to nod off... I wish I was joking, but unfortunately, it's true.
Maybe, instead of switching off the light etc, you could leave a lamp on and have some sort of noise going (quietly enough that you *can* sleep) - music, audio of something (a book, sermon, whatever) so it doesn't *feel* like you are preparing to sleep?
Well count to A-Z of drug(geek), just fall asleep with your computer+lights on, considering the fact that some dude can sleep standing up (read it in Guiness World Record book-he has a serious back condition->reclining position out of question). Fortunately, I am blessed with 'instantaneous sleep like a log' gift but fully understand your plight-my grandma suffers from insomnia most of her life->problematic mood swings...well, being a prof tri-lingual translater is pretty high stressed, so may be you should meditate or do exercises that help you de-stress and live in the moment-mindfulness...natural therapy sessions:)
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