Ask Lemmy

No screens for two hours before bedtime.

Read a book or listen to music.

Melatonin works for me.

Hot shower.

I'm able to sleep almost immediately basically wherever I lay my head, so I've never really had any problems sleeping. However the most important change I've ever made for sleep quality was how I consume caffeine. Yes, I believe you can fall asleep while totally wired, I can too. The problem is that the sleep quality will be terrible and definitely can contribute to insomnia.

So first, the FDA nailed the appropriate amount of caffeine in a day. Don't consume more than 400mg in a day, and keep track. Too much caffeine with overstimulate you and will contribute to any feelings of anxiety while awake or trying to sleep.

Second, stop consuming caffeine several hours before bed. The biological half life of caffeine is between 6-8 hours, so if you have 400mg at 2pm, you'll still have roughly 200mg in your system at 10pm. That's where your sleep quality will get impacted. My personal rule is that I should space out my consumption over the morning, and stop having any caffeine at all in the afternoon.

Jerkoff without porn

It's really simple: you stfu and listen.

Turn off the narrative, the inner monologue, the train of thought. You probably can't shut it down completely - that's okay, just let it go each time you notice it.

Meanwhile, the back of your mind is constantly generating chatter. Passively eavesdrop on that chatter. You won't be able to make much of it out, it's mumbling and disconnected scraps, like someone else's conversation across a cafe. That's okay. Just kind of tune in; if you get stuff, you get stuff.

Being still enough to listen relaxes your body, and the listening-state and the space you create for it soon fills up with dream-gibberish - and that segues smoothly into actually dreaming.

I like a podcast called Fall of Civilizations. It's very calming, quiet accounts of dark periods in history. Despite the juxtaposition, it's very chill and relaxing.

I haven't seen exercise mentioned nearly enough in this thread. Doing an hour of yoga before bed makes sleep soo much easier.

Do relaxing activities before bed.

Step 1: Acquire idiopathic hypersomnia

Step 2: Sleep and never stop

Have a 2 year old that falls asleep at 9, wakes up at 2:30ish Falls asleep at 4:30 after 2hrs of struggle and the wakes up at 0630.

In addition to all the above, I found a weighed blanket really helped me. Make sure your room is very dark, pitch black. If it is not, upgrade your blinds or a sleep mask. I got one that's simple and cotton and it works wonders.

Now its winter I also have a heated blanket.

Working out helps a bunch.

Medication:

Diphenhydramine 50mg.

Then diphenhydramine + Melatonin (20mg) (if I want to be dead asleep but will be groggy in the morning. Only used as last resort).

How To Trick Your Brain Into Falling Asleep | Jim Donovan | TEDxYoungstown https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5dE25ANU0k

Meditation works really well for me.

I heard the US military swears by a bodyscan meditation exercise. That works for me, or at the very least calms me way down. Sometimes I'll try and take a short walk through the night, because I love it, but thinking about leaving the bed an getting ready for outside makes me very sleepy :) . Good luck falling asleep, unwanted awakeness is super boring and gets old really quick.

Take 1 g of niacin and 1 mg of melatonin right before bed.

Progressive relaxation. Seriously.

This is what I tell my children, get comfy, relax your body, close your eyes, and think of something happy.

dont move at all. get comfy, then stop moving. dont even scratch a slight itch

Exercise. If you aren’t physically tired you’ll have a hard time falling asleep. Most people with physical jobs have no problem sleeping.

Warhammer 40K lore.

Anesthesia

• Partial tip: There's often the suggestion of concentrating on breathing, usually with some kind of regular pattern. This is an alternative to try.

You'll need to have been in bed for a while, mind racing. Take how extreme that racing is and then taking a similarly extreme, almost uncomfortably deep breath to match it. This requires having been in bed for a while.

Hold it for a bit. Don't count seconds - avoid numbers. As soon as you get the vaguest hint from your body that you need to let it out and breathe normally again, do so. Try to relax as much of yourself as possible as you do that. This is not a "hold your breath till you pass out" thing. You want to go back to breathing normally.

If the breath was too deep and that freaked you out a bit, try going a bit more shallow on the next one.

This has sometimes worked for me, especially if I've been asleep already and can't get back to sleep.

Sometimes I've tried a regular breathing exercise after that.

Other times I have got out of bed and done something mindless for a while until I felt tired again. No doomscrolling.

• More traditional tip: No caffeinated beverages for at least 6 hours before you go to bed. Yes, six. Nine's even better.

Controlled breathing

• Only lay in bed for sex and sleep, nothing else.
• Make sure your screens are off or have an orange filter for nighttime.
• Toke it up, if you want and it's legal, about 20 minutes before bed.
• Go to bed around the same time each night.
• and the most important... INVEST IN A GOOD MATTRESS!

Not affiliated at all, just a customer, but AmeriSleep beds have been the best beds I've ever laid in! They have just enough give in firmness to avoid hip pain while sleeping on my side, but support those pressure points evenly with your spine.

routines routines routines. same bedtime, same wake up time. if you establish a routine, it should take 14 days to kick in