Can a pill like Melatonin help to sleep?

[WilsonFitbit]

Hi everyone! 😊

When it comes to sleep, like most things in life, there is no magic bullet or medicine. Sleep aids are actually not meant for long-term use. For more information, please check this blog.  

Can anyone share their experiences about how to deal with sleep disorders? Feel free to share your thoughts! 🙌

[adinasavescu]

Hello.

I've been having sleep issues since.....forever. Since I was a child I remember looking at a clock until 4am in the morning.

At some point i've tried Melatonin (1 night only, when I was a student), but I woke up so tired, just like I never slept.

So usually when I was student and had an exam, stay awake all night, coffee, cigarettes, getting the exam, get home at 4-5pm next day and then sleep until next morning.

I've read a book about sleep stages, "Sleep" by Nick Littlehales. It helped alot and I started to use some techniques from there.

Now, I'm 30, work exclusively from home and have a 1 year daughter. My go to bed schedule is the following:

- 23:30 - 01:00 - reading

- 01:00 - 01:30 - sudoku (you can laugh) to kill any processing power left in my brain

Then I fell asleep in 5mins or so (before this it would take me about 30m - 1h30m to fell asleep)

In the morning I wake up at 9:00-9:20.

I'll try now to push everything down by 30mins so I can wake up 30mins earlier.

Hope this helps.

[WilsonFitbit]

Hi @adinasavescu, 

Interesting! I think I will try what you've done to improve your Sleep. 😴 If it has worked for you then I think it can work for me as well. 😊 Thanks for taking the time to share your experience! 

Have a great day! 

[adinasavescu]

I forgot to mention and I think it's very important:

"- 01:00 - 01:30 - sudoku (you can laugh) to kill any processing power left in my brain"

I play it on my phone but I set a blue-light filter + blue-light glasses. If you have a sudoku notebook (or actually any other intense brain teasers) would be better.

[WilsonFitbit]

@adinasavescu, wow, great to know! 😮

I'll be practicing this! I'm sure that if it has given you great results, I'll get the same too. 😉

See you around. 

[BobbyMilligan]

I had a period in my life when I sleep very badly. I could lie with open eyes until morning. It's horrible. I think stress was the cause. I was in college then and moonlighting in a cafe. I did not have time for anything, I was constantly nervous, I think this caused disturbances in sleep. In general, this is very important, you can read in more detail here https://studymoose.com/sleep about this topic. I didn't take any pills, I just put my life in order. I stopped staring at the phone before going to bed, meditation also helped.

[WilsonFitbit]

@BobbyMilligan Nice to see you around. 

I'm sorry for the experience you had and thank you for taking the time to share this with us. Definitely you've been doing a great job and Meditation is certainly a key to succeed over Insomnia and some other sleep disorders. There is another thread that talks about Mediation, if you would like to take a look at this, please click here. 

See you around. 

[Xenus]

Melatonin isn't a sedating sleep aid.It's a sleep timing medication & works by telling your brain the time to go to sleep and the dose is only 0.2mcgs to 1mg any higher dose is wasted by your body hence persons feeling dozy cranky in there waking hours.If you take melatonin at the wrong time it will mess up your sleep pattern. Beware of this so call sleep medication because it isn't to be used as a sedative. Magnesium is better for sleep as not only does it help you calm the mind it also helps your heart & the rest of your body functions.Most of us now lack magnesium.

[WilsonFitbit]

@Xenus It's nice to see you around! 

Wow, 😮 this is very great information and thanks for taking the time to share this with us! 🙂

See you around. 

[GretaS]

Glad to see this topic.   I just wanted to fall asleep a bit faster.  I bought Melatonin 3 mg.   So, I took a 3 mg and cut it in half, so I figured it was about 1.5mg.  I felt less was more for me. It was a quick dissolve, under the tongue. I took it at 9:35 pm.

I was just starting my nightly routine of mindful meditation, at 9:45pm,  about 45 mins before bed, with no TV, no cell phone, no lights, cool temperature, no Blue lights etc.  5 mins in, I felt the effects. Climbed right into bed! Fitbit Charge 4 says I was awake 30 secs @ 9:55pm then went into light sleep.   Didn't like the feeling  it gave, felt like it was taking over, but the thing is I slept longer but only 14 % REM and about 24 mins of Deep sleep,  and 68 % of Light sleep, which was unusual for me.  Most times I will have equal amounts in both.  Maybe 1.5 mg was too much.  Or possibly I shouldn't take any more.  

I use the Calm App

[cathm]

I have been taking Olly Sleep Gummies. One serving has 3mg of Melatonin.  It seems to work well for me 🙂

[Xenus]

Melatonin isn't a sleeping medication.It's a circadian timing of when to sleep.Doses of 300 mcgs for using to help set your sleep time to early or later. Melatonin is naturally produce in the darkness of night whether you sleep or are awake. Sleep is natural and important to your well-being and for those that don't sleep well it's best to try and find the source of why not. You cannot force yourself to sleep and you need to find what time is your natural time to sleep and wakeup refreshed plus able to function well the next day. Melatonin can be taken in the morning to help (but there's little evidence that it works) or 7-8 hours before bed to help change your bedtime to earlier.Melatonin is used for those with sleep disorders of the circadian clock cycle where someone's sleep is out of sync with the rest of the society yet the use of melatonin for this purpose doesn't have any proof of correcting the sleep wake times. I would say that melatonin serves little use in helping a person to fall asleep. Melatonin can cause nightmares,reduced body temperature,changes to heart rate,sweating,feeling cold and shouldn't be taken by those that are diabetic.     

[WilsonFitbit]

Hello @GretaS, @cathm, @Xenus. It's great to see you around! 

Thank you very much for taking the time to share this important information. 

[healthy2022]

I take this exact same pill every time I have a hard time sleeping. 

[hotstovehove]

Dr. Matthew walker (the sleep doctor) only recommends melatonin for jet lag for retiming sleep, its better to get in a healthy sleep routine before bed rather than medicate 

[sixpackRow]

I have been taking melotonin for over a year on and off, it really helps with sleep but I would suggest start real low since everyone may react differently than others.  But it has helped me sleep longer and have better deep sleeps and sometimes it gives you more energy the next day after you wake up.  Its helped me with anxiety and has been mentioned by many such as Ex President Donald Trump saying it may even help fight against the Covid virus.

[sixpackRow]

that being said im not sure if it safe or not to take long term but so far I have asked many people in the medical field and they seem to say that it should not be harmful to most people taking longterm as it is kinda of like a vitamin or something similar that your body produces and uses, I guess thats what I seemed to figure out atleast for my knowledge and self research.

[sixpackRow]

thats the same one I use, its really a good value and very good tasting one and dissolves quickly 😚

[GretaS]

I gave some thoughts on this subject earlier but wanted to add.  Yes i know it isn’t a sedative sleep aide. It’s like our natural melatonin our brain sends out when it’s near bed time.  I darkened my room 1&1/2 hours before bed to help bring on my natural melatonin

i take the 3 mg cut it in half and the 1.5 cut that in half due to the anxiety of the 3mg causes.  The 1/2 of the 1/2  is just my speed. No anxiety or nervousness with this amount and it’s the one that dissolves under the tongue.  I found the right amount of melatonin for me. 😊

[GretaS]

Yes on Magnesium.  In 2017 ABC10 news found that 80-90% of people are Magnesium deficient  in this mineral.  Here’s a link:

https://www.abc10.com/video/news/local/abc10-originals/fountain-of-youth-in-stanislaus-county/103-81...

after seeing this I started buying Magnesium to supplement my diet.  My sisters doctor put her on Magnesium after a full blood routine was given, she was very deficient in magnesium.