Conquering Insomniac Nights

The National Institutes of Health estimates that about 50 to 70 million Americans of all ages suffer sleep-related problems. According to the National Sleep Foundation of America, 47 million American adults may be at risk of injury and physical and emotional difficulty because of sleeplessness.

Try switching on your television and there is always a sleeping pill add staring at your face and demanding attention. Insomnia or sleeplessness is your body’s way of telling you that there is something wrong and don’t take it lightly unless it is because of love.

Defining Insomnia

An adult usually requires 7 to 8 hours of sleep everyday. Insomnia refers to a sleep disorder that is characterized by the person’s inability to fall asleep or remain asleep. Presently an epidemic in the United States, this sleep disorder can play havoc with a person’s regular sleep pattern and could also render him incapable of carrying out his normal physical, mental and emotional functioning. It is a condition that tends to intensify with age, severely affecting adults in the age group of 40 and above.

Causative Agents of Insomnia

There are a multitude of factors that can be blamed for causing insomnia, which include; psychoactive drugs, stimulants, cocaine, coffee, hormonal shifts, stress caused due to events of life, clinical depressiondefine, anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

The other factors may include parasomnia characterized by disruptive sleep events such as nightmares, sleepwalking, etc.

Types of Insomnia and Their Causative Agents

This sleep disorder can be of three types depending upon the duration for which the individual has difficulty in sleeping.

1. Transient insomnia, where the individual is unable to fall asleep for anywhere between a few days to several weeks. This can be caused either due to stress, change in environment or due to other disorders. It could give rise to a feeling of constant sleepiness or weaken motor functions.

2. Acute insomnia might give difficulty in sleeping for a duration of 3 weeks to 6 months

3. Chronic insomnia results into sleeplessness for anywhere between months to years. It usually arises due to some other disorder.

Forms of Insomnia

Insomnia is known to have four major patterns of sleep disorders.

1. Onset Insomnia
2. Maintenance Insomnia
3. Middle Insomnia, and
4. Terminal or ate Insomnia

Onset insomnia refers to the difficulty in falling asleep at the beginning of the sleep period. To put it into simpler terms, a person suffering from onset insomnia finds it difficult to fall asleep. He might lie down on the bed with an intention to sleep but might not be able to do so. It is essentially an outcome of anxiety disorders.

Maintenance insomnia or nocturnal awakening is characterized by repeated awakening in the middle of the night. Middle insomnia refers to an inability of an individual to maintain the state of sleep. It is usually a result of certain medical illness. And lastly, terminal or late insomnia, which is characterized by waking up too early in the morning, much earlier than is required.

Insomnia has another variety which is much fatal than its other forms, known as Familial insomnia. Unfortunately, it still has no cure so far and scientists are looking for a probable answer in gene therapy.

Only 28 families worldwide, have been detected to be suffering from familial insomnia, and each member of these 28 families have eventually died from this malady. It is a genetic disorder caused due to a certain malfunction in the brain that eventually results into panic disorders, phobias, dementia and hallucinations. The ailment starts showing visible signs only from the age of 35.

Possible Answers to Sleeplessness

The key to treating insomnia lies in identifying what is giving you the sleepless nights and not simply popping a pill. Using sedatives and pills may be the easiest means of relief but it is definitely not the safest. Besides, it isn’t even a cure in the true sense because the downside of their repeated usage is a high psychological and physical dependency. But that’s not such a bad news because psychotherapy and alternative medicines, such as yoga, meditation and ayurveda have very safe and reliable answers to this problem. To begin with, you can try some sleep inducing tips at home.

Sleep Inducing Tips

• Have a light dinner. A glass of warm milk or some cheese and crackers should be an ideal one.

• Avoid the consumption of caffeine in tea, coffee, fizzy drinks, and chocolate. Also try to keep yourself away from decongestants, alcohol and tobacco.

• Try and completely do away with the afternoon nap if you think it could be interfering with your sleep at night.

• Stop thinking about your worries endlessly, for it is not going to get you anywhere. Instead spend about an hour or so simply penning down your worries and their probable solutions… even may be your wishes.

• Exercise more often but seldom before going to bed at night.

What we realize today, Sophocles said long ago, “Sleep is the only medicine that gives ease.”