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This, apparently.
Yup. It is currently the time for sleep, and yet here I am.
Make up stories in my head.
Rub one out.
Practice meditation.
A good night is when I do all three in order :-)
Make up stories in my head.
This is super effective to help get to sleep. Just waking fantasies of being a superhero, or in a zombie apocalypse or being super rich. Any fictional narrative to keep the mind from wandering to racing thoughts or stresses. Gets me to sleep every time.
All the most effective stuff you can do to get better sleep is done ahead of time (like daily exercise, not spending time in bed when not sleeping, keeping a sleep schedule, avoiding caffeine/alcohol etc), so if I get to that point there isn’t that much to be done. Getting up and doing something nonstimulating other than lying in bed for ten minutes can help a little bit sometimes. If there’s something in my sleep environment that is abnormal and it’s possible to correct it that will help. Lowering the temperature can help.
Fully agree, that part helped the most with improving falling asleep time and sleep quality.
More melatonin and breathing exercises i referenced in other comment are for those abnormal, one off occasions and usually the cause can be pointed back to some daily activity.
Yeah, tbh I also take .5mg melatonin before bed regularly and add a valerian root tablet on top of that occasionally
Same, 1,9mg of melatonin, but if any of the preparation during the day isn’t on point. That melatonin does absolutely nothing. With the preparations It’s providing a slight push to speed up falling asleep.
I read many years ago that insomnia is a survival mechanism due to low calories.
I get up and have a light meal. Seems to work for me.
To fall asleep?
Think Sa on inhale and Ha on exhale can work, or I count backwards from 100 in Spanish, starting over when I forget where I am. Yin yoga is good too, forward folds calm the nervous system.
To do something else, when it seems sleep is not possible or desirable? Emotional stress? Get out of bed & go for a night walk, or even a run. Exercise. Get physically exhausted if possible.
Listen to a audiobook for a book I’ve read before. I have a sleepy mask with headphones built in so I don’t bother my partner.
If it’s a song looping and keeping me awake: I picture myself rising up above the earth to the vacuum of space where there is no sound and drifting off in the silent void.
Otherwise the go to is picturing my mind and consciousness as a submarine on the surface of wakefulness and I let myself slowly sink beneath the waves of sleep.
I used to just do hobbies until physical exhaustion would force me to sleep.
Now i sleep 9 - 14 hours on the regular 🤷♀️ Don’t fuck up your circadian rythm kids
My sister is a registered nurse, and she has a pro tip. Electric blanket. I wrap myself, and I am out like a light.
Also, I am a “sleeper” after r/Futurama_Sleepers when I was over there, so I just download episodes of my favourite tv shows, usually American Dad, Family Guy, Venture Brothers and what not, onto this old phone I have, and set the screen to the lowest brightness, sometimes the screen is off, and the volume low and I watch till I fall asleep. I have not made it past 20 minutes yet in the years I have done this.
Electric blanket as in a heated blanket? How would that help you sleep? I sleep on a heated blanket but u only do that because otherwise the bed is too cold for me but I don’t feel the heat does anything to help me sleep.
Well, the cosy warm feeling tends to lead me to sleep. It works like a charm.
Yes, heated blanket. Around me.
Go Team Venture
Go Team Venture.
make food, wrap up in soft blankets, talk to strangers on the internet. might as well at least be comfortable if I can’t be unconscious
Take more melatonin and try boxed breathing exercises. Keep trying until i fall asleep or morning comes.
Boxed breathing? Tell me more 😊.
Just a variation of general breathing exercises.
Created to calm the body and nervous system down, generally used to help with anxiety, stress, insomnia.- Breathing in while counting to 4(roughly 4 seconds).
- holding breath while slowly counting to 4.
- breathing out while counting to 4.
- waiting for 4 seconds before breathing in again.
I found putting a number of seconds on it made it much harder for me because I was concentrating so hard on breathing exactly x seconds. Just making it even and slow worked much better. YMMV
Yeah completely fair, just slowing down and controlling breathing is good enough for me as well.
I don’t necessarily subscribe to this belief but there are certainly purveyors of breathing excellence who would tell you that the count for each side of the box is important.
I agree that counting is challenging.
You’ve heard of the sandman, right? Well, now you know why marital artists punch buckets of sand
Marital artists punching stuff sounds, bad.
Melatonin just makes most people super drowsy during the day.
Most people do take it without any preparation and in too strong dosages. Basically using it as a high dose stand alone sleeping pill rather than a sleeping aid in conjunction with general sleep hygiene, which starts already during the day.
Like if i have to resort to the last method, i will be drowsy during the next day, but it’s better than being completely sleep deprived.
That sounds a bit presumptive.
Like most supplements, if you already have enough of whatever thing then taking more wont be beneficial.
Not really presumptive if you’re aware that like 99% of the adult population are disrupting their circadian rhythm, and natural melatonin production, with screens and artificial light.
But yes, like any supplement, don’t take it unless you have a deficiency.
Well the next day drowsiness is one of the most common side effects of taking it too much.
In addition to constantly seeing the same people drinking caffeine products late into the evening, absolutely no exercise and complaining how melatonin does nothing is already enough to presume that they are using it wrong or aren’t taking sleep hygiene seriously enough.
Try low dose children’s gummies; they don’t make you drowsy the next day.
What I always do: read and/or write.
Night is often much quieter than the rest of the day, which makes it perfect for quiet activities like reading and writing. And in the early morning I can even stop reading/writing in order to listen birds singing which is even better… before the roaring motorized traffic cover their tiny voice for the rest of the day (yes, I do live in a busy city).
Hearing the birds waking up is usually how I know I’ve gone from staying up pretty late to staying up really late. I am listening to them right now. It’s pretty :)
It is, indeed :)
Whatcha reading? I just finished The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K Le Guin. I already feel like I need to re-read it because it is dense but I’ve just picked up The Language of the Night so I’m gonna finish that one first. I’ve known about Le Guin forever, she’s always on the lists of notable sci-fi authors, but somehow I’ve never read her stuff until now and I think I’m hooked.
I just finished reading of Cordwainer Smith first volume of his Instrumentality of Mankind. I read it in a French translation I was given, not expecting much out of it, I was almost decided to just give to a friend of mine but then decided to give it a chance, just reading a few pages to see what it was all about and if it was any good… I could not put it down. Most of the time, I was very much impressed. It’s smart, it’s bright, deeply humane, and very imaginative too. It was subtle or not so subtle, depending the story. And most of the time it was very well crafted. I felt like a moron to never have read anything by this dude.
I liked the book so much I picked the next 3 volumes of that set… in their French translation, like the first volume I just read, as I was unable to get my hands on any English print edition.
This evening, not sleeping, and alone in our new but yet unfurnished apartment (save a few books, obviously), I started re-reading of The Hobbit, this one in its original English ;)
What a coincidence, Le Guin speaks very highly of Cordwainer Smith in The Language of the Night. Gonna have to give him a go soon.
Does she? Had no idea, but that may not come has a surprise they both shared the same ability to create entire worlds that were so effing convincing :)
Depends on what I want to accomplish when I can’t sleep.
If I don’t have to be up early the next day and/or don’t have anything terribly demanding the next day, I will embrace the insomnia to an extent. Play a game for a bit. Maybe go do some work on the computer. Empty the dishwasher. Just find useful things to do that will help make the next day(s) a bit lighter.
If I do have to get up, have a heavy day, or just would prefer to sleep, then I do fairly standard things. I’ll go grab something to read (sans a screen). I’ll find something relaxing to listen to (no videos, just audio). I’ll try various visualization / relaxation / counting techniques.
And if all else fails, I’ll just find some random movie to watch and sit/lay on the couch or in a recliner to veg out.
For me, not being able to sleep sucks, but lying down with my eyes closed and embracing my thoughts still leaves me feeling better the next day compared to getting up, moving around, etc.
i scroll lemmy… yeah i should stop doing this
take a pill
