To ask you about your sleep?

[SolarSystemic]

If you used to sleep badly and now sleep well, what helped? Is it light level, temperature, something you eat, a supplement, something you do or use or wear? What changed your sleep?

(if you’ve always been a great sleeper please don’t answer, I’m looking to try some things that might finally help me get the rest I really fucking need 😩)

I have ADHD and am in peri so I know those things affect my sleep, but I want to try a few different things to see if I can go from 3 hours to four or five or maybe even more!

Watching to see if I can get some useful tips!

Amitriptyline 30mg (prescribed for something else)
Magnesium glycinate
Separate rooms
Earplugs

Oh and a cool gel pillow for my head and another one to rest my feet on, when it's hot

I’ve got magnesium glycinate but it makes me so bloated I stopped taking it as Inwas really uncomfortable! Earplugs are a good shout. Don’t have enough bedrooms for me to be in my own one but I imagine that really helps! I used to take amitriptyline till I got pregnant and I’ve never gone back on them…worth a thought…

No caffeine after 1pm (it has a half life of 8 hours) - 3 cups of coffee max in the morning, but better if just 1

Cut down/eliminate alcohol

Listen to Ally Boothroyd’s yoga nidra for sleep on YouTube to help drift off

Lots of therapy (feeling safe and secure helps me let down my guard for sleep)

Bringing bedtime forward - used to be regular 11pm but now more like 10pm.

Losing weight helped breathing, and practicing breathing through nose properly through the day helps me do that more naturally at night (good breathing helps with getting into deeper sleep)

Make sure the room is properly dark - again helps with deeper sleep and signalling nighttime to the brain

I know it sounds silly but things that helped me

• Teddy Bear / Jellycat bunny
• Temple Spa cream - Restore or they also have a pillow mist but I can’t remember what they call it
• Electric blanket
• A piece of calm-ish music I can play quietly to remind my head it’s bedtime. I settled on Venus from Holst’s The Planets but I’m not normally a classical music person at all
• Pitch black room
• Brushed Cotton duvet for cosiness

Blackout curtains/blinds
An eye mask
Ear plugs
DH sleeping in another room
Never looking at my phone/a watch/the clock in the middle of the night
No caffeine after 1pm
No alcohol after 8pm (and not much before)
Cutting out onion, garlic and other high fructan veg which gives me endless wind and disturbs my sleep

The above have helped, but ideally I need to eliminate stress I think, which means giving up my job (not financially viable!) Also, I'm still having regular periods and sleep very badly the week before my period starts, so maybe not having periods will help a bit one day!

Weighted blanket. It literally transformed me from needing to lie in bed for an hour or two before dropping off, to being able to close my eyes and be asleep in minutes. Witchcraft.

I think my sleep has always been dominated by hormones. I have always slept badly the night or two before my period. I'm 53 and my sleep had definitely got worse during perimenopause (I'm not in menopause yet). For a while I had trouble getting to sleep, then that stopped. Then I started waking up at 4:00 every morning. I'm now sleeping well, but I'm not sure if it's a temporary balancing of hormones, or the supplements I take, a women's 50+ one, a probiotic and also ashwagandha. The ashwagandha definitely sorted my perimenopausal anxiety.

I think that is my main issue as my sleep started to go wrong when I hit puberty and it’s been a mess ever since getting worse when I was pregnant and then in waves after weaning and after going into peri. Interesting about the ashwaghanda, I might try that. I tried other things like red clover and agnus caster and they weren’t helpful.

The ashwagandha is incredible - it switched off my anxiety within a week, light flicking a light switch! The woman 50+ supplement may have also helped with the sleep - I generally tend to be a bit anaemic and it has iron in it. Anaemia can cause or contribute to poor sleep.

I've recently started taking magnesium and it is making a positive difference.

Yes, magnesium made me sleep too, but unfortunately it doesn't agree with me- it gave me terrible stomach pains!

Okay I might give it a go. And my iron is quite low but I’m useless at remembering to take supplements and forget most days, maybe that is affecting it too. Thanks, this is all very useful.

For me what works wonder is a intense cardio session at the gym followed by a shower in very hot water. I get that depending on family circumstances this can be challenging.

What time do you do this? I have heard about not exercising too late at night but a friend told me she sleeps better after an evening Pilates session.

Stopping worrying about sleep and accept that, for now at least, you sleep badly.

That's literally the only solution and the mind can't be tricked. If you're worried about sleeping and desperately striving for sleep, you won't sleep.

Just accept that your sleep is bad for now. Much like, if you had a cold, you wouldn't rail against it or stress about having a cold. You'd just think 'this is shit, but it will go at some point'. The more you try to control and fix your sleep, the worse it is likely to get. Just eat as well as you can and exercise as much as you can and see what happens.

Slept like a baby till chemo last year! Things that I find helpful. Not a complete cure though.snack before bed,warm milk and some crackets.cool bedroom cotton sheets fan .3bsquare meals .can't sleep when hungry. A walk with the dog.bath afternoon as fall asleep too early otherwise.nothing scary or gritty violent in the run up to bed .even the news sometimes. Lavender spray.

Also teddy and Caffeine free tes.no alcohol

One hour before going to sleep, so around 9 pm.

Wow okay, this is so different to the advice I’ve heard about exercise!

I take magnesium, tryptophan, and melatonin (ordered from France) about an hour before bed.

No caffeine after midday.

Only a little bit of alcohol - preferably none at all because it puts me into too heavy a sleep initially which makes me more likely to wake up early feeling like I'm not refreshed.

Dim lights only in the evenings. I have fairy lights and a salt lamp for my only lighting.

Keep the temperature in the bedroom about 17 or 18 degrees.

An open window or a fan can help. A breeze is calming.

I sleep under an electric blanket in a silk sleeping bag. The warmth in bed in a cold room is just right. A silk sleeping bag is perfect for summer and winter too. I'll use just the sleeping bag and a blanket when it's roasting.

A snack before bed can help, especially some kind of eggs or a banana.

White noise. I've made a perfect mix for myself on a sleep noises app. That really helps switch my brain off or drift into my imagination. If I'm still struggling, I'll have an audiobook as well. This is on a Bluetooth speaker next to my bed.

Eye mask.

Trying to follow my natural sleep pattern. I'm a night owl so I let myself do things late at night if that's when I've got the energy to. It's much easier to sleep if you wait until you're actually tired.

I also have a small amount of sleeping tablets on prescription and my antidepressant is a little soporific, so those help too. I have chronic insomnia so it is something I've spoken to the GP about in the past.

Magnesium high dose and fixing my anemia - plus no caffeine past 8.30am and daily excercise.

Got a new job. Previous job played on my mind and I would wake up in the night thinking about work

Peri was shocking for my sleep, apart from stressful times, I slept well until then but peri has absolutely wrecked that.
I’ve always avoided caffeine from lunchtime as I’m sensitive to it. I do take a magnesium supplement which I think probably helps (my friend swears that cream rubbed into the feet is better, maybe try that if you didn’t get on with the supplements?)
But, actually the biggest difference was realising that it actually didn’t matter- I wasn’t any more tired the next day, it’s boring but that’s all.
dh has been away for a few days, I’ve definitely slept better - not ready for separate beds but seriously considering two single quilts instead of our king as he flops it onto me when he gets too hot (in his sleep to be fair)