
Dealing with Insomnia - jacquesm
https://jacquesmattheij.com/dealing-with-insomnia/
======
caymanjim
I think my biggest problem is that I don't exhaust myself physically. Humans
are built for constant labor. We're the endurance-running champions of the
animal kingdom. As recently as last century, almost all jobs were physically
exhausting.

Mind work is exhausting as well, but in a different way. At the end of a
strenuous day of coding, and endless meetings, I'm drained. Completely wiped
out. I _feel_ physically exhausted, but I'm not, at all.

On the rare occasions that I physically exhaust myself, be it home remodeling,
yard work, or canoeing, I sleep like the dead. No insomnia, solid rest. I
still have all the same things going on in my life; the same job, same bills,
all the anxieties large and small that "keep me awake" other nights. Which is
why I don't think any of it is psychological. My body just isn't worn out
enough.

I'm not looking for advice. "You should exercise more! Have you tried X?" This
is my observation. We aren't constructed for office work.

~~~
derefr
> Humans are built for constant labor. We're the endurance-running champions
> of the animal kingdom.

I mean, sure, we _can_ do that. But most of our ape relatives lay about all
day socializing and taking advantage of their social cohesiveness to hunt-and-
gather very quickly (and then get back to lazing around.) They have many
capabilities, but rarely use them, because social organization is just so OP
compared to the defenses of most of the animal kingdom.

The big strong apes (e.g. gorillas) don't use their strength for _anything_
day-to-day; they just use it in occasional tribal territorial disputes and
social-hierarchy disputes, which don't take up all that much of their time,
all-said. Certainly not enough to wear them out by the end of the day, every
day.

I don't see any reason that our sleeping habits would have gone through a big
evolutionary shift relative to all the other apes; so if they can—and do—sleep
just fine without exhausting themselves, we very likely can as well. If we
can't, it's very likely not "lack of exhaustion" that's the cause.

IMHO, exhaustion seems to just be a hack, overriding the concerns of some
other part of us that thinks it important for us to stay awake; rather than
the proper resolution of that mechanism's concerns.

~~~
caymanjim
Apes spend over 50% of their day chewing food, and most of the rest sitting
around digesting. Their diets are low-energy and they really can't do much
else. We require over 25% more calories (adjusted for total body mass). There
are some large physiological differences. This is what they're doing while
socializing. We really are turbocharged engines by comparison. Our bodies are
still adjusting, poorly, to the shift to agriculture and its higher caloric
supply. Until recently agriculture was also hard work for everyone in a
society. Apes can't wear themselves out in the same way because they lack the
horsepower. They're maxed-out.

~~~
derefr
Have there been any studies on the differences in behavior of apes fed high-
calorie diets? (Presumably non-interventionist studies, of e.g. apes that
scavenge from urban areas encroaching into their habitats.)

For that matter, how about the "city" monkeys of Lopburi, who eat human food
(either from human offerings, or by stealing it)? Anyone looked into their
sleep cycles?

~~~
caymanjim
I'm approaching the limit of my simian expertise. Those are interesting
questions. I know captive apes outside laboratory conditions (zoo animals,
pets, entertainment) are prone to diabetes, heart disease, and other modern
human medical plagues, but I don't know their sleep habits.

~~~
StavrosK
Are apes not in captivity not prone to those diseases? What do they die of?

------
piinbinary
> Finally, the world is asleep and even a person who has trouble focusing in
> the face of distraction has a chance of getting something done.

"The world is asleep" is basically my definition of serene and peaceful.

\---

A while back, there was a national holiday, so I had the day off. I didn't
actually have anything I wanted to do with that day, so I used it to plan out
my next work project. It was a very productive day where I went from being
very unsure of how to do the project to having a blueprint that directed what
I did for months to come. The project would be in a much worse place if it
weren't for the thinking I was able to do on that one day.

It wasn't a productive day in the sense that I got a lot of things done (my
usual definition of productivity), but it was productive in the sense that I
got some important, deep thinking done. It's rare to get a chance to do such
deep thinking.

This kind of productivity is hard to achieve in the face of distractions. But
I think it is actually worse than that: It is hard to achieve when there is
even a _risk_ of distractions. When my brain knows that someone could demand
my attention at any time, it seems to limit the amount of working memory,
focus, and time I can spent thinking about something.

But if I know that I don't have to pay attention to interruptions, the problem
I'm thinking about can take over and I can spend time swimming in the problem
instead of just splashing my toes in.

All this is a long-winded way of saying that knowing you _might_ be
interrupted can be almost as bad as actually being interrupted.

~~~
bosie
This shouldn't come across as flippant but how can you be productive if you
never think deeply?

~~~
piinbinary
I think I get what you mean.

To me, it's a matter of degree. Reading slack, reading emails, 1:1s, project
sync meetings, merging PRs, etc all require nearly no depth of thinking.
Creating a design for a small problem or understanding unfamiliar code
requires a bit more, debugging more still.

The possibility (and actuality) of interruptions is also a matter of degree. A
day with one meeting after lunch and nothing on fire allows for deeper focus
than a day with nothing but 30 minute gaps between meetings and 15 people on
Slack all wanting something.

The deepest thinking - the kind that is best suited to having an entire day of
space - helps the most with the hardest problems: planning a complex project,
understanding a new bit of type theory, etc.

(And it is not necessarily true that these problems are impossible to solve in
the face of distractions, but a day of focus might match the output of a
distracted week - and sometimes it's hard to budget a whole week just to think
about something!)

edit: s/is only strictly necessary for the hardest problems/helps the most
with the hardest problems/

------
34679
After decades of trouble falling asleep, I've found a simple technique that
works for me. The goal of this technique is to replace words/monologue with
images in your stream of consciousness. I do this by picturing three shapes,
each engulfing the previous one. Start with a sphere. Just imagine a sphere
and nothing else. Then picture a 5 sided pyramid that perfectly engulfs the
sphere so that the sides are tangential. As this happens the sphere shrinks so
the pyramid takes up the space of the sphere. Then repeat, but with a cube. So
the cube encompasses the pyramid, with the bottom planes the same and the 4
upper edges intersecting with the 4 upper corners of the cube. Then shrink
that and put it in a sphere, starting the process over.

I've found that when I'm really tired I have no trouble conjuring this imagery
and sometimes within just a few cycles, vivid explosions of color will flood
in and I go to sleep. Other times, I struggle to picture a sphere and start
off with the 2d equivalents - circle, square, triangle. The whole thing is a
bit like counting sheep, but that never worked for me.

~~~
baby
I have a similar technique that I really need to document I think about random
ideas in succession very quickly. For example:

if I hammer an icecube I’ll get to the meeting on monday. But then that’s
apple day. Better running away. There are dogs falling from the sky so I’ll
take my fork. Etc.

It works every single time. Takes around 10-15min of doing this

~~~
sideshowb
I've recently been trying a podcast called sleep with me, it basically takes
this approach, about an hour of deliberately not very coherent narration

------
flowerlad
Try magnesium. Stress depletes magnesium. The cells in our body need magnesium
and calcium for their operation. When you're low on magnesium your cells can't
go into off state. When that happens your muscles become stiffer and you can't
sleep. Magnesium supplementation is the solution.

"Supplementation of 500 mg of Mg has been associated with significant
improvement in the insomnia severity index, sleep time, sleep efficiency,
sleep onset latency, serum cortisol concentration, serum renin, and
melatonin."
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5637834/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5637834/)

"As compared to the placebo group, in the experimental group, dietary
magnesium supplementation brought about statistically significant increases in
sleep time..."
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3703169/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3703169/)

"When Mg2+ was reintroduced in food and water, sleep organization and ECoG
recordings were restored to their original patterns."
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8232845](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8232845)

~~~
ComputerGuru
Thanks for providing the links on the benefits of sleep linked to magnesium,
but can you provide a link for this:

> Stress depletes magnesium.

~~~
flowerlad
I don't have any peer-reviewed research publications on this, but here's a
magazine article:

[https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evolutionary-
psychia...](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evolutionary-
psychiatry/201106/magnesium-and-the-brain-the-original-chill-pill)

Quote: "stress causes us to waste our magnesium like crazy"

------
verylittlemeat
I'm 30 and just went through the most serious bout of insomnia in my life. It
was nothing like the insomnia I read about or saw in media.

The crux of my insomnia was anxiety. I was dead tired and sleep deprived but
as soon as I laid down my mind and heart would race. I couldn't convince
myself to relax with any of the mind tricks in this thread. I would get so mad
and frustrated that I would try to will myself to sleep, tossing and turning
for hours. The thought of browsing my phone in bed or reading or anything else
just made me more angry because I knew I was tired, why wouldn't my body
sleep! The crazier part is that right now I'm furloughed, I have no real work
or life obligations. I have no reason to be worried about going to sleep or
waking up a certain time.

The solution ended up being kind of dumb and novel. I turned my bed into an
adult rocking/shaking bassinet. I'll spare you the details but I basically
attached one of those vibrating body massagers to the frame of my bed with a
sleep timer. For some reason this relaxed me enough to consistently fall
asleep in about 10 minutes every night.

(Also just a note: I tried all the other standard stuff. No alcohol, no
caffeine, intense exercise, sleep hygiene etc etc)

~~~
keenmaster
What in tarnation, that sounds like a product idea. Maybe that works because
the vibrations draw your attention in a multi-sensory way, forcing your racing
thoughts to a halt. Maybe there’s also a Pavlovian response. Vibration = sleep

~~~
verylittlemeat
You should try it and see what you think. I thought of other fancier designs
like using "bass kickers" or transducers as a more permanent solution.
Honestly though I'm just happy that I found something to help me sleep. If
you're willing to put in the time/effort to turn it into a product go for it.

The idea came to me as a coincidence. During my insomnia I came across this
product [0] in a hacker news comment. I was so tired and delusional that I
figured I'm basically just a cranky baby +150 lbs.

[0] [https://www.happiestbaby.com/](https://www.happiestbaby.com/)

~~~
balfirevic
Come on, we need pictures!

Is it noisy, could it be used in an apartment with someone living on the floor
below?

------
lbayes
I've struggled with brutal insomnia (getting to sleep and staying asleep) my
entire life (45 years old now). Over the years, I've gotten pretty good at
forcing myself to get to work early and just made due with 4-6 hours on most
nights and trying to make it up on the weekends.

Early this year I discovered medical marijuana. It's completely game changing.
A few puffs from a vaporizer (with flower, not the terrible oil pens) and I've
had some of the best sleep of my entire life. I don't remember a time when
I've ever actually felt good waking up until now.

The other key (for me) was the book, "The Obstacle is the Way" by Ryan
Holiday. This helped me dramatically reduce the nonsense and worries that
would crowd my mind as I tried to fall asleep.

Obviously YMMV, but these two things together have helped far more and far
longer (6 months now) than anything else I've ever tried.

~~~
wuwuno
I was born not to sleep. Newborns typically sleep 22-23 hours a day. I was
sleeping for 1-2 hours. I almost destroyed my family. If you have children
imagine your child only sleeping 1-2 hours day.

From birth until I was about 12 I lived on 1-3 hours sleep a day, but I slept
every day.

When I hit puberty I started having days and days of no sleep, my record is 11
days without sleeping I was 15. From 14 until my mid 50's my routine was get
2-3 hours of sleep, then be awake for a 3-8 days, then get 2-3 hours of sleep,
then be awake for 3-8 days, wash rinse repeat, over and over again.

I once was working a trade show setup in my late 40's, round the clock prep,
my company had 3 shifts of people doing all the prep work, I was there for all
5 days every shift. That's when my co-workers realized that I was actually
awake, most people think that I was sleeping and didn't know it, or get cat
naps, lied etc. Because nobody can even consider being awake that long but the
thing is that when I get sleepy I actually fall asleep, it just rarely happens
and when it does happen, it doesn't last very long. Usually I'm just awake.

Yes I went in for sleep studies but I needed to be wired up at all times, and
it's a real drag being wired up and then trying to sit in a room for 6 days
until I get sleepy. I did it twice, once for 5 days another time it was 4 days
and both times I didn't fall asleep what they learned is that the normal
cycles that people go through to fall asleep didn't happen for me. When I die
they can try examining my body to see if they can figure it out.

When I was in my mid fifties I found a iphone app called BrainWave is a
Binaural beats program that will actually allow me to sleep on nearly a daily
basis. It's been a godsend, because being awake all the time really can wear
you out intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually.

~~~
rajlego
Wow, that's insane.

There's a program called SuperMemo which has a feature called sleepchart. In
sleepchart, you plot sleep episodes which gives you some neat data that can
help figure out things like subjective night [1].

But since SuperMemo is a spaced repetition system, sleepchart can also do some
very unique analysis. The main graph it can make with repetition data + sleep
data is alertness over time: how grades change the longer you've been awake. I
would be very curious if you were to try it to see how your alertness/grades
reported for repetitions change the longer you're awake.

[1]
[https://supermemo.guru/wiki/Subjective_night](https://supermemo.guru/wiki/Subjective_night)

------
bamboozled
There is way too much pressure on people to get enough sleep. We are told it's
scientifically and medically important, but it doesn't help people feel more
relaxed thinking that their brains are turning into a disheveled walnut from
not getting the perfect 8 hours of sleep each night.

Why We sleep provides some good insights and tips but it can also make one
feel quite scared of not getting enough sleep. We should stop feeling so
pressured and ashamed if we don't get the prefect 8 hours.

Thinking of it objectively, what was sleeping really like hundreds or
thousands of years ago? Did we ever have a time where the perfect sleep was
attainable, purely free of stresses, in 100% darkness with no interference, or
is that just an idea we have?

Personally what makes sleeping harder for me, is all the anxiety around
getting great sleep and the negative feelings I have towards that experience
the next day. Usually by lunchtime I forgot I had a bad sleep and all the
negative feelings associated with it and just get on with life, and I feel ok.

------
sillysaurusx
If you suffer particularly bad insomnia, I encourage you to do a sleep study.
It was life-changing for me.

I was able to discover that I suffer from narcolepsy, a rare but nonetheless
real condition. It's not at all like most people think: you don't randomly
fall asleep during the day. But your sleep schedule isn't really a schedule so
much as a stochastic random walk.

Even if you don't have a rare disorder, there's a good chance a sleep study
will benefit you. For example, a coworker said that a CPAP machine was
similarly lifechanging.

~~~
joegahona
I just had a sleep study, but because of snorting, not insomnia. I was playing
around with one of the many snoring apps available now and was mortified at
how I sound all night! They gave me a take-home apparatus to wear one night an
then I had a call with a doctor who interpreted the results to me. He said I
wasn't a horrible case but recommended I try a CPAP for a few months, which
I'm now in the process of getting.

------
jedberg
Ironically I'm reading this as the clock reads 5:23am and I'm just winding
down for the night. Out my office window I can see the sun rising.

I've broken this habit in the past. When my wife was working as a teacher and
I dropped her off at work every morning, I was up and out every weekday at
7:30am, and at work by 7:50. I got a ton of stuff done in the morning because
no one else started showing up until 9am at least.

But now, during quarantine, we set no alarms. No one in the family has to be
anywhere at any particular time. And so we've all shifted, even the kids. All
of wake around noon, and the kids go down around 2am (and the adults between
4am and 6am).

Late nights just seem to be our natural schedule, but all it takes is an alarm
and an early morning responsibility to shift the family schedule.

~~~
gonzo41
I am having this same issue. I'm trying to get back 20 mins each night to
bring it back to a 12pm bedtime.

I'm still working from 9am so the mornings are pretty rough at the moment, But
something about the lockdown is trouble.

------
Brushfire
I’ve struggled with insomnia my whole adult life and I can tell you the three
factors that have helped the most are, in order:

\- removing caffeine completely

\- getting enough direct sunlight (hours per day)

\- losing weight

Everything else (melatonin, blue light, exercise, sleepy tea, other drugs,
etc) never helped or made my quality of life worse.

~~~
keenmaster
Caffeine is too useful for me to give up entirely. I had similar success with
a rule: no caffeine after 12 PM (not even caffeinated soft drinks). Caffeine
has a long half-life, which is especially problematic for people who, for
genetic reasons, respond more to a given amount of caffeine. What I usually do
is I have 2 cups of coffee back to back before 11 A.M. I feel the benefits for
most of the day. It may be tempting to violate the rule and have an afternoon
coffee “just this once” at the beginning but you get used to it. Furthermore,
if you feel the need for more coffee in the afternoon, that’s a sign that your
work habits and distractions need to change, not your physical energy level.

~~~
acituan
> if you feel the need for more coffee in the afternoon, that’s a sign that
> your work habits and distractions need to change, not your physical energy
> level.

Out of curiosity, why does this apply to the afternoon coffee and not the
morning coffee? Maybe finding coffee useful at all is a sign?

~~~
jacquesm
Because cafeine breaks down over time so your evening/afternoon coffee has a
much bigger effect on your later sleeping attempts than morning coffee. I
don't drink coffee at all so that does not apply to me but I can see the
confusion in the GP and your response to it.

~~~
keenmaster
Correct, that's what I was referring to with the long half-life. The later you
consume caffeine, the more likely it is to disrupt your sleep. A logical
extension of that is the following: if you know that caffeine has a worse
reward-to-harm ratio in the afternoon, and you consume it even though it might
disrupt your sleep (assuming it does), you might be grasping for productivity
straws. Alternatively, caffeine pretty much only has upside when it is
consumed in the morning. It increases wakefulness and several academic studies
found that coffee specifically improves your health (not sure how much of that
is due to the plant material vs. the caffeine).

------
warrenmiller
Give 4-7-8 breathing a go

[https://www.drweil.com/videos-
features/videos/the-4-7-8-brea...](https://www.drweil.com/videos-
features/videos/the-4-7-8-breath-health-benefits-demonstration/)

~~~
TedDoesntTalk
Thank you for this.

------
mettamage
I am dealing with sleep issues right now. My 2 game changing habits are:

\- melatonin

\- doing my best to wake up at 06:00.

In reality, I wake up at 07:00 or even 09:00 but it is guaranteed to save me a
few hours of sleep deprivation. In general with these 2 “tricks” I have 2
hours less sleep deprivation than normal. They also have a lot of synergies.

One other thing I am now thinking about is to have a color coded night light
with red (you have to sleep), orange (you can wake up if you’re wide awake and
truly can’t sleep) and green (you’re in the wake up zone) as color codes. By
doing this, I wouldn’t feel the need to check my time at night. Or maybe I
should program an app that has some Siri integration (if that’s possible,
probably isn’t). By having this, I wouldn’t feel inclined to check the time.

Oh, and this would be alongside an alarm.

------
manmal
For some people, improving (reducing) CO2 levels in the bedroom might be low
hanging fruit. Ever since moving to a new place with a controlled ventilation
system, I had no dream recall, and often suffered from incredible fatigue and
tiredness. I suspect that I was low on REM phases, but never got a sleep study
done. Finally, I started opening the sleeping room window ever so slightly, by
turning the window handle a bit to the open position. We also started changing
the air filter of the ventilation system more often, as air flow becomes
noticeably weaker after ~3-4 weeks. As a result, I often dream now, and wake
well rested most of the time. For me, air flow has proven more important than
blue light reduction, or weight loss.

~~~
mike_h
If you’re curious about CO2, there are a number of home CO2 monitors available
these days. It was really enlightening to me to see the levels rise well above
optimal within just a few hours of sleeping with the room sealed.

~~~
manmal
Thanks for the hint! CO2 is so often overlooked as the problem. There’s even
CO2 toxicity, and it happens faster than one would believe.

------
kirse
_I never made the link with the sound levels before._

I just figured this out recently too. >6pm when people left the office and
>8pm when the dull humming of the HVAC turned off gave this odd feeling of
calm like it had been subconsciously aggravating me for hours.

Also stumbled on a wiki article on "Directed Attention Fatigue" [1] which
implied that the brain's way of focusing is not like turning up the heat on a
laser, but more like applying multiple blinders to a horse to create a tiny
reticle of focus. That basically meant clear out as many visual-field and
sound distractions as possible to minimize the energy required for attention
(and increase stamina, too).

One thing I also try w/ the noise-cancelling headphones is only wear them
during productive work, so that my brain subconsciously associates headphones
on = work time.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_attention_fatigue](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_attention_fatigue)

------
DenisM
Sleep problems are largely caused by anxiety, once treated it gives way to
solid sleep.

Tweaking the schedule/environment/diet/etc to improve sleep is like using AC
to overpower a thermostat-controlled furnace.

Most people who are told they have anxiety will fight tooth and nail against
the notion.

~~~
acituan
> Sleep problems are largely caused by anxiety, once treated it gives way to
> solid sleep.

Surely you mean _anxiety disorders_ , not anxiety itself. Anxiety is a part of
healthy human psyche. In that, having anxiety in response to improper
schedule/environment/diet is a sign of health and changing those would be the
primary way to "treat" it.

By the same token, only taking pills or going to therapy while
schedule/environment/diet stay bad is not treating it, even if the symptoms
could go away for a while. It is just delaying the problem for a greater
future crisis. Plus no doctor/therapist worth their salt would say "let's
ignore the context of your unsustainably taxing life, instead take these stop-
gap solutions to make you sleep for now".

~~~
DenisM
You're arguing with a lot of thins I did not say.

~~~
acituan
You've equivocated anxiety with anxiety disorders and dismissed the
suggestions on improving environmental factors. I posited even if a person
presents with anxiety, fixing environmental factors should be the first thing
to consider.

Sure I went ahead and criticized pill pushing as a first option which you
didn't openly suggest, but you made a vague suggestion of "treating anxiety
without changing environmental factors" which leaves pills and talk therapy as
the only remaining solutions as far as I can tell anyway.

~~~
DenisM
When I speak of "environment" I mean it in the most literal sense -
temperature, fresh air, sound/noise background, light pollution, mattress
firmness. Anxious people get obsessed over those things because they are
easily reached, but this obsession only bring temporary relief. I understand
you assign a different meaning to that word, so there is some misunderstanding
stemming from that.

In light of this clarification, would you like to start over?

------
btam
> After reading many reviews I kept on coming back to the same brand which I
> had sworn to never buy another item of due to their disrespect of users’
> systems integrity, aka the ‘rootkit debacle’

Does Sony really have the best noise cancelling headphones? What brands/models
have worked for people here? I've continuously struggled with distracting
noises through my education.

~~~
kolp
Bose are very good. I've a pair of wireless over ear headphones and my
girlfriend has the wireless in-ear ones. Noise cancellation is very good with
both, especially for constant background noise.

All over ear headphones will tend to cause your ears to warm up, so the in ear
ones are more comfortable. But the integrated microphone with the in-ear
headphones is surprisingly poor for phone calls.

~~~
masklinn
How large are their OTA headphones? I've been wondering about OTA noise-
cancelling headphones for a while for both music and cycling as I've bad ears
and excess wind leads to repeated otitis on short order (making actual non-
stationary cycling problematic). But I also have large ears, so most OTA would
literally sit on the ear cartilage and pressing it against the ear, making
wearing them for extended periods very uncomfortable. I remember AKG cans
having large-enough pads that they'd fit properly.

~~~
jacquesm
OTA -> OTE, I can't imagine 'over the air' headphones :)

~~~
masklinn
> OTA -> OTE

Yeeep.

> I can't imagine 'over the air' headphones :)

Well bluetooth are kinda OTA as opposed to wired 'phones.

------
non-entity
I've always had trouble sleeping but the conditions around the coronavirus
have made it increasingly worse.

I've been able to force myself to sleep recently with enough sleep aids, but
the amount I have to take to knock me out is terrible because it lasts so long
into the next day. Whereas previously I may have had to fight microsleeps if I
was particularly sleep deprived, I find myself having to fight full on passing
out until mid afternoon at least.

This, is a huge must for me:

> Absolutely no intra-day napping. When I violate this rule (as I still
> sometimes do) I usually have a bad night.

Prior to wfh, I would often come home from the office completely drained. Even
i did nothing at all and just sat aroud the exhaustion was worse than the rare
occasion I get physical exercise these days. It almost felt like my brain was
calling me to bed. But I've learned taking naps almost certainly means I wont
sleep the coming night.

------
nashalo_nighly
If you struggle with bad sleep I encourage you to get tested by a sleep
doctor. I was diagnosed with delayed sleep phase disorder (DSPD) and honestly
reading the Wikipedia page made me cry.

All my life I thought I was just a lazy person because I couldn’t achieve
anything in the morning (even if working at night is perfectly fine for me).

Lockdown really changed my life for the better. I was lucky enough in my job
to be able to set no alarm at all in the morning and I was able to follow my
internal sleep schedule. I began to have dreams again, and I feel actually
alive during the day. It’s wonderful but now I worry a lot about the time when
I won’t be able to wfh.

------
nippoo
The effect of noise on focus and productivity is super-interesting and one
that I've only accidentally come to realise recently myself. I live in an
averagely noisy part of the city and built myself a room-within-a-room sound-
isolated studio as a fair chunk of my work is audio-related. I was quite
surprised by how much my focus has increased since starting to work in the
studio (even on completely unrelated work). Since then I've noticed how easily
my focus switches at even the slightest noise (the fridge compressor kicking
in, a car driving past etc)

------
TheAdamAndChe
I'm reading this book(Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker) right now. The number
one piece of advice it provides is to set an alarm to go to bed and try to
fall asleep at the same time every night, even on weekends. Other pieces of
advice include lowering the temperature to 65°F at night(really), reduce or
stop caffeine and alcohol intake, avoid screen time and light at night, and
several other pieces of advice.

It's an okay book. Not the best I've read, but if you feel tired during the
day, it's worth a read. My sleep quality has markedly increased since starting
to read it.

~~~
elric
I enjoyed the book. If you're interested, my comment history on HN contains a
reference to i somewhere, where someone linked to serious criticism about many
of the book's claims, and a reply to said criticism by Matthew Walker.

Regarding the alarms: I find that consistency is much more important for mee
than total hours of sleep. I'm much better on a consistent 7h/day than on
8h/day where my sleep/wake time moves around.

------
Barrin92
I used to have bad anxiety and panic attacks when I was in my early 20s and in
university and also dealt with insomnia a lot. Exercise and the other tips in
the thread can help if people can't sleep due to bad sleep hygiene or just the
problems of modern lifestyles, but when the reason are mental issues or stress
and anxiety which seems to affect a lot of people during the pandemic it might
not always help.

What helped me a lot was to pick up an advice I got on fear during panic
attacks from a psychologist, which is to let go of control. If one tries to
control panic and can't then it's easy to develop a 'fear of fear' when you
fail, as it's ultimately simply not possible to control these things always.

Same helped with insomnia for me. It's very easy to be worried of going to
sleep if all you think about is how long you're going to lie awake, how good
your quality of sleep is and so on and you end up wired the moment you go to
bed and it becomes its own mental thing. While it sounds dumb and trivial to
simply stop worrying about it, it's actually a relatively hard thing to do.

It didn't solve sleep problems for me completely, which isn't the point, but
it's made me sleep a lot better, and most importantly made me less judgemental
about being tired a day. Mechanical solutions like forcing myself into a rythm
with discipline never tended to work for me well.

------
pedalpete
I've been an insomniac my entire life (46 years) and in December started
working on a wearable monitor my brain-waves and interact with them using
sound in order to induce sleep and optimize sleep states.

There are two similar products on the market already (Dreem and SmartSleep)
but I have a different approach.

I'd be keen to hear who in this community may be interested (I'll be posting
our webpage with more info soon) and if anybody has experience with Dreem or
SmartSleep, I'd be keen to hear of your experiences.

~~~
dnissley
I wrote up my experience with dreem here:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23432243](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23432243)

~~~
pedalpete
Thanks for linking to that. Sorry to hear you're going through the CBT-I
thing. I can't tell you how disappointed I am that this is the current state
of sleep therapy.

I hope it works for you, if not, we've got something on the way :)

------
lpellis
I'm on the same schedule you were (working till sunrize), but I dont have a
family or other obligations yet. If you were in my position do you still think
its worth it to try and change to a more regular cycle? I really enjoy my
nights.

On the topic of noise, there is one thing I wish could be more recognized as a
nuisance, and that is the damn leaf blowers. Especially now that everyone is
forced to work from home, every day around here for a couple of hours you are
subjected to that.

~~~
jacquesm
> I really enjoy my nights.

Yes, it's very seductive. Until I had a family I didn't see anything wrong
with it, that was just an out-of-phase life but it worked well enough for me.
Having kids and a business makes it a lot harder to live like that, and
working until you drop is an easy way to mask the fact that I had serious
problems falling asleep, either at a normal time or even at all. Working until
exhaustion seemed like a pretty efficient fix, I'd get a lot done and
eventually did get my sleep though not nearly enough of it.

The damage is cumulative as far as I understand it now and even though it gave
me an edge for a while I wonder if the price was worth it. Maybe get that book
from the library and read up on it (and some critiques of the book as well,
it's not all equally solid), then make up your mind as to what is the best
approach for your?

> the damn leaf blowers

They're a complete nuisance and utterly ineffective as well. Also, everybody
has their own schedule for running them. Fortunately here they are not too
popular but the few that are there really get me worked up.

------
olingern
Also an insomniac. I’ve ran into “sleep anxiety” over the past few years
which, for me, means becoming anxious when I think I’m supposed to go to bed.

Things that have helped:

\- Minimum of 10K steps per day

\- Weightlifting and HIIT

\- 0 light in my room (windowless room)

What has helped most:

\- Letting go of a rigid schedule and just letting tiredness dictate when I go
to bed.

My lifestyle is a luxury I can afford because I don’t have kids. I imagine
being a parent would really make dealing with insomnia much more difficult.

~~~
7demons
Become parent and your insomnia would be gone in a few weeks. You would be
exhausted mentally and physically. Drained out. I remember my child when she
was 1 - 2 years old. Jesus Christ... I slept wherever I could. In car, even in
toilet at work.

------
zaroth
A few years ago I found myself experiencing a different sort of very
debilitating sleeping problem. It started, as I recall, as something that
would just happen on airplanes, my legs would feel almost like a buildup of
lactic acid unless I moved them around. I could keep them still maybe for a
few second at most, until the sensation built to a point where it was
irresistibly uncomfortable and swinging or tapping my feet would instantly
provide relief. Restless leg syndrome.

While at first confined to trying to sleep in an airplane chair (interestingly
it never happened while sitting in front of a computer to work, or sitting at
the dinner table, just when sitting to _sleep_ ) eventually it followed me
into the bedroom, where it became a serious problem. Basically within seconds
of lying down my legs would start winding up. Think like, in order to get them
to settle down having to rapidly kick against the bed for 15 seconds and
getting like a 2 minute window to try to fall asleep before the sensation
built back up. And then even in my sleep, I would still be kicking around. Not
very practical to say the least.

What finally solved it for me was a doctor suggesting I try trazodone. It’s an
SSRI which was originally developed as an antidepressant, turns out to suck
for that, but it is a very nice little sedative. As long as I have 6hrs to
sleep, 25mg completely stops the restless leg syndrome and doesn’t make me
wake up groggy. It was an absolute lifesaver.

On a separate note, I can absolutely relate to getting my best work done at
night. Many times an all-nighter would result in more productive work than
multiple days that led up to it. The next day would be a wash, but usually I
could find myself back to a diurnal rhythm within a day or two. I never went
full vampire because frankly I find it far too exhausting to be trying to keep
that level of focus day after day, but many times over the years when workload
got out of control a shift to working nights was a crucial strategy.

~~~
pmoriarty
You might want to check your nutrition. Sometimes issues like this are caused
by nutritional imbalances (such as getting too little or too much of a certain
nutrient). For instance, iron deficiency can be a cause for restless leg
syndrome. Though please be careful with iron, and only take it under the
supervision of a physician, as too much iron can be deadly.

------
softwaredoug
anxiety about fatigue the next day begets insomnia, which begets anxiety...

So I focus more on coping with daytime fatigue rather than controlling sleep.
I find it’s helped my insomnia to focus less on sleep ”performance”

\- Instead of rating my sleep, I mentally rate my fatigue during the following
day from 1-5. 1, I can’t function at all. 5 I’m full on galaxy brain...

\- I’m often surprised how many “bad night sleeps” get me to a pretty good 4/5
the next day.

\- I observe my days are usually at least a 3, which helps with the anxiety
that creates insomnia

\- I use exercise, sunlight, engaging work, rest to cope with the fatigue and
get an energy boost

\- with this data, I don’t stay in bed if I can’t sleep. I find other things
to do, knowing it’s likely I’ll still have a 3 or 4 day...

All in all it helps me a ton to defang the anxiety. I remind myself some of my
best days are jet lagged on first day of some fun trip in a new place!

------
lorthemar
I normally have a really difficult time focusing on things, especially work
related, this is mainly due to the noise and movement in an office setting.
I've been working from home for quite some time now and I used to get most
done during the night just like you. It's quiet and it's dark. I think the
dark helps as much as the noise as well. There's less things that catch my
attention. But I realized that, my sleep schedule was the main culprit behind
me being unproductive during the day. I've tried various techniques, but it
didn't help too much (I've been meditating regularly for over a decade now).
The best way is to tire yourself, brisk walking etc. and also finding what
makes you disconnect from your daily life.

------
inimino
I hesitate to speculate as much as I'm about to on the basis of a blog post
alone, but here goes...

Everything about this post screams to me that the real problem may be chronic
stress. Rather than seeing the trouble sleeping as a symptom of stress, and
addressing that, the author is just treating sleep as one more thing to be
aggressively managed and thereby adding even more stress to the mix ("the time
has come to put a stop to this" \-- yikes! sleep is meant to come naturally,
it's not another checkbox on a to-do list!).

I haven't read the book and don't know the author's life circumstances, so
maybe I'm completely wrong, but that's just how the post reads to me.

~~~
jacquesm
Probably more than a grain of truth in there, but there is a cyclical element
at work here: not enough sleep -> less efficient the next day -> more
stressful -> even less sleep. There are a lot of those cycles at work here all
of which can have cause/effect switched around at will and still be valid. So
sleeping better has remarkably reduced my stress levels.

But thank you for pointing this out.

------
elliekelly
I feel like I leave this comment every few months on HN but the podcast “Sleep
with Me” has been so immensely helpful to me that I take every opportunity to
share it. Something about Scooter’s voice and the way he talks about nothing
gets my brain in just the right spot to turn off. It has been more effective
for me than any sleep aid medication I’ve tried.

I know it won’t be a magic bullet for everyone but trying a podcast for a few
nights is about as low-risk as a potential insomnia solution gets.

I’m not affiliated with the podcast at all other than being a very happy
listener. Or maybe non-listener is a more accurate term? I’m usually asleep in
the first ten minutes or so.

~~~
thereticent
Peter Yearsley's Librivox recordings are great for this, too. When I'm not
tired, he's an excellent reader. When I am, he gets me straight to sleep.

------
timack
I used to have a lot of problems falling and staying asleep. The best thing
for me was implementing a no caffeine after 10am rule - caffeine's half-life
in you body is about 5 hours so if you have a cup of coffee at lunch time
(12pm) you'll still have a quarter cup sloshing around inside you a 10pm when
you should be starting to get ready to sleep. (Adjust times as to your
preferred schedule - but as I have kids demanding food waking me earlier than
I'd like every day so I need to be at least semi functional from 6am so
working backwards I need to be asleep by about 11ish each night).

------
petercooper
I think sleep (and getting in and out of it) is hugely individual and you need
to work with your own physiology. My discovery was that I can't "think" when
other people are talking because I think verbally. So putting on speech and
lying down == sleep. I've listened to podcasts or audiobooks every night for
several years now and am asleep within 5-15 minutes.

The other benefit is I've also listened to hundreds of books and podcast
episodes, but all in tiny chunks. The next night I seek to the spot I last
remember and continue.

------
dhruvkar
I've had horrible sleeplessness all my adult life. I have a 10 month old baby
now and with the pandemic, it's been hard to get things done since both my
wife and I work full time. A few things that have helped:

\- going to sleep when the baby sleeps ~8:30p-10p.

\- getting up super early ~3:30a-4:30a

\- cutting out coffee and replacing with a mixture of black/green tea.

\- not having caffeine after 8a.

\- following this routine even on weekends.

My sleep quality is WAY better and I don't feel so tired during the day. Also
I get a lot done in the morning and spend the afternoon with my daughter.

------
chimen
I'm using NC headphones for years. Highly recommend Sony MX3 or even MX2.

The issue for me is that I'm now worried of the constant Bluetooth waves that
go into my brain since I wear these headsets pretty much the entire time I
spend at the computer (quite a lot). I actually gave up wearing them due to
this concern.

I tried finding a headphone that does noise canceling and produces audio
without bluetooth. There's nothing on the market. Something with a processor
for NC and normal audio input for audio.

~~~
noir_lord
Bluetooth uses the 2.4GHz spectrum (along with a lot of other stuff) which is
non-ionising, the main side effect is heating but bluetooth transmitters have
_tiny_ power output so any heating effect would be unmeasurable.

Your body is constantly bombarded by radio sources both natural and
artificial, honestly I wouldn't worry about it.

------
cmoxfox
Ironically, the book he cites "Why We Sleep" gave me insomnia.

I had never had any issues sleeping before reading it, but then I read it and
thought "wow sleeping is soooo critical, I need to do better." I started
getting stressed about getting enough sleep. Before long, I would feel anxious
the minute I laid in bed.

But the fact that I wasn't sleeping made me even more stressed about sleeping!
It was a reinforcing loop.

What helped me get back to sleeping well was to just stop caring about it.

------
biolurker1
Stressed out from covid quarantine I started having insomnia which spiraled me
down to self reinforcing insomnia and Anxiety cycle.

The most terryfying thing was that I was worried that if I don't sleep I am
damaging my hippocampus forever and slowly getting Cognitive decline. That
obviously made me unable to sleep. At some point after some months I upped my
physical exercise and started melatonin and valerian and they seem to work for
now.

------
pmoriarty
I've found a pretty effective means for me to fall asleep when I have insomnia
characterized by racing thoughts: I simply count from one to four over and
over again, non-stop until I fall asleep.

Now some details, background, and theory regarding this method. The idea
behind it is to try to keep the mind occupied so that it doesn't have a chance
to think about all those things that keep me awake.

In the past I'd tried a bunch of different methods for falling asleep,
including the common one of counting from one to a hundred (or backwards from
one hundred to one), but found that I would often lose track of where I was in
the count, and have to start over. This minor annoyance was why I decided to
count a much smaller number, so I'd never lose track of where I was.

Another problem that I had was that if I counted too slow, then some thought
would sort of "sneak in" in between the numbers and there'd be some chance
that I'd start thinking about that rather than continue the count. To
counteract this I started counting faster, and found if my counting was fast
enough and if I tried to focus on the count rather than letting my mind drift
while counting automatically, it usually worked pretty well at letting me fall
asleep.

Now, this isn't foolproof, as major anxiety, the effects of stimulants like
caffeine, physical issues such as pain, etc, can overwhelm such a method, but
for more "ordinary" insomnia caused by racing thoughts I found this simple
method to be quite effective.

Incidentally, chamomile tea will make me drowsy, and so will small doses of
melatonin, and if I don't fight the drowsiness and try to fall asleep as soon
as I get drowsy, that often helps too.

Something else that helps is being slightly chilly. Not so much that the cold
keeps you awake, but just enough for that the blankets feel comfortably warm.
Being either too hot or too cold is bad for sleep.

Wearing earplugs and a blindfold can help, as can pot, if you get the right
strain and the right dose.

Finally, I've found that certain types of food (like a big bowl of pasta) will
make me pass out, even at inconvenient times like that middle of the day. I
haven't tried eating as an insomnia cure, since I generally don't like to eat
big meals before bed time, since digestion stops for me while I'm asleep and
waking up with a half-digested meal can sometimes be uncomfortable.

------
asadkn
ASMR works well for me, most of the time (quality of ASMR matters - what's
popular is just clickbait and not great content). Other times I need to
meditate for a while to calm down and clear my head.

Personally, the most important thing for me is to not work or think about
anything that would get me in the obsessive problem-solving or worry mode,
around the bed time hours.

~~~
morsch
> quality of ASMR matters - what's popular is just clickbait and not great
> content

Any recommendations?

------
rjrodger
If you’re like me and noise cancelling headphones make you seasick, try 3M
Peltor Optime ear protectors - _very_ effective.

~~~
duggable
Thanks for this. I've always hated noise cancelling headphones - they make my
ears hurt. I'll give these a shot.

------
juped
This is not insomnia, but delayed sleep phase, and it's usually treated with
light boxes or melatonin.

~~~
jacquesm
Having trouble to fall asleep and sleeplessness is typically called insomnia,
that it is paired with delayed sleep phase is an unfortunate side-effect for
those days that I did get (some) sleep, and from my preference for working
when it is quiet (ie: nights).

The one feeds into the other which eventually results in missing lots and lots
of sleep. I was under the - mistaken - impression that you can get by on 4
hours of sleep or less but this is really not the case so if you suffer from
this in some for or other then better take it serious.

Sticking to a routine, avoiding stressful subjects just before sleep, relaxing
activities (music, reading) before trying to fall asleep all helped in making
it easier to fall asleep. Staying asleep is another matter, and addressing the
noise that reaches my bedroom is one more thing I plan on tackling to avoid
frequently waking up during the night.

~~~
devdas
DSPD lets you get 8 hours of restful sleep, just not at a convenient time.

Insomnia means you don't get enough sleep at all.

~~~
jacquesm
Yep. See article.

------
pfdietz
I find melatonin can be very effective.

------
saos
I'm sure noise cancelling headphones would prevent me from hearing my alarm!

~~~
latchkey
Not if the alarm is in the headphones.

Years ago, I started sleeping with earplugs. I can't sleep without them now. I
get the best and deepest sleep this way. I feel like it turns off my
subconscious, because my brain is no longer processing external input.

~~~
662587649495439
Could you share some information about the earplug type/brand that works for
you?

I am looking for a decent sleeping earplug or earbud as I have recently moved
to a noisier place. I’ve tried sleeping in noise-cancelling over ears and
AirPods with white noise but neither worked for me, they were far too
uncomfortable. I am also concerned that an industrial ear protector would
prevent me from hearing alarms or emergency situations.

~~~
latchkey
I personally like this model [1]. Cheap. Sometimes they can get uncomfortable
or even fall out in the middle of the night, but usually if I reseat them,
they are fine.

The trick to getting them in easily is to squish and lick them. Totally gross,
but you get used to it and it really works well. I wash mine every morning
with water and just keep reusing them for a while.

Agreed with the other, you rarely sleep through stuff you really need to wake
up for like a phone alarm next to you.

[1]
[https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/b683124e-a538-4bec-9dfa-5bd...](https://i5.walmartimages.com/asr/b683124e-a538-4bec-9dfa-5bdc92f9a4a7_1.d6ec1bcc15c906a36b77533879c095bf.jpeg)

~~~
saos
I've tried similar ones this week... I've never slept so well!

------
beeman
I have rarely felt so identified with a blog, for a huge part it's like I'm
reading my own story. Thanks a lot for sharing!

I'm going to read the book you mentioned and I'll consider taking magnesium as
suggested here.

Thanks!

------
wakkaflokka
I had bad insomnia during graduate school, tried just about everything under
the sun (medication, sleep studies, lifestyle changes, herbs) and eventually
did CBT-I with a therapist, and that was my ultimate solution. She had me
start with going to bed at 3am and waking up at 7am for a week. I was
absolutely exhausted, felt like my days were dreams. Then, we pulled forward
he’s time to 2am. Checked how long it took me to fall asleep, and if I
reported it was quick, then pull it to 1am, etc. until I was falling asleep
quickly but also felt refreshed. I kept this all down on some worksheets
provided.

The key was absolutely no matter what, no matter how tired I felt, I had to
wake up at 7am and get out of bed. No naps.

We found the optimal spot to be 11pm lay in bed, and wake up at 7am. I always
keep that schedule, deviating only by 30min or so even on weekends. Haven’t
had trouble sleeping since!

I also think going from graduate school (little solid schedule) to a corporate
9-5 job helped. Covid has mangled that a bit, but I still keep the same sleep
schedule.

tl;dr- CBT-I was a life-changer for me.

~~~
drpancake
CBT-i more or less fixed me too. It should be noted that sleep restriction
(the practice you're describing here) is only part of CBT-i but it seems to be
the most important.

I also gave up coffee and I stop looking at screens 30-60 mins before my bed
time. Before the therapy ~30% of my nights were sleepless.

This article helped a lot: [http://ilya.sukhar.com/blog/an-algorithmic-
solution-to-insom...](http://ilya.sukhar.com/blog/an-algorithmic-solution-to-
insomnia.html)

~~~
wakkaflokka
Really good point - there was a bunch of other restrictions/lifestyle changes
that probably helped contribute. I think the main one was going from two cups
of coffee (morning, and then afternoon) to one cup (morning) really helped me.

Also the recommendation that if I couldn’t fall asleep within 15-ish minutes,
to get out of bed and do something until I’m tired again instead of lay there
and “try” to sleep.

~~~
drpancake
Yes the 15-20 min rule helps a lot! I tried a morning coffee again recently (I
miss it) but it messed up my sleep that night. But that could be due to my
mind playing its tricks on me rather than the caffeine remaining in my system.

------
6510
In my imagination it works something like: If melatonin levels have to exceed
cortisol not challenging yourself physically would never require a lot of
melatonin? You might still sleep but barely?

------
louwrentius
This article seems relevant.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21546850](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21546850)

------
hank_z
I had the same issue. The way I solve it is to get rid of all digital gadgets
in my bedroom and turn down the light as much as can. It’s simple but works
for me.

------
jakevoytko
I've had a lifelong struggle with insomnia. Last year, I worked with a sleep
therapist to help get things under control. I still have bad nights, and jet
lag still messes me up. But I don't take nearly as much sick leave for
insomnia as I used to.

I had tried individual "sleep hygiene" things over the years with little
success. She helped me realize that I was running a system that lent itself to
bad sleep. Single changes were unlikely to help. For me in particular, keeping
a regular routine, getting sunlight exposure, and minimizing caffeine were
important. It's amazing how much impact a few fundamentals have.

Normally, I would fall asleep anytime from 12 to 3 and wake up between 8 and
9. I committed to falling asleep at 11:00, waking up at 7:00 every day and
immediately going for a walk. Ordinarily I would have resisted these measures,
but I had been in a bout with insomnia for months at that point. I was willing
to try anything. Over time, this helped set a regular rhythm.

I was also overcaffeinating myself. She gave me some helpful guidelines for
determining when I've had too much coffee. This amounted to taking the half-
life of caffeine, measuring how much will still be in your bloodstream at
bedtime, and asking yourself, "Would you drink that much coffee at that time?"
I also would use caffeine to fix bad nights of sleep. She suggested replacing
extra caffeine with midday walks. This helped quite a bit.

I don't have problems falling asleep (just staying asleep), but she
recommended wearing orange safety glasses that block blue light. I would feel
sleepier before bedtime when I did this. I didn't keep this measure going, but
I still have them in case I ever have trouble falling asleep. I also wear a
sleep mask, which is the single-best change I've made.

This came with some sacrifices. I went on a beach vacation with some friends
last year, and I went to bed at 11 while they all stayed up until 1. This
created a weird dynamic. But I had just started to overcome my severe insomnia
bout, so I didn't want to throw it all away. Now, I find myself continuing to
stick with the schedule because I know that I get results. This means that I
leave a lot of events earlier than other people. But it feels easier to say
"no" now that I'm in my 30s.

It also had some benefits. I now have an hour and a half before work that I
use for side projects. It turns out that despite my mental model of being a
night owl, I'm actually very productive in the morning. I've maintained a
regular writing schedule and have managed to do some side project work.
Previously, I had struggled to fit time in for these things.

------
TedDoesntTalk
> The noise cancelling tech is a key element in this story

The author has my sympathy. I’ve learned to ignore noise, but I understand not
everyone can do that.

------
baby
Have you tried weed? If I really can’t get to sleep I smoke one puff and it
always works.

~~~
jacquesm
I hate all drugs and the industry they bring with them, if that's what it
would take I'd rather be awake. Rhyme entirely unintended must find another
way to mend it.

~~~
baby
so you don't drink tea? What's the difference with a cannabis tea?

------
Kiro
ASMR is the only thing that has helped me.

