Re:Chronic sleep deprivation suppresses immune system
by Terr_ on Tuesday January 31, 2017 @09:06PM
(#13537537)
> Drinking alcohol seems to be very expensive on sleep cycles.
I've heard that as it wears off there's a "rebound" effect, so that alcohol now means being more wakeful X hours later. I've never really been (or wanted to be) drunk enough to know for sure.
Re:Chronic sleep deprivation suppresses immune system
by dzhiurgis on Wednesday February 01, 2017 @10:46PM
(#13547929)
The biggest issue is when you stop drinking, sleep is terrible for few days. I found that valerian is helpful as it produces GABA chemotransmitter -- same thing that alcohol replaces.
Using f.lux, exercising, no caffeine past 5 and establishing proper sleep hygiene fixed it for me, but it took me till my 30s to figure it out. Drinking alcohol seems to be very expensive on sleep cycles. With exercise I also found I needed to do it before 8pm or I would often still be very awake. The other thing is meditation to calm yourself down, I found that sometimes I would be breathing very fast when lying in bed, turns out I was wired still.
And when I slip, I'm back to finding it harder to get to bed on time, 12:30, 1am, 1:30am, 2am, problems start with getting to work on time. Having to catch up at the weekends, sleeping till 12. Finding it incredibly hard to get going on Mondays.
I also found when I had slipped with correct bedtime, melatonin helped me reset my sleep clock back to midnight. Taking it just one or two nights 45 mins before bedtime, will help me get back to bed at a right time. Apparantly the standard dose is 10x what you actually need (300 micro-g is enough, rather than 300 mg). I only use it once every few months.