I was under the illusion, for most of my life, that alcohol helped with sleep, until I did some research and found out it practically does the opposite. Or honestly, listened to the book "Why do we sleep" by Matthew Walker https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34466963-why-we-sleep. It is absolutely fascinating and worth a read/listen for anyone wondering what we know about sleep so far.

An interesting point from the book: For people that drink regularly for long stretches, they can end up with dreams literally spilling into reality because their brains never reaches deep REM due to the alcohol. It's fascinating. I've never reached that level personally. However I've heard anecdotes of people getting insanely vivid dreams after stretches of drinking.