Insomnia – An Introduction

A lot of people feel life would be a lot more fun if we didn’t need to sleep. Indeed, due to the fact that, normally, we all sleep from 22:00 – 06:00… our lives are 33% sleep. Oh how much more we’d get done if we no longer needed sleep. Though, if you’re an insomniac, you probably don’t share these sentiments. Don’t get too frustrated though, insomnia is actually a pretty common condition to suffer from. This is because sleep is the one bodily function that is mainly determined by many physical and mental factors.

You see, during the night hours, the level of melatonin, a hormone with many roles, rises, creating, among other things, the sensation of sleepiness. During the dawn hours, the levels drop back down. This, in turn, regulates our sleep-wake cycle. Yet, as mentioned earlier, many factors, mainly mental, have an effect on the release of melatonin, creating irregularities thus leading to conditions such as insomnia. Interestingly enough, melatonin is inhibited by light and permitted by darkness; for these reasons, it is referred to as, “the hormone of darkness.” With that, the tip of the iceberg on a way you can overcome insomnia may have just been shed. 😉