Insomnia: What’s keeping you up?
In today's world with so much day-to-day stress, insomnia presents itself as a quiet irritant -- keeping us awake at night, waking us up every time we close our eyes, and making us feel fatigued during the day.
The symptoms are hard to diagnose, but they are consistent.
As adults, we are expected to sleep between 7 to 9 hours to get a complete rest before the new day starts, but common causes like stress, anxiety, depression, rooms with uneven temperatures, jet lag, too much caffeine consumption -- even uncomfortable beds -- can persistently keep you awake, and have you suffer insomnia.
Medical professionals tend to fill out an entire questionnaire for you, just so the diagnosis receives the maximum amount of attention. Starting from measuring your sleep patterns to your daytime sleepiness -- you might even be asked to log in every day on a "sleep diary" just to ascertain insomnia. But once you zero in, home remedies and prescription drugs are in abundance.
The primary aim for your physician will be to make you fall asleep and remain asleep. Therefore, your prescription will aim to achieve exactly that. In addition, doctors may ask you to strictly maintain a specific time for sleeping and waking up to reset your body clock. This will also mean limiting the number of daytime naps, so your body becomes fully exhausted by the time you head to bed at night.
These days, we have taken insomnia for granted -- as part and parcel of modern life. But there are effective ways to fight it and win. The radical change in your mood and wellbeing is certainly worth the effort.
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