First, let’s correct the common misconceptions about insomnia
1. “I don’t get enough sleep”. The concept of “8 hours of adequate sleep per day” seems to be firmly rooted in people’s minds. In fact, the concept of 8 hours is only an average of human sleep and is not the gold standard for individuals. Although the sleep time is reduced, as long as it does not affect the daytime work life and the next day’s mental and physical strength are good, it is not insomnia.
2. “I won’t be able to sleep tonight, and I will be very sick if I can’t sleep”. People are often afraid of insomnia itself, overly concerned about the adverse consequences, and easily associate insomnia with the decline in health, loss of beauty and even death, so whenever they are close to bed, they feel nervous and fearful, worried about not being able to sleep; and insomnia in turn “confirms” the correctness of their fears, so that constantly implied, but Insomnia then becomes the central problem of one’s life.
”Insomnia is not scary, what is scary is the fear of insomnia”. If you sleep in bed, keep imagining the bad consequences and keep putting pressure on yourself, it will make your body more alert, and sleep will be farther away from you.
If you think about it, many people in the rest of the night to play cards, entertainment, and how have “insomnia” trouble? People have a strong ability to self-regulate, and if the brain thinks it is not enough rest, it will automatically replenish sleep. Clinically, we have not found people who have been up all night for a long time, and even for those who participated in sleep deprivation trials, there is a tiny amount of sleep, not no sleep at all. Therefore, there is no need to worry too much about your insomnia.
3. “I can’t cure my insomnia”. Many people tend to pursue sleep maintenance time too much in the treatment process, and dissatisfaction with the quality of sleep can lead to a decrease in sleep quality. The correct understanding of your sleep pattern and the quality of your work life the next day is the measure of sleep quality.
Do you have the same misconceptions about sleep? Now you know that these perceptions are not true, right? Then let’s correct them quickly. Here are some behavioral guidelines that will help you get a good night’s sleep.
Now, let’s adopt some useful methods to improve our sleep
The beginning of good sleep: developing good sleep hygiene habits
Some people’s insomnia is caused by poor sleep hygiene, and some people have occasional trouble sleeping, which can be exacerbated by poor sleep habits. Therefore, developing good sleep hygiene habits is the beginning of correcting bad sleep and making sleep regular and good.
The development of good sleep hygiene habits is summarized as follows.
1. sleep to punctuality, on time to bed, get up, do not stay in bed and “bad” sleep, that is, on weekends, vacation should also do so.
2. Do not drink coffee, tea and alcoholic beverages after dinner, and do not smoke, because these can cause excitement.
3, hunger hinders sleep, before bedtime, such as hunger can eat a little cookies, sweets, a glass of milk, etc..
4. Create a good sleep environment, avoid bright light, noise, appropriate temperature in the bedroom, do not put the alarm clock, choose the right bed, pillow, mattress, pad, etc..
5, the bedroom as a special place for sleep, do not read books and magazines with stimulating before going to sleep; do not work in bed, and do not think about today’s troubles and tomorrow’s work in bed. If you want to think, get up and think enough to sleep again.
6. Regular physical exercise in the afternoon and early evening can help you sleep. However, insomniacs should be careful not to do strenuous exercise within two hours before bedtime.
The right amount of sports at the right time, both to help sleep, but also to enhance physical fitness, why not do it?
Third, after correcting the poor sleep hygiene habits, let’s start to further improve the quality of sleep actively.
Please be sure to follow the following principles to deal with insomnia
1. Do not stay in bed or in your bedroom at any time other than when you sleep. Take the bed as a special place for sleep, do not engage in activities not related to sleep in bed, do not lie in bed reading, watching TV, listening to the radio, etc.
2. If you still can’t sleep after lying in bed for 30 minutes, you must get up and leave the room to do something gentle, and go to bed only when you really have the feeling of sleep. After going to bed, if you can’t fall asleep quickly, get up immediately, and then go back to bed only when you feel like sleeping again. If there is no sleep, then simply do not sleep.
3. Throughout the night, if you wake up in the middle of the night and can’t fall back to sleep quickly, follow the above method to do.
4. insist on waking up and getting up at the same moment every morning, regardless of how well you slept the night before.
5. Resolve not to go to bed during the day.
Pay special attention to the fact that when you can’t sleep and leave the room, don’t bring the idea that you will eventually return to bed, but think about not sleeping anymore. After getting up, you can carry out gentle, calm, less stimulating activities, the lights should be as dark as possible, do not smoke, eat or do gymnastics.
The establishment of conditioned reflexes is a slow process, and it takes persistence to get results. At the beginning, there will be little sleep, but if you can persist in training, the sleep time will gradually lengthen. Especially for people with bedtime anxiety and fear of sleep, the effect is better.
Fourth, if you feel the fear of nervousness before sleep, then use the easy methods you can use to relax yourself physically and mentally, now we introduce a few common methods, you can choose your own way according to your own body and family environmental conditions flexible.
Chinese medicine’s sleep health method.
1, daily before bedtime hot feet rubbing Yongquan point
Hot water scalding feet before bedtime, scalding feet with the heating water, first warm and then hot, so that the feet scalded red. Rub the foot, the heart of the foot with a person at the line (about the front 1/3 of the midline of the foot) for the Yongquan point, belongs to the kidney meridian, the first right foot toes with the bottom of the basin, so that the heel is exposed to the water, with the left foot heart to rub the right foot heel, play the role of rubbing the left foot Yongquan point. This number of days rubbing one hundred, and then change rubbing the right Yongquan point one hundred for a round. To hot water so that the water temperature hot feet. So do a total of three rounds around three hundred times that is. This treatment can accelerate the process of falling asleep.
2, combing method
Operation method: comb the head with a comb, the direction of the front hairline → top of the head → back of the head → neck (the middle, left, right once each); from the top of the head in the central radial respectively to the corner of the head, solar plexus, hairline on the ear, hairline behind the ear (left and right once each), comb 3-5 times a day, at least 5 minutes each time.
3.Sit in meditation
First lie down, you can also sit on a chair with a backrest, close your eyes and imagine in your mind some more familiar and longing scenes. For example, you can imagine that you strolled to a lush green grass, grass with small flowers of various colors, fragrant. When you walk forward, you faintly hear the sound of running water, which turns out to be a clear creek, a few small fish swimming against the water network. You bend down to pick up to catch, the water is very cool and pleasant …… you can then imagine going on. To have the feeling of being there, the five senses and body are in the midst of a beautiful feeling. Imagine a lot of subjects, such as vast and spreading beaches, mountains and parks, light singing and dancing wonderland, etc.. Do not imagine something too exciting, you are in the imaginary scene, is relaxed and comfortable, you feel are some comfortable scenes. You get relaxed from the imagination, get pleasure, temporarily forget the insomnia to bring you tension, maybe in a beautiful reverie sound asleep.