Caffeine

Caffeine is a strong activation stuff. It makes us more awake, and can have an effect in at least 14 hours after consumption.    

The following fluids contain caffeine:

• coffee
• tea
• chocolate
• cacao
• cola-drinks
• some energy drinks

You should avoid food and fluid with caffeine before you go to bed. How many hours that are recommended varies, but the most common is four hours. People with sleeping difficulties ought to avoid products with caffeine earlier, for instant 5 am. People with insomnia ought to cut out all caffeine for some weeks, to see if this helps. Fluid with a lot of sugar can also disturb sleep.

Medicine

Some medicine can be stimulating. If you take medicine that has this effect, ask your doctor when you ought to take them so they do not affect your sleep.

Avoid regular use of sleeping medicine.

Alcohol

Some people use alcohol to relax before they go to bed, and experience that this makes it easier to sleep. You should not do this because the effect of the alcohol diminishing within hours, and when the alcohol level in the blood decreases this gives an increased activity and you risk waking up in the middle of the night. If you use alcohol to get to sleep over time, the quality of sleep gets poorer.

Food

Do not go hungry to bed, but do neither eat so much that it is keeping you awake. Do not eat meals that hold more than 600 calories less than three hours before bedtime.

Fluid

You ought not drink any fluid the last one and a half hour before you go to bed - especially if you usually wake up during the night because you have to go to the bathroom.

Supper

Among the natures most tranquillizing stuff we find tryptofan, an amino acid that exists in plants and meat. When we consume tryptofan, it quickly turns into serotonin and melatonin. These calm down the brain, and make it easier to sleep. The right supper contains both trypofan and carbohydrates. The carbohydrates help the trypofane get more quickly into the brain, where serotonin and meltonin are made, so you get sleepy. 

Suggestions for supper:

• oatmeal with slim milk and cinnamon
• whole-grain bread with slices of tomatoes and chicken spread
• slim yoghurt
• fruit

• banana
• cheese
• nuts
• milk
• tuna fish
• turkey

Seafood can also make you sleepy – fish soup is good. Herbal tea like chamomile and valeric, and hot milk is also soporific. If you take a bath before you go to bed, you can put the herbs in the bath water. The water should not be too hot. 

Talk with the doctor if you have sleeping problems –

there can be something that causes the problems that ought to be treated.

Tell a friend

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