Need some natural insomnia remedies? One of these might be just right for you!
This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure for more details.
Insomnia can be pretty horrific. It is easy to start feeling desperate when you know you need sleep badly, and you can’t get to sleep (or stay asleep).
I used to have bad insomnia. And when I say bad insomnia, I mean that there were many nights that I got about half of the sleep or less than I needed and I woke up feeling terrible. I struggled through my days and missed many things in life because I was too tired. If I tried to do things anyway, sometimes I crashed and felt bad for days. I started to feel truly desperate to find an answer to my insomnia.
I began looking for something that would help me. After a while, I finally did find some insomnia remedies that helped me and now I hope to inspire and encourage you that it is possible to sleep well.
In this post, I also included some stories from others who found answers for their sleeping issues.
Here are eight things that you can consider doing to help you sleep well again.
This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure for more details.
Take Magnesium
Magnesium can be a super help for getting a good night’s sleep. Most everyone can benefit from magnesium supplementation. I regularly recommend magnesium to my friends and family for a couple of reasons:
- Magnesium is helpful for relaxation, calms nerves, helps digestion, and relieves muscle spasms. Because of these benefits, many people with fibromyalgia, migraines, anxiety, PMS and insomnia find some relief with magnesium supplementation.
- It is hard to get enough magnesium from food alone. So supplementation is a good idea for most people.
- Magnesium is also very hard to overdose on-only people with kidney failure or a few other serious medical conditions could overdose on magnesium.
There are quite a few different forms of magnesium. Some aren’t very good. Two really good forms are magnesium citrate and magnesium glycinate. The citrate form can cause a laxative effect-which some people find beneficial. If you don’t want that effect, I recommend the magnesium glycinate.
Magnesium can also be obtained through detox baths. Sybil writes about how detox baths helped her insomnia in her post on detox bath recipes.
Try Melatonin
Melatonin is one of my favorite sleep helpers. I took some last night as a matter of fact. 🙂 I only take melatonin when I need it, but it is wonderful for me. If I can tell that I am going to lay in bed a long time and not be able to fall asleep, I take melatonin.
Melatonin has some other benefits besides the sleep benefit-it can also be helpful for digestion and acid reflux. I have often wondered if that is why it helps me to sleep. If I have indigestion it seems to help that and I fall asleep.
Melatonin is a sleep hormone, and for many people this sleep hormone can become disrupted.
You can try some natural ways to raise melatonin, like having a completely dark room when you are sleeping, and keeping a sleep schedule. Also, making sure you see some sunlight or go out in sunlight soon after you wake can also help. I do all these things to help my hormones naturally, but I occasionally need some extra help and that is when I take the melatonin.
The best dose of melatonin is often a very small dose. I take around 300 mcg which is the equivalent of about 1/3 of a milligram. I take the Douglas Laboratories brand, but I take only about 1/8 of a pill!
Prayer and Scripture
I find this to be invaluable to help me sleep! When I am struggling with sleep, I often pray and ask God for help. Sometimes, I read scripture before bed if I can tell I need to feel more peaceful. There is just something about the Bible that brings a peace that no other book can.
I am definitely not the only one who has found this to be true. Teresa Mansfield is a certified Stress Relief Coach. Because of this she knows some things about insomnia. But when she tried to help her daughter overcome her insomnia she wasn’t able to (even after addressing medical issues).
After lots of trial and error, Teresa found that Scripture along with a bedtime routine finally helped her daughter to get good sleep. You can read all the details of Teresa’s story in her blog post.
Lavender Oil
Lavender oil is an essential oil that has calming and antidepressive properties. I haven’t tried lavender oil yet, so I thought I would share my friend McKinzie’s lavender oil story.
Here is her story in her own words: “I’ve always been a poor sleeper ever since I was little. I remember lying awake at night as a kid trying to count backwards from 100 over and over. In adulthood I eventually had to start taking a prescription sleeping pill because it would take me hours and hours to fall asleep (and as an already tired mama, that just didn’t cut it).”
“When we knew we wanted to have our second baby I had to look for a more natural option and someone suggested lavender oil. I put a little bit diluted with coconut oil on my big toe and rub it in. I was seriously amazed that this actually helped. After a couple weeks I was totally off of the sleeping pills and still fell asleep well! If you are struggling with insomnia, definitely give it a try!” (You can visit McKinzie at her site Today Mommy.)
Valerian Root
Valerian Root can help sleep by calming anxiety and increasing GABA in the brain. Valerian contains volatile oils that can calm the body’s central nervous system.
I asked Jill (from Organizational Toast) about her experience with valerian. She had this to say: “I had two problems. 1. I had a hard time falling asleep. As soon as my head hit the pillow my mind would start racing. My 2nd problem is that I would wake up around 2 or 3 in the morning and wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep for hours. The valerian root helped me to fall asleep and stay asleep. When I travel I make sure I have the tea with me!”
Jill also mentioned that recently she added magnesium and CBD oil to her daily regimen and she says she has seen even better results.
Help Your Liver
I had elevated liver enzymes show up on some of my blood tests. I’m glad I was told that at one of my doctor’s appointments. It made me realize that my liver might be the cause of some of my symptoms.
I began to do some research on the liver and discovered that an overworked or congested liver can definitely affect sleep. In fact I think that a lot of people have overworked livers and that is one of the main causes of their insomnia.
If you are wondering if you might be one of those people, you may want to check out this list of symptoms caused by a struggling liver. It may help you to decide whether your liver might need some tlc.
If you want to improve your liver health, here are some super helpful things for improving your liver:
- Castor oil packs
- Milk thistle
- Juicing
- Healthy salads
- Detoxifying foods
Get your hormones tested.
Many hormones play a role in insomnia. Thyroid hormones, adrenal hormones, estrogen, and progesterone are some common ones. If you have PMS, difficulty sleeping, weight gain or loss, depression, breast tenderness, or other symptoms that seem to be related to hormones, you may want to get hormone testing.
There are blood hormone tests, but some practitioners say that saliva or urine testing is more accurate. (If you have recently had your thyroid tested and it came out normal, you may still have a thyroid issue-you can read more about thyroid testing and adrenal tests here.)
I have found better sleep through healing my adrenals, and boosting my progesterone levels. I slept and rested as much as possible when I was working on helping my adrenals. I also worked on detox and killing off pathogens (with antibiotics and with herbal antibiotics). The reason why detoxing and killing off infections helps the adrenals is because the adrenals can begin to suffer when there is an underlying infection or toxicity.
As for progesterone, I was taking bio-identical progesterone for a while. But, now, I just eat lots of thyme (natural progesterone maker). I also take B-vitamins and minerals to help my progesterone levels.
Don’t Give Up
Whenever you are dealing with sleeping issues, it can be easy to fall into despair. But don’t give up! Here is some advice for when you are struggling with insomnia. Take this as encouragement from someone who has been there. These next suggestions aren’t to put pressure on you or make you feel bad, but to hopefully help you as you are waiting for the answers that will help the insomnia. Here is my advice:
Be thankful for the sleep you get. Whenever you miss sleep, plan to take a nap when you can. Remind yourself that you will get some sleep (whether it is at your nap time or bed time). Go about doing the absolute must do’s. Try to cut everything out that can be cut out. Be nice to yourself. Ask others for help. Especially ask God for help.
And don’t give up! I was able to find things that helped me, and maybe one of the things in this article will be just what you need to help you get a good night’s sleep.
Disclaimer: This post is not medical advice. I am not a doctor or medical professional. I share only from my own experiences and research. Consult your own practitioner before making changes in your diet or supplements.
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