Natural aid to improve sleep quality?

[ghostofjack]

2nd what Grandote wrote. I will add that in my experience diet, diet, and diet is most important. Supplements are not natural to be taken in isolated form and should mostly come from food. Some of the ones that can influence neurotransmitters can have unintended side effects.

On the Magnesium, check out Magnesium oil which is a topical spray and absorbs extremely well. Natural Calm is a good brand for oral Magnesium. I take either an hour or two before bedtime because they relax me.

The only supplements I ever take are ones that used to be in our natural diet but are lacking due to modern food production and/or climate. (I take magnesium which has been depleted from our soils dramatically and Vitamin D3 due to the Northern climate I live in. Occasionally I will also take kelp for iodine since I live nowhere near an ocean and don't have good access to sea veggies and fresh fish.)

If you ever try Melatonin, start with the smallest dose. For some weird reason it gives me a hangover.....zombie style situation.

[Lunar]

Thanks for all the great info everyone.

It's funny, my chiropractor/naturopathic whole heath practitioner has been telling me lots of stuff you guys are mentioning here.

The yoga roller for one is amazing for relaxation, for those of you who've tried it, on your legs especially, you know exactly what I mean when I say "Oooo, hurts so good." I've never thought of trying it on the feet, but will do tonight.

Epson salt baths, and natural oil supplementation(fish, coconut and fatty acids from chia seeds and stuff) she stresses the importance continually.

Grandote, thank you a million for reminding me about relaxation. I used to meditate routinely, often in the exact way you described and back then I never needed any sleep aids.

[JimboS]

Lots of good suggestions here thank you for the contributions. NyQuil or a mylan does the trick for me if i have a hard time getting to sleep and with the stress of my job, sometimes I have to resort to these methods. Thank you for

[themadhatter420]

kava kava has always worked for me, the extract, I make a great tea and use other flowers I grow, I love nature, its where ALL of our things that help us our synthesized from , only if its one chemical, its in everything, learned tat years ago in school

[Lunar]

kava kava has always worked for me, the extract, I make a great tea and use other flowers I grow, I love nature, its where ALL of our things that help us our synthesized from , only if its one chemical, its in everything, learned tat years ago in school

kava kava has always worked for me, the extract, I make a great tea and use other flowers I grow, I love nature, its where ALL of our things that help us our synthesized from , only if its one chemical, its in everything, learned tat years ago in school

I consider Kava to be in a class of its own. For me it has a paradoxically dualistic effect, each one so totally antithetical to the other, it's near impossible to explain to anyone who hasn't experienced it firsthand. In this way, and this way alone, I liken it to a psychedelic.

Kava relaxes unsubstantiated worries away. The actual feeling is not unlike a benzo, but in my opinion more preferential. If you have difficulty talking to the opposite sex or time wasting anxieties over deciding what to do moment to moment. Not on kava.

With that being said, on kava it is impossible for me to sleep. Contradictory, I know, but I am well experienced with this plant and this is just the effect it has on me. I would love to meet others who have this same experience and have developed ways to work with it because kava is amazing. But I rarely use because of this undesirable side effect.

Also MadHatter, I would love to know recipes you use for preparation if you'd be so kind to share. Especially if they produce consistent effects. Whereas my description above holds true in general, sometimes kava will knock me right out.(Though only temporarily, b/c later on I'll have trouble sleeping)

Honestly, Kava is so complex it deserves its own thread.

[teddy1998]

Exercise!

[barq2]

I am interested by this website:

hxxps://www.grc.com/health/sleep/healthy_sleep_formula.htm (replace the xx with tt to make the link work)

GRC are a tech company but seem to be researching a stack of sleep aids (six pills). Some of the ingredients make complete sense to me. The main reservation I have is about the way this research is being done. They are making claims about reliability in a general sense, but reliability has a very specific scientific meaning. I think this is where GRC have to be seen to be a tech company, rather than coming from a more scientific perspective.

I would be interested in anyone's direct experience of the ingredients - especially in combination.

Longer term I will do my own checks on the safety of each ingredient based on scientific/medical literature available (keeping in mind potential interactions with my existing medication). Then I will attempt to source the ingredients and measure changes to my sleep. This comes with the obvious caveats that I can only test on me, my measure of sleep will be a) fitbit recordings and b) subjective notes as I go along, subject to placebo, etc. But unlike the GRC reporting, I can subject my experience to statistical analysis.

Unfortunately I can't do anything just yet due to a change in my medication. I really need to stabilise that before messing around with anything else. Also my workload is so ridiculous at the moment that some nights I don't have time for much more than 4 hours sleep. (Occasionally there is a silver lining to insomnia!)

Would be very interested in opinions on the above stack.

[classemlaff]

I am interested by this website:

hxxps://www.grc.com/health/sleep/healthy_sleep_formula.htm (replace the xx with tt to make the link work)

GRC are a tech company but seem to be researching a stack of sleep aids (six pills). Some of the ingredients make complete sense to me. The main reservation I have is about the way this research is being done. They are making claims about reliability in a general sense, but reliability has a very specific scientific meaning. I think this is where GRC have to be seen to be a tech company, rather than coming from a more scientific perspective.

I would be interested in anyone's direct experience of the ingredients - especially in combination.

Longer term I will do my own checks on the safety of each ingredient based on scientific/medical literature available (keeping in mind potential interactions with my existing medication). Then I will attempt to source the ingredients and measure changes to my sleep. This comes with the obvious caveats that I can only test on me, my measure of sleep will be a) fitbit recordings and b) subjective notes as I go along, subject to placebo, etc. But unlike the GRC reporting, I can subject my experience to statistical analysis.

Unfortunately I can't do anything just yet due to a change in my medication. I really need to stabilise that before messing around with anything else. Also my workload is so ridiculous at the moment that some nights I don't have time for much more than 4 hours sleep. (Occasionally there is a silver lining to insomnia!)

Would be very interested in opinions on the above stack.

Thanks for the link, just the referral to the brand of time released melatonin was worth the read.  I also enjoyed the in-depth explanation of each of the supplements.

[Lunar]

Does anyone have a quality kava kava supplement or tea to recommend?  Due to PM testing I am unable to take the occasional benzo.  Been missing that lately.

I usually stick with the powdered root from Kona Kava Farm. www.konakavafarm.com

They seem to have partnered up with some other kava varieties which are all offered at Kava.com

But the best Kava I've ever had is the Mahakea from Kona Kava. It's a specialty item that is not always available, but when it is(which at the time of this writing it was) it is only available directly from konakavafarms.com **Be Careful, this sh*t is potent** Especially if prepared correctly. I have on more than one occasion regretted not heeding this warning. ; ) I've had friends, who claimed to be connoisseurs, bitch that I only poured them an ounce or two to only have them pass out spilling their unfinished kava in their laps.

[Grandote]

I have found something new that seems to work very well. I hesitate to name it since it will invite ridicule and censure. In a week or two if it keeps working I will reveal the new sleep aid. Some things work for a while and then stop so I want to be sure.