What’s The Best Cure For Insomnia?

As a long time sufferer of insomnia, I know what it’s like to go for days with little or no sleep. As exhausted as you feel, as soon as you lay down in bed your brain suddenly clicks into the ‘on’ position, and you find yourself racing over thoughts and concerns you didn’t even know you had. I have spent a long time looking for a cure for insomnia, and I’ll share my experience with you on my attempts at insomnia treatment.

The first thing I tried in my quest for restful sleep were drugs! As a tax paying American, I worship pharmaceuticals as much as everyone else. Fast acting and effective, drugs can certainly help you get to sleep, but are they a cure for insomnia? Perhaps, but not a very healthy one. The drugs you take to help sleep fall into two basic categories; prescription and over the counter. Unfortunately, none of them are without some side effects.

I find that most of the over the counter drugs leave me feeling funky and irritable the next day. The only non-prescription chemical I think even comes close to being a cure for insomnia is melatonin. Melatonin is a hormone secreted naturally by your pineal gland. What melatonin does isn’t exactly fully understood, but it seems to have something to do with regulating sleep patterns. I find that taking a melatonin supplement knocks me right out without any noticeable symptoms the next day and I defiantly sleep better as a result .

Unfortunately, it only seems to have this effect for me if used once in awhile. Using melatonin even twice in a row doesn’t seem to work as well, and the third consecutive time I take it does nothing. Additionally, since it is so unclear about what melatonin may do, I’m a little cautious about using it too often.



Prescription drugs are generally extremely effective remedies for insomnia. However, they are not without drawbacks and serious side effects as well, and shouldn’t be thought of as a cure for insomnia. The most commonly prescribed drugs for insomnia fall under the benzodiazapine family of chemicals, which are all very addictive. It is very easy to become dependent on these drugs, and once you are you wont be able to sleep at all without them.

In the long run, the best cure for insomnia I’ve found is regular and vigorous exercise. Once I got more serious about my workout routine, I found myself sleeping like a baby at night. Just 3-4 times a week I went for a short 20-30 minute run, and on the off days I do some push-ups, sit-ups, and lift free weights. Most people can’t stand the thought of exercise, but honestly, just 20 minutes out of a day is a very small price to pay for longer and more restful sleep . Also, just 20 minutes of vigorous daily exercise can do nothing but good for your general fitness and wellbeing too, so it’s not only your sleeping disorder that benefits, and out of all the insomnia cures I’ve tried, exercise has changed my life in more ways than one.