How to Stop Hot Flashes From Causing Insomnia
Author: WendyJones Total views: 34 Word Count: 918
One of the more debilitating symptoms of hot flashes is their impact on our ability to get a good nights sleep. A deep and uninterrupted night's sleep is too long overdue for many postmenopausal women. Many women say they just lie awake, unable to go to sleep or stay asleep, and worrying about being alert for the day ahead.
My grandma used to say she had "eyes like saucers" when her hot flashes were keeping her awake at night - I think she meant she was suddenly wide awake and unable to get back to sleep - but we certainly got the picture.
It seems that hot flashes, and insomnia in particular have plagued us for a very long time - as even the great Shakespeare wrote about it in Macbeth when he employs a physician to deal with his wife's insomnia: " Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, Race out the written troubles of the brain; And with-some sweet oblivious antidote cleanse the stuft bosom of that perilous stuff which weighs upon the heart." Well, at least that's what it sounds like to me.
Impact of Hormone Replacement Therapy
So we know insomnia and hot flashes have been with is for centuries, but it seems to have escalated dramatically just recently during the last few years. Many people believe it to be related to the HRT scare that was publicized a few years back - where the clinical trials suggested that the risks of using hormone replacement therapy greatly outnumbered the benefits.
Mass withdrawal from HRT resulted which lead to a lot of women experiencing menopause symptoms all over again. Not that I'm suggesting HRT was good - just finding the cause of all these symptoms again. However, there are many other natural and herbal remedies for menopause (and insomnia) that are equally as effective and also provide a benefit to overall health.
Even though insomnia is a fairly common experience for post menopausal women, there isn't a "one size fits all" solution. As with every other symptom of menopause, you need to determine how it's affecting you, and what the best cause of action will be. Don't simply start popping sleeping pills to get through - they only offer short term solutions at best.
These days, women are learning to tailor treatment to their own medical history and risk factors. That often means sitting down with a health care provider and researching all the options carefully. For some, hormone replacement therapy is a reasonable short-term remedy.
How Aging and Insomnia Interact
Both men and women experience less-restful sleep after age 50 within the five stages of sleep, stage one, transitional sleep, and stage two, light sleep, are known as non rapid eye movement, or NREM sleep.
Stages three and four, deep sleep or Delta sleep, are the most restful. Rapid Eye Movement or REM sleep, stage five, when dreaming occurs, occupies about 20 percent of sleep time.
As we age, particularly as we reach 50, we spend more time in sleep stages one and two, which means we tend to sleep lighter and are more prone to wake up prematurely. This has a knock on effect which makes us get tired earlier at night, and wake earlier in the morning. But we still have many options for improving our sleep.
First task on the list to figure out where we are having problems and what is causing the disruption to our sleep process. Do you have difficulty falling asleep, or do you drift off easily only to wake up soon afterwards. Are you continually wakening during the night, or just wake to early in the morning? Are the hot flashes causing you to wake suddenly, or do you experience one almost immediately you awaken?
The Role of Natural Herbal Remedies
While there are some very specific herbs for menopause, not all herbal remedies are everything they claim to be - so tread carefully. Over the counter sleeping medications can help for a while, but these should be viewed as a short term solution to help you start sleeping properly again. Your aim is to create a new sleep pattern (like your original one when you slept right through the night), rather then rely on drugs to make you sleep.
How To Stop Hot Flashes From Disrupting Your Sleep
If hot flashes are waking you up, you should look for the triggers that bring them on. That might be a specific smell for one woman; a dream in the middle of the night for another. Manage the hot flash trigger, rather than take a sleeping pill. Sleeping pills don't manage hot flashes, they just deal with the symptoms.
It's definitely a case of finding out what your body needs, and working with it. Drugs and medications aren't the best thing at keeping your body in harmony.
My suggestion would be start with simple things like changing your diet and your routine. Take 15 - 30 minutes at night before you go to bed and simply sit down somewhere quite (away from the TV) and relax. Relaxing in a darkened room helps your body to increase production of sleep hormones like melatonin. Don't do anything stimulating late at night, like exercise or taking a hot shower.
Diet also plays a part. Some hot teas - cinnamon tea, for example - might induce hot flashes and should be avoided. Carbohydrates actually increase sleep hormones, so that low-carb diet might be a culprit. Mom was right. Warm milk does induce sleep. But skip the cookies. Wheat toast should be just the ticket to help usher you into dreamland.
My Articles Directory Free Web Content Provider
About the Author
Don't with menopause symptoms any longer. Wendy Jones shares her experiences of insomnia and hot flashes on her blog talking about symptoms of menopause Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service
Copy and Paste Article Code.
Remember: The article body, title, author bio and links may not be changed or removed. By publishing this article, you agree to all the terms in our Terms of Service.