Insomnia

I recently read a newspaper article that said an insomniac is someone who takes more than a half an hour to fall asleep, and may wake up during the night.
I found this strange, considering I can take upwards of one hour to get to sleep, and have recently been waking up in my sitting room downstairs, even after falling asleep in bed. I had always thought an nsomniac was someone who couldn't sleep at all...
Your thoughts?

I can take anywhere from 2 seconds to 2 hours to fall asleep.

Staying up late is fun. Having to wake up early the next morning isn't.

Originally Posted by Sicin Mor

I recently read a newspaper article that said an insomniac is someone who takes more than a half an hour to fall asleep, and may wake up during the night.
I found this strange, considering I can take upwards of one hour to get to sleep, and have recently been waking up in my sitting room downstairs, even after falling asleep in bed. I had always thought an nsomniac was someone who couldn't sleep at all...
Your thoughts?

Yeah. The time it takes me to get to sleep is directly related to how tired I am. If I've been working from dawn to dusk, I'll pass out as soon as I get comfortable.

Otherwise I may stay up five or ten minutes thinking about stuff. If you take more than an hour to get to sleep, or anywhere near that, you need to do something. Exercise, rid your mind of distracting thoughts, get a more comfortable bed if need be.

I'd like to know around how much sleep you get per night/week before saying you're an insomniac. If you get the reccommended 8-10 hours, you're fine. I heard that 8-10 thing a long time ago, though not everyone gets that.

Actually, insomnia is when you technically can't sleep at all. It's caused by a substance that was found in certain foods. A test was performed that confirmed this by feeding a group of people food containing the substance and feeding another group of people food that didn't contain the substance. All the people who ate the food containing the substance developed insomnia, whereas the people who ate the food that didn't contain it were fine. I can't remember what the substance was called, but I can probably find out using Yahoo or Google.

It was explained to me by an insomniac that he didn't have trouble falling asleep per se, but he had trouble staying asleep. The slightest noise or disturbance would wake him up, and he'd have trouble getting back to sleep. Since the guy was actually a diagnosed insomniac, I took his word for it.

I always refer to the times when I can't fall asleep for a long time or don't get a lot of sleep for long periods of time "sleep madness."

Hi, my name is Liah, and I'm an insomniac.

Seriously, I have sleeping problems. I can't fall asleep till, like, 4am, and even when I do I wake up an hour later. I usually wake up 4 or 5 times during the night. I've been like this for a while.

It's hard for me to fall asleep when I lay my head down because... I guess I think too much? Like, when it's just me in my room, no sound, no light, or whatever, I often find myself just thinking. It's usually about things like the day's events, or what assignments I have to do, how I'm going to do it, what bills need to be paid, or sometimes I find myself thinking of things that may've happened that day and how I wished it *could've* gone.

My best friend also had sleeping problems similar to mine for a long time, but she eventually saw a doc' and got some sleeping pills. I think maybe I should do the same. I've not seen a doc' yet and I usually jokingly say I'm an insomniac, but I've not really taken the thought seriously. I guess I've been like this for so long that it seems *normal*. Reading through everyone's post makes me think pretty hard on it, though.

Not so much an insomniac but I do get really bad night terrors.
I woke up the other night screaming. My partner said that i ran down stairs faster than anything. I woke up on the chair wondering how I got there.

I actually enjoy a bit of a nightmare every now and then but the real night terrors are just ****ing pants.

Originally Posted by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insomnia

Insomnia is a sleeping disorder characterized by the inability to fall asleep and/or the inability to remain asleep for a reasonable amount of time. Insomniacs have been known to complain about being unable to close their eyes or "rest their mind" for more than a few minutes at a time. Both organic and non-organic insomnia constitute a sleep disorder.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, approximately 60 million Americans suffer from insomnia each year. Insomnia tends to increase with age and affects about 40 percent of women and 30 percent of men

Apparently there are quite a few possible causes, too, but mostly what you'd expect:
Having any stimulants
Hormone shifts
Psychological problems
Going to bed earlier/later than normal, and/or shifting the schedule of your day.
Brain injuries
Using too many sleep-inducing drugs (Buh?)
...And a few other things.

Given that, I'm surprised that everyone doesn't suffer from it.

Actually, insomnia is when you technically can't sleep at all.

Insomnia is a sleep disorder that's defined by chronic difficulties in either falling to sleep, maintaining sleep, or enjoying a restful sleep. There are some insomniacs who have no problem what so ever getting to sleep, but they can't seem to manage to get either a full nights sleep, or a fulfilling and restful sleep.

One of the really interesting things about insomnia, in my opinion anyway, is that sufferers often greatly exaggerate how long they take to fall asleep. You can find people with pseudoinsomnia who'll be adamant that they take well over an hour to get off to sleep - but when you monitor their sleep, they could only be awake for some fifteen minutes.

Float your zeds.

I take around forty minutes or so to get the sleep. It's been good for me now though, takes less time.

I never wake up in the middle of the night, though.

Takes me 10 mins to fall asleep, but on a good night out or a late working night it takes mere seconds.

I have woken up in the morning once at my mates house in Chepstow, even though i fell asleep in my bed in Caldicot the night before. Never woken up in the middle of the night though unless i needed the loo.

I really dread going to sleep and I have no idea why so I either don't go to sleep at all or wait to really obscene time to actuall go to sleep it's really anoying. Even while I write this post it is 11:49pm and I have no intention of going to sleep any time soon.

Originally Posted by VoiceOfNoOne

I really dread going to sleep and I have no idea why so I either don't go to sleep at all or wait to really obscene time to actuall go to sleep it's really anoying. Even while I write this post it is 11:49pm and I have no intention of going to sleep any time soon.

Aren't you always tired? How do you have enough energy if you don't sleep?

I have sleeping problems. But it's when I drink soda most of the time. I have been known to talk in my sleep and stuff. It sometimes take me from 10 minutes to 2 hours to finaly sleep. Sometimes I don't sleep at all because my body won't want to sleep.

Originally Posted by felix

Aren't you always tired? How do you have enough energy if you don't sleep?

Well I never really feel tired and I do sleep sometimes its just not as much as I should really.

I usually go to bed around midnight, and notice that I'm still awake around 1am.

If it's a good night, I'll sleep until the alarm goes off at 8:15, but if it's a bad night (relatively speaking) I'll wake up about 3-4 times between 4am and when the alarm goes off.

Also, I'm a rather deep sleeper; it takes about two or so minutes for my alarm to wake me up (and it's really loud), and it's really hard for other people to get me awake.