Insomnia

The most common sleep disorder is insomnia or sleeplessness. Twice as many women as men complain of insomnia, and it is more prevalent among the elderly.

There are three kinds of insomnia

• Difficulty in falling asleep.
• Awaking in the middle of the night.
• Early morning awakening.

Insomnia is mainly due to psychiatric or medical problems such as depression, alcoholism, sleep apnea, nocturnal enuresis (bed wetting), restless leg syndrome (muscular cramps of calf muscles). Other factors such as stress, bereavement also lead to insomnia for about 3–4 weeks. Fasting, indigestion too results in temporary disturbances in the sleep.

A small percentage of disorders related to sleeplessness start during childhood. Generally, sleep disturbance results in fatigue, irritability and unpredictable levels of work efficiency. On an average, an adult requires about 6–8 hours of sleep a day.

Measures to be taken for good sleep

• To go to bed only when feeling sleepy.
• Not to stay in bed for longer than 10 minutes if unable to sleep.
• Not to sleep during the day.
• Try to sleep and get up at the same hour every day.
• Drink a glass of warm water before going to bed.
• Eat early a light dinner. At least 3 hour gap should be there between supper and going to bed.
• Take hot and cold foot bath which relieves cramps occurring in the legs due to varicose veins or any other condition.
• Do deep breathing for 10 minutes.
• Perform yoganidra or progressive muscular relaxation before going to bed.
• Drink a glass of warm milk or water with honey.
• Avoid stimulating drinks such as coffee, tea, cola or cocoa with evening meals or after.
• Take hot foot immersion bath for 20–30 minutes or prolonged cold foot bath for 45–60 minutes.
• Cold spinal bath is a tonic to induce sleep.
• Massage taken 2/3 times a week is helpful in inducing sleep.

Migraine

Migraine which afflicts 12% of the world’s population is still a misunderstood phenomenon. Migraine needs no introduction. There will be distinctive hammering or throbbing one–sided headache during an attack with nausea or vomiting. Only a migraine sufferer knows the severity of the affliction. When it strikes it stops work, thought and every other activity of the sufferer.

Migraine headache takes the form of either classical migraine or simple common migraine. The classical migraine attack can easily be distinguished from the other by the chain of reactions that characterize it. The troublesome syndrome is preceded by an ‘aura’ which serves as a warning of the headache to follow.

The ‘aura’ may take the form of an uncommon feeling of well being which alerts the person to expect an attack. The initial symptoms of migraine are usually blurring of the vision which may reach its peak in 15 to 30 minutes and then fade. Normalcy will return in about an hour. Then starts the typical one–sided headache, throbbing in nature, accompanied by nausea and vomiting. The severity of pain ranges from a dull, persistent ache to an unbearable thumbing and pounding pain. The pain is triggered off, most of the time, by intense light and high frequency sound.

Common or simple migraine occurs more frequently than the classical one, it has no aura or any early indications of the impending attack. But all the signs of a typical migraine’s attack may manifest.