I have no medical background, but I do like sleep....
Melatonin is a hormone secreted by the pineal gland in the brain. It lets the
body know that it is dark outside. Melatonin directs the body to prepare for
sleep.
You can help encourage the sleep enducing effects of your body's natural
melatonin by staying away from bright lights in the late evening before you
sleep.
Getting a good dose of bright light early in the morning when you rise
helps re-affirm the body's natural melatonin cycle ( low level melatonin
in morning, high level in evening ).
If you decide to try ingesting melatonin, you only need a very low dose for
it to have an effect on your biological clock ( up to 0.5 milligrams for the
average adult ). Melatonin can constrict blood vessels, so it should not
be taken regularly or in large doses.
You should be aware that caffeine has a half-life in the bloodstream of
between 3 and 7 hours. Therefore, a typical caffeine drink with 100 milligrams
of caffeine will leave you with around 50 milligrams of caffeine floating
around five hours later. Five more hours and you will still have roughly
25 milligrams. The exact effects depend on a person's age and their caffeine
tolerance.
Then there's the really obvious stuff - avoid any potentially stressful stuff
before you go to sleep eg, don't catch up on lot's of unread email just before
bed time and don't think of it as a good time to fill out your tax return, etc.
Distractions from other people who stay up later than you are bad enough,
but you don't want to encourage your own mental distractions.
Sleep well !
John
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