Stress Management Support Group

I try doing some light yoga or stretching for about 20 minutes. Often it helps. I also take Melatonin. That helps quite a bit. I take a Melatonin after I do some yoga and relax with a book on the heating pad an hour before bed. If I am extremely stressed, however, this doesn't help as much. I am considering a hypnosis CD for sleep.

For me .. I try not to watch tv or do anything which requires a lot of thinking before sleeping ... reading a book helps me to doze off. Keeping the room dark with some lavender aromatherapy tends to help.

Do keep a comfortable temperature in your bedroom... my place is too hot at nights .. hence I usually put my air cond on a timer..

I would say to be careful of Melatonin, in regards to how it might affect your dreams. My wife takes it, and I was having a particularly stressful day ahead of me - so I took one to help me go to sleep.

I worked, I slept well and had no groggy side affects. BUT, I had the weirdest nightmares that night. I told my wife, and she said "I bet it was the melatonin....it makes me have weird dreams sometimes too."

I'm sure this varies from person to person, but I thought I would share.

Busy mind at night? maybe intrusive over thinking as soon as your head hits the pillow? If so, see what kind of thinking it is usually. Is it about the next day or the day you've had?
I have a technique I call duck shooting (I mean the carnival kind), Imagine the thoughts are those tin ducks on the reel. As a thought you feel needs sorting comes along, think of a do-able small thing you can do to address it, and as you do, imagine it tipping over like tin ducks at a fair. This way you feel empowered. always remember all problems can be actioned upon, even if it's small at first. When all the ducks are 'shot' your mind should be calmer.
Shut down any thoughts of what I call 'What ifs', you running every scenario will not do anything but keep you awake, if an issue comes along, you'll deal with it there and then. Also avoid the 'shoulda- coulda' scenarios of thinking what you could and should have done in the day's events...they've happened, you did what you did...move on!
Reduce caffeine drinks (coffee/tea/cola/energy drinks) over the space of two weeks. wean yourself off SLOWLY as sudden cessation can cause headaches. make a wean off chart. Don't fool yourself into thinking you NEED caffeine, that's nonsense and only a belief, caffeine causes massive peaks and crashes, very bad for sleep patterns!
Get a bedtime routine and no computing, gaming, movies etc just before bedtime, they are bad for your calm down time, which should be at least half an hour (duck shooting can be done in your calm down time if need be). Deep breathing is free and nature's calmer downer, so to get a nice calm feeling going, just take in some deep breaths, all the way in, hold for three seconds and as you exhale, all the way out, give a sigh "Aaahh", a sigh is nature's way of saying "all is over and done". I'm sure when you do a big shopping trip, afterwards you flump in your chair and sigh? well there you go, all is done!
Never 'reward' your brain for waking up, so no book reading or especially TV watching if you wake in the night, this trains your mind to wake up, just close your eyes and relax.
Lastly, there is no 'trying' to sleep, sleep needs no effort, sleep happens in the absence of activity or effort, so forget 'Trying' to go to sleep, it will find you when you are calm.
Goodnight!

Ask your doc if you should try benadryl or melatonin.

Try doing some reading before bed, something
that will soothe you and not stress you out.

Try taking a warm bath about an hour before bed.

I use Melatonin and it does work well. However, it gives me really vivid dreams. I am trying to stop the habit of thinking about ideas etc while I am in bed and trying to get sleep. I find that I get scary dreams whenever I have spent time thinking about things before I fall asleep. I suggest to other members here that they should try to avoid thinking about things while they are in bed and trying to get to sleep.