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Not being able to fall asleep at night, night after night, can leave one feeling hopeless and even depressed. You lay in bed for hours, staring at the clock and helplessly watch the minutes tick by until you finally fall asleep with only a few hours remaining before the alarm goes off. This is called insomnia and it affects millions of people. Some people experience it every night, while others only experience it once in a while. But, only having it occasionally doesn't make it any less serious to the person experiencing it.

Luckily, there are ways to achieve a full night's sleep. Some include prescription medication, while other methods include behavioural changes. To understand how to cure insomnia, it is important to look at some of the causes of the disorder. Caffeine use a few hours before bedtime has been invariably linked with insomnia as have the use of other stimulants. Stress and anxiety plays a big role in sleep disorders because when the body calms down and you're faced with the silence of bedtime, the mind begins to race, thoughts fluttering to every little thing that makes you anxious. This can go on for hours, making you so frustrated that falling asleep is impossible. Other causes include, but are not limited to: mental disorders such as depression (insomnia can also lead to depression), use and abuse of over the counter sleep aids, and hormone changes in the body, such as when a woman goes through menstruation or menopause.

To begin with the treatments, we will first look at the drugs available to aid one in achieving healthy sleep patterns. There are many prescription drugs available such as Ambien or Lunesta. These drugs have very little side effects when compared with benzodiazepines and anti-depressants, and have a small risk of dependency. If you don't want to go the way of prescription drugs, Melatonin is a supplement you can take about a half an hour to an hour before bed that should help you fall asleep, if the reason for your insomnia is a circadian rhythm disruption. Also, there is evidence to support that Magnesium supplements aid in falling asleep due to muscle relaxing properties. Though, it should be noted that Magnesium should not be taken without Calcium as the two need to balance each other out. There are Calcium-Magnesium supplements available in any grocery store.

While I do recommend trying prescription drugs and supplements, I do not recommend over the counter sleep medication as it can exacerbate your sleep problems instead

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