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Different hormones play different roles when it comes to sleep. Changes to your hormones can affect your sleeping patterns.
For example, melatonin, one of the significant sleep hormones, is responsible for telling your body when it’s time to sleep. Changes in your melatonin levels can significantly impact your sleep cycle.
Changes in hormone levels during can also cause hormonal insomnia. Find out how these hormones play a role in sleep and ways you can correct them naturally through lifestyle changes and supplements.
Symptoms of Hormonal Insomnia
Hormonal insomnia occurs when there’s a change in your body’s hormone levels, which alters your sleep cycle. If you have hormonal insomnia, you might experience the following symptoms:
- Inability to fall asleep after lying on your bed
- Short sleep cycles where you wake up in the night and cannot fall back asleep
- Waking earlier than you used to
- Difficulty maintaining a regular sleep pattern
- Poor concentration and fatigue due to poor sleep
What Causes Hormonal Insomnia?
There are several factors that can contribute to hormonal changes that cause hormonal insomnia. Fortunately, they’re hardly considered severe medical issues. Some of these factors include:
Menopause
Menopause causes significant hormonal imbalances due to the decrease in estrogen levels. Some women experience hot flashes, night sweats, and insomnia. The hot flashes and night sweats can also contribute to making a night’s rest difficult and affect your sleep patterns.
Pregnancy
Hormonal changes occur during pregnancy and also after childbirth. These hormonal changes can contribute to insomnia. Symptoms associated with pregnancy, like back pain, an increased need to urinate, and acid reflux, may occur and make sleeping uncomfortable.
Thyroid disorders
The thyroid controls the body’s metabolism. There are two types of thyroid disorders: hypothyroidism, where the thyroid hormone is under-secreted, and hyperthyroidism, where there is excessive thyroid hormone secretion. Fatigue, mood swings, and muscle tremors that are seen in thyroid disorders often contribute to insomnia.
Stress
Stress can cause a lot of disturbances in the body, and insomnia is one of them. Cortisol is commonly known as the stress hormone. Prolonged stress raises your cortisol levels, which, among other things, affects your ability to sleep.
How Hormones Affect Sleep
There are several hormones that play a role in your sleep cycle. These different hormones affect your sleep patterns in different ways.
Melatonin
Melatonin is known as the sleep hormone. Produced by the brain in response to darkness, it helps with setting the body’s 24-hour internal clock. When you feel sleepy, melatonin is released, which slows down your body’s metabolism, causing you to feel more tired and eventually sleep off.
Cortisol
Cortisol, known as the stress hormone, is released by the adrenal gland when you’re under stress or anxiety. When your cortisol levels are high, you will find falling or staying asleep hard. Eating sugary and processed foods before bed causes your cortisol levels to rise, which affects your ability to fall asleep.
Estrogen
During pregnancy, your estrogen levels go up, and during menopause, they fall. This fluctuation in hormone levels can alter your sleep cycle.
Progesterone
Progesterone levels change as estrogen does. There are high levels of progesterone in pregnancy and low levels in menopause. This also affects sleeping patterns.
Growth hormone
Growth hormone is released to help you sleep better, mostly during the pubescent or adolescent stage. This hormone is responsible for height increase and building bones and muscles, which occur as you sleep.
Leptin
Leptin is responsible for appetite and energy usage. It reassures the brain that it has enough energy, enabling you to sleep properly without waking up at night because you feel hungry. When leptin levels are low, you start to feel hungry, which can cut your sleep short.
Ghrelin
Ghrelin makes you feel hungry at night, and this can increase your appetite, affecting the amount of sleep you get or even preventing you from getting any sleep at all.
Treating Hormonal Insomnia
Correcting hormonal insomnia requires different approaches, which can include addressing certain lifestyle habits, using supplemental melatonin, and also using therapy.
Lifestyle changes
Sleep hygiene is essential. Taking warm showers, avoiding coffee or sodas before bedtime, and letting go of all gadgets, phones, or electronics once it’s time for bed can help improve sleep.
You should also limit daily naps. If you sleep during the day, you might find it hard to sleep at night. A sleep schedule or routine helps the brain and body know when to sleep.
Your diet also plays a role, as sugary and processed foods cause a rise in cortisol levels, which reduces sleep.
Exercise is also proven to be beneficial in correcting hormonal imbalances. When you engage in light exercise before sleep, your body feels full, which can make you feel sleepy.
Natural remedies
Taking the supplement melatonin can also help improve sleep. This can be in powders or gummies. Caution is to be taken when using them, so it is advised to speak to your doctor to know which melatonin supplements are best for you and the proper doses to take.
Also, the use of herbs and teas like green tea and chamomile tea can help promote relaxation and better sleep.
Behavior therapies
Sleep therapy, sleep monitoring, and cognitive behavioral therapies can also help regulate sleep and correct hormonal insomnia by addressing the psychological causes of insomnia.
Medications
Sleeping pills are often prescribed by your doctor in cases where there’s a medical or pathologic cause of hormonal insomnia. Consult with your doctor on prescription medications used to correct hormonal insomnia.
Talking with Your Doctor about Hormonal Insomnia
It is important to speak to your doctor when you begin to experience insomnia. This helps your doctor determine whether it is due to hormonal causes or other underlying illnesses. They can also rule out any other medical condition by conducting investigations like blood tests, thyroid function tests, or a brain scan.
Frequently Asked Questions
Have a sleep routine; this helps to regulate your body’s internal clock. Also, use the supplement melatonin and reduce your coffee or soda intake.
In menopause, where there are low levels of estrogen, sleep problems, insomnia, and fatigue are present.
Melatonin is primarily responsible for sleep. Estrogen and progesterone changes can also influence sleep cycles in women.
Has anyone tried any natural remedies for hormonal insomnia that actually work? I’m kinda desperate here and would love some tips. Thanks in advance!
Hey Lisa, I’ve found that a combination of valerian root and chamomile tea before bed works wonders. Also, keeping screen time to a minimum an hour before bed helps a lot!
Interesting read but I’m not totally sold on the idea that all insomnia cases are hormone-related. There’s got to be more to it in terms of environmental factors and habits.
This article was really informative! I’ve noticed similar symptoms in my mother. Going to discuss these insights with her doctor. Thanks, Vitamins For Woman.
Good article. Had no idea hormones played such a big role in sleep. Wonder if adjusting diet could help with this too.
While the article touches on important points, it’s crucial to note the detailed mechanisms of how these hormones interact with our sleep cycles. Some simplifications may not give the full picture.
anyone else tried the medications mentioned? kinda wary of side effects n whatnot. could use some real talk feedback.
Well, if stress is causing insomnia, guess I should just quit my job and become a professional napper. Problem solved!
The section on how estrogen and progesterone affect sleep is fascinating. It highlights the importance of hormonal balance, not just for sleep, but overall health.
Great article, really appreciate the breakdown of different hormones and their effects. Makes me more aware of my body’s signals.
interesting read, makes me think about how everything in our body is so connected. hormones and sleep, who would’ve thought?