Sleeplessness

Sleeplessness is a wearing and exhausting complaint. The present age is a nervous age, and insomnia is growing more and more frequent. Unhappily, orthodox medicine has numerous drugs which give, not sleep, but unconsciousness. Natural sleep is refreshing. Unconsciousness produced by dangerous drugs is a disaster: These drugs are habit-creating. One meets numerous patients who were given a sleep producing drug for a few days, and who become enslaved by it and who no                                                                                  longer can secure natural sleep.
All the sleep-producing drugs known to orthodox medicine are poisonous, and not infrequently the dose has to be “increased from time to time” and therefore more and more poison has to be taken to secure a night of rest and of unconsciousness.
There are simple methods which are apt to produce sleep in innumerable cases. In some cases sleeplessness is due to hunger. A glass of “milk and a few biscuits at the bedside may produce sleep. In other cases sleeplessness is due to over-eating. A heavy meal taken late at night keeps the patient awake, and it is of course disastrous to give such an individual poisonous drugs instead of regulating his diet. In other cases there is acute restlessness and nervousnessdue to hard and continued work late at night . Then there are cases of sleeplessness which are due to anaemia, to throbbing pulses, to over- consumption of tobacco and so forth. Each individual case must be studied by itself and must be treated on its merits.
There are many simple ways of improving sleep. A dish of onions taken in the evening or just before going to bed is soothing to many, and sleep producing. Vigorous massage of the feet of the patient when in bed is another method which frequently brings about sleep. The sleepless may be soothed and the throbbing blood be withdrawn from the head by massaging the back downwards. This is best done with a cloth wrung out in hot water. When the patient has been rubbed downwards for a few minutes he frequently begins to feel sleepy.           Of course, the sleepless must not read exciting books in bed, and, before all, they must not turn on the light and start reading because they cannot sleep. If the sleepless lie quietly in bed, relaxing body and brain, they will get wonderful rest even if there is no sleep.
Homoeopathy has wonderful medicines for sleeplessness. It will lead too far to enumerate and describe a large number. I would mention only a few. Frequently sleeplessness is due to over-activity of the brain. The patient feels Jar more wide awake at night than in the daytime. Such patient can be given wonderful sleep with Coffea tosta in high potency, My favourite potency is the 30th Strong coffee taken at night produces sleeplessness by over-stimulating the brain. Like should be cured with like. An infinitely small dose of Coffea has produced deep natural sleep in innumerable cases in my own experience.
Aconite is a heating and exciting drug. It over- stimulates the whole body. If sleeplessness is due to the heat of the body, restlessness, impatience, then Aconite may be tried. My favourite potency used for that purpose is the 3x. If the patient has a hot head and throbbing pulses, then Belladonna 3x or Glonoine 3x may give wonderful relief. If the patient is very restless, very tidy, loves heat, feels chilly, then Arsenic should be tried. I usually employ the6x potency. Nervous patients who suffer with depression will often be given sleep with Ignatia 3x, while excitable, nervous patient who are apt to tremble outwardly or inwardly maybe greatly benefited by Gelsemium 3x.
Source : The Homoeopathic Heritage