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Page 39
| Don't make your bed a place to watch TV, do paperwork or eat. |
| A light snack may help; a heavy meal won't. |
| Unless prescribed, don't nap during the day. For most people, this can throw off the sleep schedule by confusing the body. |
| Natural sunlight during the day can be helpful for falling and staying asleep, so get outdoors even for a brief walk. |
| Caffeine in the evening disturbs sleep, even if you're not aware of it. |
| Alcohol causes fragmented sleep. Although it can be initially calming, liquor can interfere with the quality of your sleep. |
| Chronic tobacco use disturbs sleep. |
| Try not to rehash the day's problems or worry about tomorrow's. |
| When you go to bed, relax your muscles, beginning with your feet and working your way up to your head. |
| Often the key to successful herbal treatments lies in focusing upon some part or function of the body that is experiencing problems. Hypnotics and nervines are best selected based on the role they play upon the system in question and not simply their strength as hypnotics. If an accompanying health problem affects a particular body system, then the hypnotic remedy can be selected as follows: |
| Circulatory system: Motherwort, lime blossom, balm. |
| Respiratory system: All of the hypnotics can help as anti-spasmodics in conditions such as asthma, if used at the right dose. Wild lettuce eases irritable coughs. |
| Digestive system: The relaxing nervines and carminatives are all important especially chamomile, vervain, balm, hops and valerian. The antispasmodic herbs will help with |
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