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Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

lesswrong.com

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Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#21

Post by thisacctforreal »

skadamat wrote: post #8

Every single person here, if your serious about diving into the science of sleep, should read Matthew Walker's book: Why We Sleep: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501... His interview on Joe Rogan is a good summary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig He covers everything from why we sleep (obv), naps, melatonin, etc. I've just finished it and really enjoyed it.

I think lots of people reading hn have picked it up in recent weeks, I just finished the first two chapters myself :)

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#22

Post by hendzen »

slaveofallah93 wrote: post #9
hendzen wrote: post #7

If you regularly buy Melatonin, I highly recommend Trader Joes Brand chewable Melatonin tablets. In my area they cost $2.99 for a bottle, far below the cost of other brands, and the dosage per tablet is 0.5mg or 500mcg which for me is pretty optimal. EDIT: corrected units.

>0.5g or 500mcg I hope you mean 0.5 mg not 0.5g because that would be a very big dose!

thanks - that was a typo.

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#23

Post by robbiep »

drasticmeasures wrote: post #11

From the article: >The consensus stresses that melatonin is a very weak hypnotic. The Buscemi meta-analysis cites this as their reason for declaring negative results despite a statistically significant effect – the supplement only made people get to sleep about ten minutes faster. “Ten minutes” sounds pretty pathetic, but we need to think of this in context. Even the strongest sleep medications, like Ambien, only sho…

2 other low hanging fruit that make me pause re credibility:

The article butchers the role of intracellular adenosine increases. It would be fairly easy to describe the full mechanism but instead says that Adenosine is made whilst awake and cleared while asleep which is a gross oversimplification and actually pretty scientifically inaccurate.

It further describes UpToDate as 'the gold standard research database' - UpToDate is nothing of the sort - it is a authoritative clinical reference. Think Economist for medicine, except each article is about a condition, diagnosis or treatment and it is updated. But like all clinical references that are produced by humans, it has biases specific to the authors, their clinical practices etc

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#24

Post by TheEzEzz »

elchief wrote: post #14

I used to suffer terrible sleep until recently. Always exhausted in the morning. Sore all over. Missed meetings, or called in sick some days. Would wake up around 11 if I could Now I can wake up around 630 am, lift weights, do HIIT, and be early to work Melatonin wakes me up in the middle of the night. I take Unisom (Doxylamine) as well. Works pretty well in combination I have blackout curtains but I need some light…

Just an anecdotal warning. Unisom is not recommended for long term use. I didn't know this and used it for a year straight to combat stress induced insomnia during my first startup. It took me a few years before I returned to feeling "normal". YMMV.

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#25

Post by anonytrary »

mkolodny wrote: post #15
anonytrary wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he did mean .5mg since 500ug is .5mg. Still, I'm a bit confused. The bottles I get come in doses of 10mg, I can't imagine taking even just two or three of them in a single night! On the other hand, I'd think 1/20th of my pill (.5mg) would be way too little. After reading this relevant paraphrase from the article: > There have been few studies on sighted young people. One finds that 1 mg works but 0.3 mg doesn…

> On the other hand, I'd think 1/20th of my pill (.5mg) would be way too little. That's one of the key points of the article: > “But my local drugstore sells 10 mg pills! When I asked if they had anything lower, they looked through their stockroom and were eventually able to find 3 mg pills! And you’re saying the correct dose is a third of a milligram?!” > Yes. Most existing melatonin tablets are around ten to thirty…

Yes, I ended up reading the article after commenting (shame on me) and edited my answer to contain their answer. Sorry!

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#26

Post by droopyEyelids »

elchief wrote: post #14

I used to suffer terrible sleep until recently. Always exhausted in the morning. Sore all over. Missed meetings, or called in sick some days. Would wake up around 11 if I could Now I can wake up around 630 am, lift weights, do HIIT, and be early to work Melatonin wakes me up in the middle of the night. I take Unisom (Doxylamine) as well. Works pretty well in combination I have blackout curtains but I need some light…

Can you share any more details about your life?

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#27

Post by colordrops »

atomical wrote: post #16
skadamat wrote: post #8

Every single person here, if your serious about diving into the science of sleep, should read Matthew Walker's book: Why We Sleep: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501... His interview on Joe Rogan is a good summary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig He covers everything from why we sleep (obv), naps, melatonin, etc. I've just finished it and really enjoyed it.

Joe Rogan is one of the biggest propagators of pseudoscience. It's not a good sign when a guest appears on his show. Joe usually tries to rope them into talking about his two favorite health topics: cholesterol and testosterone.

You must not listen to him recently. I've listened to maybe 15 episodes and haven't heard either of those yet. He's been a pretty level headed host. It could be that he's better than he used to be because I've only listened to recent episodes, but it's been great so far.

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#28

Post by kovek »

atomical wrote: post #16
skadamat wrote: post #8

Every single person here, if your serious about diving into the science of sleep, should read Matthew Walker's book: Why We Sleep: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501... His interview on Joe Rogan is a good summary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig He covers everything from why we sleep (obv), naps, melatonin, etc. I've just finished it and really enjoyed it.

Joe Rogan is one of the biggest propagators of pseudoscience. It's not a good sign when a guest appears on his show. Joe usually tries to rope them into talking about his two favorite health topics: cholesterol and testosterone.

Hi atomical, that's an interesting claim. Can you explain more why you believe that? I have listened through a couple of episodes and those made for interesting discussions.

Re: Melatonin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#29

Post by prostoalex »

skadamat wrote: post #8

Every single person here, if your serious about diving into the science of sleep, should read Matthew Walker's book: Why We Sleep: https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501... His interview on Joe Rogan is a good summary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig He covers everything from why we sleep (obv), naps, melatonin, etc. I've just finished it and really enjoyed it.

Kevin Rose also did a podcast with Matthew Walker shortly after the book came out https://www.kevinrose.com/single-post/matthew-walker
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