I've tried it a few times. I find that I sleep like a rock, but have a dull, throbbing headache in the morning. My wife swears by the stuff...
Melatonin
31–40 of 229 posts
Re: Melatonin
#32I've taken it and really does help me sleep better. It helps me fall asleep easier if I wake up in the middle of the night. I was taking about 1/3 of a 3mg tablet.
I did stop taking it though because I felt depressed after about 2 weeks of taking it every day.
I will probably take it again periodically if I am traveling.
Re: Melatonin
#33Melatonin does work wonders, but you never know how your own body might react to it.
I have many issues with my sleep cycle and quality of sleep. Melatonin is one of the few things that alleviates my problems. However, for me, it's only good for one night. I can take melatonin for one night out of a month, and get a blissful, restful night of sleep. If I take it two nights in a row, evil side-effects start creeping up.
It begins with a headache. If I take melatonin two nights in a row, the next day I will wake up with a headache that's hard to shake. My dreams, while very vivid and pleasant the first night, become more gloomy and depressing the second night. By the third day, my dreams are full-on, vivid, terrifying nightmares. I feel depressed and angry all day, and the headache borders a migraine. After four days of melatonin, I'm a wreck. It no longer puts me to sleep, nor gives me restful sleep. It becomes nothing more than a pill full of nightmares, depression, anger, and a bad migraine.
The first time I started taking melatonin, I had no idea it was causing these side effects. It took a while to pin down, and I just assumed it was related to my ongoing battle with sleep. I do recommend it, just know that you may have adverse reactions to continued use.
Re: Melatonin
#34I take it when I travel across time zones to reset my internal clock. Works great! If I take if for more than 3-4 nights in a row it seems to lose its effectiveness.
I was going to mention the same thing. I used it when I was flying a lot internationally and it worked to overcome my jet lag pretty effectively.
Definitely recommend it if you travel internationally.
Re: Melatonin
#35The problem with a lack of FDA regulation is that there is no guarantee on what you are taking. The freshness of the product and the veracity of what's in the pills will always be suspect to me. If I could trust where I get my melatonin from, I would gladly take it. But I've learned too much about how terrible this industry is.
I don't trust many, but I do trust Nature's Way, Now Foods, and Jarrows. They do proper batching and testing.
I'll check them out, thanks!
Re: Melatonin
#36I use melatonin regularly to regulate my sleep cycle. It's a very effective part of a regimen (sleep hygiene, f.lux, etc) that allows me to manage a nearly-decade long problem of insomnia. However, from a psychological standpoint, it's a very good thing melatonin is so safe. Every single person I've ever recommended melatonin to, I've directed to this article and discussed it with them. Every single such person then…
This whole discussion is starting to make me feel reckless in a hilariously inconsequential way. I literally said to myself "I think people take melatonin when they have trouble sleeping...", went to the drug store, bought a bottle, and started taking the dose it recommended, at the time it recommended. Apparently I skipped out on a whole bunch of research I was supposed to have done.
Re: Melatonin
#37Interesting. I work on call shifts. (Linux sysadmin, one week out of three is 24/7 on call -- which works much better than rotating one day out of three.) I've used Melatonin for years to 'regulate' my sleep cycle so that I can stop my tirelessly creative brain from thinking about that article I read a few hours ago on Hacker News.
My other 'hacks' to keep my sleep cycle regulated are f.lux where possible, using only dim incandescent lights in the evening around the house once I am ready for bed, and NOT using a laptop, iPad, or anything with white/blue LEDs in bed. Wake-up is accomplished with an alarm clock that activates a piece of "wall art" that slowly changes color spectrum to full daylight using LEDs and shines on the bed.
Having good control of my sleep cycle keeps jet lag, time changes, mid-night alerts, and other things that disrupt most people from disrupting me as much for as long.
Re: Melatonin
#38There are some problems with Melatonin (as supplied) - you don't really know how much (if any) you're getting. Investigators found that quality control was very poor and some brands contained very little melatonin. (I can't find it now, but it was something like Consumer Reports or similar?) It's a prescription only med in some places (UK) so you might not be able to get it. But it is "remarkably effective"[1] for je…
The upside of being a prescription med is that you can expect it to have better quality control.
The downside is that it's not usually prescribed to people under 55.
(http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Insomnia/Pages/MedicineOverview...)
Re: Melatonin
#39The problem with a lack of FDA regulation is that there is no guarantee on what you are taking. The freshness of the product and the veracity of what's in the pills will always be suspect to me. If I could trust where I get my melatonin from, I would gladly take it. But I've learned too much about how terrible this industry is.
I don't trust many, but I do trust Nature's Way, Now Foods, and Jarrows. They do proper batching and testing.
I have to add LiftMode, their products are pretty good, and come with test results to show exactly what you are getting.
Re: Melatonin
#40Lots of data at http://examine.com/supplements/Melatonin/