Sleep is under-appreciated … by people that can get a suitable amount. Once you can’t, you figure out how glorious it was all along. 

Lack of sleep is dangerous

In a survival situation, lack of sleep is dangerous and can be deadly. It’s not just about feeling tired and grumpy, either:  Cognitive abilities and learning decreased in students who got less than seven and a half hours of sleep a night.  Worse yet, those same students didn’t realize they were cognitively impaired until they got less than five and a half hours a night.

As the Bard put it, it is “Sleep, That Knits Up the Ravelled Sleeve of Care” ( Macbeth → Act 2, Scene 2, Page 3).

Bad things can happen

Besides cognitive and physical impairment, insufficient sleep strongly provokes our long-term stress response in the form of release of the hormone cortisol.  Lots of cortisol.  While cortisol is a very helpful thing at the right time and at the right dose, continuing to release a lot of it for days or weeks on end does not make your innards (that’s the highly technical term for heart, blood vessels, glucose and lipid metabolism, etc.) at all happy.

This leaves preppers with a dual problem:  During ‘gray skies’ times of our lives is when we are least likely to get good sleep, and when we can least afford to not get good sleep.  This post has some ideas on how to improve sleep during tumultuous times (or calmer ones). I’m not a physician, so these are ideas, not prescriptions.  As always, do your own evaluating.

Dark and quiet

Um, yah, you probably knew that dark, quiet environments are best for good sleep.  But do you have soft, comfortable ear plugs and a light mask for everyone in their bug out bag?  They take next to no space or weight.  There are situations where you wouldn’t want to reduce your awareness of course, but you might also find yourself sleeping in a safe spot with someone who saws more logs than your average lumberjack.  While you’re packing, is there something your kiddo would find relaxing and comforting that can slip in there?

The sky is blue.  Blue does not make us sleepy.

Electronics screens put out more blue light than we realize, and that blue light close to bedtime inhibits your usual secretion of the hormone melatonin (more on that later).  Melatonin helps make you sleepy.  Too much screen time close to bed, worse sleep.  Not a problem during an EMP, but if there’s power, your kids will be using their screens if they can, I betcha.  Many devices now have a little app that puts the screen in ‘night mode’, reducing its blue light output.

Our internal clocks like it when we keep regular hours

Your brain has a fine internal clock.  The more you can match your behavior to its expectations, getting up and going to sleep at regular times, the better the melatonin release will match your needs.

Melatonin is the hormones our brains use to spread the message that it’s time to sleep

In the normal course of events, the hypothalamus of your brain releases melatonin on a 24 hr cycle, more or less.  Environmental cues, including when it’s light and when your active, adjust this cycle. That’s why you want to sleep dark and quiet at a regular time.  Melatonin can also be bought over the counter, so you can give your system a boost when it needs the help and you need the sleep.

When?  Melatonin is slow acting.  Taking it half an hour before you’d like to be sleepy works for most people; and that’s if you’re putting it under your tongue for faster absorption.  If swallowing a pill, give it an additional half hour.  It won’t hit you like a freight train; the effect comes on more subtly.

How much?  The scientists who study the stuff say it’s most effective at between 0.3 mcg and 1 mcg, depending on the source.  The 0.3 mcg dose produces blood levels pretty close to the natural peak level. The big box stores sell pills with 5 mcg – which is insane, imo. 

When it comes to hormones, more is not better!  For one thing, when you take too much of a hormone regularly, your cells tend to lose their sensitivity to it and won’t react well to just normal levels for awhile thereafter.  I know the feeling; when somebody yells at me I tune them out after a while too. I buy the 5 mcg because that’s what they’ve got, but I cut them into quarters for Salty and myself.

Is it safe? The sources I looked at found it was.  Some mentioned the receptor downregulation (cells losing sensitivity) problem with habitual use.  A few people have a little morning sleepiness the day after, but it’s mild compared to other sleep aids.

Does it work? Summing up the studies I read, I’d put it “Gently effective”.  This is not a ‘take the pill and sleep like Rip Van Winkle until it wears off’ kind of thing.  It promotes sleep but doesn’t force it.  People get to sleep earlier and get better quality sleep.  If you have to wake them up, their brains still work. (<– personal observation).  Overall, it’s by far my favorite chemical sleep aid.

Diphenhydramine (Benadryl and Co.): It’s not just for allergies

I hope every prepper has a big bottle of this stuff stashed.  It is very good as an allergy med, and in some cases can reduce other issues such as asthma and skin contact rashes like poison ivy (actually also an allergy).  It works by blocking the cells from making a signal they use to talk among themselves, a chemical called histamine.  Why bring it up here?  Histamine helps cells talk about things other than allergy.  One effect of blocking histamine is to promote sleep.

When? Diphenhydramine works fairly fast; I wouldn’t take it more than fifteen minutes before I was ready to sleep.

How much?  Read the labels for max dosage.  Half doses might work great for sleep; people’s sensitivities differ.

Is it safe?  Depends.  Are you going to follow the instructions and only use it occasionally? If so, sources agree it’s pretty safe unless you are breast-feeding.  The stuff gets into Momma’s milk, and we’ve got no real clue how well Junior can deal with that.  It’s also not recommended for asthmatics.  They (Proctor and Bianchi, 2012) didn’t explain that one, but I suspect it’s because it overlaps actions with some asthma meds and they didn’t want overdosing. 

Daytime sleepiness

Daytime sleepiness and some cognitive impairment (both mild) occurred in some people at normal dose levels.  They didn’t explain ‘cognitive impairment’ specifically, but I’ve noticed it’s hard to get my brain moving after I use this, particularly if awakened before a full night’s sleep. I wouldn’t use this one if I thought I might have to wake and think fast.

If’ you get stupid and take stupid high doses, bad things happen.  Racing heart rate and hallucinations were the most reported overdose signs.  Radovanovic et al. (2000) just mentioned holding these folks until the dose wore off. Also, there’s some evidence that chronic use increases your risk of developing dementia.

Does it work? Yep, definitely works for most people.  Some go down like a pole-axed ox when they take this, some find it doesn’t put them right down but does help them sleep deeper.  

Good sleep and sweet dreams to you!

Here are some of the sources I read:

Ashley Proctor and Matt T. Bianchi, “Clinical Pharmacology in Sleep Medicine,” ISRN Pharmacology, vol. 2012, Article ID 914168, 14 pages, 2012. doi:10.5402/2012/914168

Carter, M. and Juurlink, D. Melatonin. CMAJ November 20, 2012 vol. 184 no. 17 First published April 16, 2012, doi:10.1503/cmaj.111765

Costello, R. B., Lentino, C. V., Boyd, C. C., O’Connell, M. L., Crawford, C. C., Sprengel, M. L., & Deuster, P. A. (2014). The effectiveness of melatonin for promoting healthy sleep: a rapid evidence assessment of the literature. Nutrition Journal, 13, 106. http://doi.org/10.1186/1475-2891-13-106

Gray SL, Anderson ML, Dublin S, Hanlon JT, Hubbard R, Walker R, Yu O, Crane PK, Larson EB. Cumulative Use of Strong Anticholinergics and Incident DementiaA Prospective Cohort Study. JAMA Intern Med.2015;175(3):401–407. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.7663

Radovanovic D1, Meier PJ, Guirguis M, Lorent JP, Kupferschmidt H. Dose-dependent toxicity of diphenhydramine overdose. Hum Exp Toxicol. 2000 Sep;19(9):489-95.

*By rachel CALAMUSA (It’s time to sleep Uploaded by xiaphias) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons