Matthew Walker, a sleep expert, says sleep aids like Ambien are counter-productive.
<a href="https://www.drugrehab.com/addiction/prescription-drugs/ambien/sleeping-without-ambien/" rel="nofollow">https://www.drugrehab.com/addiction/prescription-drugs/ambie...</a>
"Dangers aside, Ambien and other hypnotics don’t necessarily provide you the kind of sleep your body actually needs. In his book, “Why We Sleep,” Matthew Walker, director of the Center for Human Sleep Science at the University of California, Berkeley, argues that the sleep people get from taking hypnotics doesn’t have the same restorative quality as natural sleep. In an interview with New York Magazine, Walker explains that drugs like Ambien simply “switch off the top of your cortex, the top of your brain, and put you into a state of unconsciousness.” The drugs actually sedate you, he says, and “sedation is not sleep.”
The good news for those who desperately crave sleep is that a variety of techniques and methods can help you achieve a blissful state of slumber without prescription medications. Here’s a look at some good ways to reboot your sleep cycle. ..."<p>Discussed at length in his book:
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34466963-why-we-sleep" rel="nofollow">https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34466963-why-we-sleep</a><p>Also mentioned in this review:
<a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/10/better-than-ambien/543771/" rel="nofollow">https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/10/better-th...</a>
"At last comes an explanation: According to the new book Why We Sleep, by Matthew Walker, the director of the Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab at the University of California, Berkeley, the sleep people get on sleeping pills like Ambien is not true sleep. Drugs like these simply “switch off the top of your cortex, the top of your brain,” he explained to New York Magazine, “and put you into a state of unconsciousness.” That’s not sleep; that’s cryogenics. According to Walker, sleeping-pill sleep doesn’t have the same restorative powers—and there are lots, from an immune boost to emotional resilience—as good, old-fashioned zzzzs.
Sleeping pills don’t even seem to work all that well. It’s true that some people say they fall asleep faster and sleep better on pills. But, as Walker writes, there’s little difference between the amount of time it takes someone to fall asleep with the help of a pill, compared to a placebo. Even a newer drug, suvorexant, only helps people fall asleep four to eight minutes faster, according to one study he describes.
In addition to causing daytime grogginess, Walker argues, Ambien impairs memory and increases the risk of cancer and death. “Do you feel differently about using or continuing to use sleeping pills having learned about this evidence?” he asks the reader. This reporter does.
Luckily, there is a better way. Walker recommends something known as CBT-I, or cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia. A major part of it is proper “sleep hygiene”—well-known advice like keeping the bedroom dark and cold, using your frigid cave-bed only for sleep and sex, and turning off anything that emits light a few hours before bed. ..."<p>Note that, as Walker explains in this interview with Joe Rogan, if you are not dreaming at night due to alcohol or drugs, your brain may start making you dream when you are awake, leading to hallucinations.
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig&feature=youtu.be&t=402" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwaWilO_Pig&feature=youtu.be...</a>