Insomnia, lack of sleep and restless leg syndrome often go hand in hand. It could be down to meningeal compression, prescription antidepressants or double jointedness.
We recently dug up another potential cause to add to the mix: magnesium deficiency. According to a study published in the Romanian Journal of Neurology, the authors determined that poor quality sleep in patients with restless leg syndrome was caused by a deficiency of magnesium.
The US Department of Agriculture’s Human Nutrition Research Center in North Dakota also confirms that magnesium helps regulate sleep and that magnesium treatment can improve sleep quality and decrease the time taken to fall asleep.
Magnesium could be worth looking into even if you don’t have restless leg syndrome, then. Don’t self medicate, though – speak with your doctor and see what they recommend.
Remember – natural supplements aren’t always safe supplements.
Source: PubMed
As always, there's more information and advice in our insomnia support forum.
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Given the way the term “natural” is used for all sorts of things MOST people do not consider natural, I am in agreement with your last line. Some of the things that go into “natural flavorings” are disgusting. If someone says, Use this natural remedy instead of nasty drugs, they’re forgetting that if that remedy does work, then there is little difference between that remedy and drugs in terms of active ingredients.
I’ll look into magnesium–I think I’ve got some around, but can’t remember why I bought it. I could also find out what foods I should be eating anyway are high in magnesium…
http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/food/magnesium-foods.htm
says Artichokes are good for magnesium (oh, no, the horror!), as well as several nuts, almonds among them. Almonds are just chock full of nutritional bits!
Pumpkin seeds and spinach are meant to be good for magnesium content, too:
http://www.insomnialand.com/blog/10-types-of-food-all-insomniacs-should-know-about/
I ran out of Requip/ropinerole and tried ca. 500 mg of magnesium the other night. Now, I was already aching from 90 min. of continuous dance practice, and took 800mg of ibuprofen as well. Neither the ibuprofen or the magnesium did anything to alleviate distress: if the aches had let me sleep, the twitchies wouldn’t have.
As it turns out, I actually do have a diet rich in magnesium, as it seems to be plentiful in the foods I like already–someone please find something only found in lobster than I need to have in my system, pleasepleaseplease!
I’ll check on the pear pulp recipe, as the pears in front of me could be rather soft right soon.
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