Comments on: How to fight mild insomnia: audio books as digital sleeping pills

By: mandarine

mandarine — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 22:18:51 +0000

I have not recipe for staying asleep, but the whole point of the article is how to go back to sleep quickly.

By: john marzan

john marzan — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 02:21:34 +0000

my problem nowadays is how to STAY asleep. I sleep at 12 and wake up at 5am. And i have a difficult time going back to sleep. any tips, mandarine?

By: Susan

Susan — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 14:16:50 +0000

I have been doing this for a couple of years as well and am thrilled. I had horrible insomnia and actually was dependent on sleeping pills. Now, no more pills and I sleep well every night!

It really works.

By: john marzan

john marzan — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 10:57:47 +0000

good advice. i’ve been using my mp3 player as sleeping aid for two years now. everything you said is true. music doesn’t work because my mind doesn’t “get tired” listening to that. i listen to podcasts from ESPN radio or Bloggingheads tv. it works 95% of the time.

to mattathias
mp3 players are inexpensive nowadays and very lightweight. i bought a cheap one from china.

By: mandarine

mandarine — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 04:09:05 +0000

Well, you could download mp3 audio books and burn them onto CDs. If your CD player is recent enough, it can read mp3 files. Otherwise, you’d have to convert the mp3 files into .wav, then burn the CDs. With such an uncompressed format, it would mean one CD for every 60 minutes of listening - one CD would be enough if you just want excerpts for going to sleep, but if you wish to listen to a complete novel, it may amount to quite a few CDs

By: mattathias

mattathias — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 14:03:30 +0000

Hmmm. I have exactly the same problem getting to sleep. However, I don’t have an mp3 player (I do all of my podcast listening, etc. from the computer) so I’ll have to try and find books on CD.

By: mandarine

mandarine — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 06:27:15 +0000

Boring is OK to fall asleep with if there is a motivation to focus on it (like a class). Otherwise, if it’s just boring without special motivations, my mind wanders away and the rest of me just pretends to be reading and I do not fall asleep.

By: healingmagichands

healingmagichands — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:17:40 +0000

Hmm. So you probably should not listen to books on tape if you are driving somewhere. . .

I had a genetics textbook that had amazing sleep inducing properties; especially the chapter on alleles. Something about reading text that mentioned that rather soothing word over and over again. For years, that was the book I had by my bedside if I was having trouble falling asleep. (I never did get through that chapter. In fact, I had to drop the class because it was so boring and the professor was so boring I knew I would never be able to study it all well enough to get a decent grade!)

By: mandarine

mandarine — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 06:50:24 +0000

You are very welcome, Sadie. I hope it works for you. If it does not, well, you’ll be enjoying the audio books. That’s not much of a risk.

By: sadie

sadie — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 15:56:09 +0000

Thank you, thank you, thank you…for laying out this remedy in such careful detail. I have (for decades) suffered from the same not quite ‘acute insomnia’ syndrome, and I am a light, light sleeper besides (so cannot stay asleep once I manage to get there). I am eager to try this…and I will be eternally grateful (not an exaggeration) if it works. P.S. I found you at aerophant. Thanks ~ sadie