Insomnia is the most common sleep disorder. It manifests in three ways:
- Initial insomnia: also called sleep-onset insomnia or first-hour insomnia. It is the difficulty of falling asleep when lying down.
- Intermediate insomnia: also called second-hour insomnia. It is the difficulty of staying asleep during the night. The person falls asleep but wakes up during the night one or several times and has trouble going back to sleep.
- Terminal insomnia: waking up very early in the morning and not being able to sleep anymore.
According to Western medicine, the causes of insomnia are:
- Primary: stress, anxiety or depression.
- Secondary to: changes in sleep schedules, heavy and late dinners. Pain, cough, nasal congestion that wakes you up during the night. Need to urinate. Consumption of stimulating substances (coffee, tea...), side effects of drugs. Hot flashes.
Insomnia and Traditional Chinese Medicine
Insomnia affects the Shen and the Hun. The Heart, Spleen, Kidney, Liver and Gall Bladder organs are involved.
In general, excess Yang or Heat states in the evening make it difficult to fall asleep and are more typical of first-hour insomnia. Deficiency states (especially of Yin) make it difficult to sustain sleep and are more related to second-hour or terminal insomnia.
The main patterns related to insomnia are: