What to know about symptoms, causes of and treatments for sleeplessness during pregnancy insomnia
Pregnancy is a special time of life, full of hope, love and expectation. But it can also be a sleepless time. Between the physical changes that occur within your body and the anxieties that often accompany impending motherhood, it’s common to have some difficulty drifting off to sleep or staying asleep. According to the American Pregnancy Association, 78% of pregnant women experience insomnia at some point during pregnancy.
What is insomnia?
Being unable to fall asleep or getting too little or poor-quality sleep is known as insomnia. About 20% to 30% of people experience insomnia, according to Dr. Alex Dimitriu, a sleep medicine specialist who founded Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in California and is double board-certified in both psychiatry and sleep medicine. Every person with insomnia is not the same. While some people have no issue falling asleep, others wake up too early or find it difficult to get back to sleep when they wake up. Even when they get eight hours of sleep, some people don’t wake up feeling rejuvenated because of low-quality sleep.
Symptoms of pregnancy insomnia
Dr. Jesse Mindel, an assistant professor of medicine and neurology at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, claims that insomnia can strike at any time during pregnancy. “Whereas anxiety-related symptoms tend to be more common earlier in the pregnancy,” weight gain-related insomnia is inherently more likely later in the pregnancy. According to Dimitriu, many women find it most difficult to fall asleep during the third trimester since their bodies have undergone so many changes by then. “Anatomically, women carry fairly large babies by the third trimester.” According to him, some women may find it too difficult to get a good night’s sleep due to the aches and pains associated with the third trimester. Furthermore, for certain women in the third trimester, there can be “a bit of mounting anxiety as the due date approaches.”
Causes of pregnancy insomnia
Mindel says that “insomnia can be a normal reaction to things that change in your body. During pregnancy, a woman’s whole body changes, and a lot of those changes are things that can lead to sleep disruption.”
Diagnosis of pregnancy insomnia
During a routine prenatal care visit, a medical professional would usually diagnose pregnancy insomnia, according to Dr. Sherry Ross, an OB-GYN at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, California. A clinical examination, such as a blood test, is not able to diagnose pregnancy insomnia.
“The diagnosis starts with a conversation between a pregnant woman and her health care provider,” Ross says. Ideally, the health care professional will ask her pregnant patient a series of questions, like how many hours of shut-eye she typically gets and how many hours she’s sleeping during her pregnancy. If the patient is sleeping fewer hours than usual and experiencing certain symptoms, she may have pregnancy insomnia. Those symptoms include feeling foggy or having trouble focusing during the day, headaches and exhibiting slower reflexes while driving. If your doctor doesn’t ask you about your sleeping regimen during a prenatal visit, volunteer the information, Ross advises.
Treatment
Because managing insomnia during pregnancy is not all that different from managing it at any other point in life, there are a few easy tactics and home cures for pregnant insomnia that might be helpful. Keeping up appropriate sleep hygiene is crucial to managing this illness.
Also read-Insomnia : A Patient’s Guide To Insomnia And Its Symptoms
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Disclaimer: The opinions and suggestions expressed in this article are solely those of the individual analysts. These are not the opinions of HNN. For more, please consult with your doctor
