NERVOUS SLEEPLESSNESS AND HOW TO DEAL WITH IT.

Press, Volume XLIV, Issue 6878, 10 October 1887, Page 6

NERVOUS SLEEPLESSNESS AND HOW TO DEAL WITH IT.

{Omaha World,] Yes." said a prominent local physician to a World reporter, "I have studied this question of insomnia, or sleepessncsaV a great deal.' I have'had a number of very vexatious cases, most of which I have been able to cuxe without, the aid of narcotics; There are two kind** of lessnsss-rone entirely nervous and almost always curable; and the other the precurr sor, or rather the first stag-?, of mania, and seldom curable. You understand that I am speaking of independent insomnia— not of the kind of sleeplessness that curses people who have trouble and who He awake and brood, upon it. This latter variety of wakefulness is entirely sympathetic ; remove the inciting outside causa and you have cured the insomnia. This can not, of course,- come within the province l of the physician. " The one great cause of insomnia Is a mistaken idea on the part of the people that they must sleep so many hours whether or no. I have not quite come to the point of believing that a man should never go to bed or never try to sleep if he

does not feel sleepy, but I am pretty near there. Nature is the best doctor and may generally be relied upon to reform an

unnatural condition. We all know that nothing varies more than appetite. Some

men eat pounds of food, and others eat ounces, and both closseslive healthily. Some arc sensual, some nob,: and the high level of health is enjoyed, by one class equally with the other. Moreover, the same individual varies in his appetites in different years, temperatures and climates. All this being true, why should we subscribe to the inexorable demand of so-called physiological science for nine hours' sleep for everybody, summner and winter, year in and year out? One of my patients sleeps naturally ten or eleven hour out of the cwenty-fbur; and another sleeps six hours and sleeps enough.

* Ifc was only the other day that a professional man sent for mc, and when I answered the call asked for some harmless opiate, saying that he had been unable to sleep well for several weeks, and that as a consequence he felt bad all the time. I ascertained that ho had nothing in par ticular to trouble him and then refused to give him medicine. 'You are all right,* I said; 'you get sleep enough—all that your nature demands. Don't go to bed until you feel like it, Sit up and read some easy book — some light novel not too exciting Play solitaire. If the weather Ls pleasant go out into the night and walk. If you feel like it take a sponge bath. Do anything you can to amuse yourself, except to smoke. Don't touch tobacco after 6 o'clock m the evening. Above all things, don't worry. Don't think that your system demands that you shall go to sleep at ten and remain asleep until seven.: It won't hurt you to stay awake all night. Just let nature take care of this matter of sleepWhen you get sufficiently tired you'll sleep fast enough. The thing to provide for is not sleep, but some easy or pleasant occupation to prevent lonesomeness,' while you are awake.* A week afterwards I met this man on the street and he told mc that he had been sleeping seven or eight hours anight ever since I had called on him. All that ailed him was the mistaken notion that he had to sleep whether he wanted to or not. He would lie awake a half hour after going to bed and then begin to fuss for fear that he would hear the clock strike. After he had heard it striko once he would swear that he must get to sleep before it struck again. Under these circumstances he was sure to faiL Then he would wait for the midnight whistle, and after that for the one o'clock whistle —-'and- so the night would go on wretchedly. "Therearo as many curesforslceplessncss as there are for biliousness, and every one of them is more or less successful. Some people eat before going to bed, others drink a quart, of .cold-water, others wear electric belts—l could name you a, hundred of the-?e crazy notions adopted by those who think they must go to sleep by main force. Why do they often produce the desired effect t Simply because they give the nervous sufferer a definite and easy subject to think of and prevent him from worrying himself into a fever over his inability to.sleep., The electric belt has no more direct effect upon the mind than a piece of fat bacon buried under a tree has on a wart. I would as soon recommend the bacon as the belt for insomnia. Sleeplessness is, ninety-nine times out of a hundred, a nervous, foolish condition of I the mind—a fancied disease which may doubtless be mitigated by the practice of the theory of mind-cure. * Think that you are well and you will be. well," says the faith doctor: think that you are going to sleep and you will go to sleep. Think that something will put you to sleep and the thought, not the thing, will put you to sleep. But all these remedies play out

The onl * tWnglbrtl__ effect an absolute cure of Insomnln Z i f* trying to sleep when he _,»*? rte£?th_»N heb^to choke down food wheuTe t,

Herol Before you go 111 tell you _ a _ httk tblng for tho nervous peop£\w may mud your paper. When a man __. worried for two or three hours for fo_! that he won't get to sleep, ho often work* himself into a physical fever. Under these clrcumxt-ince* let him throw off* erery rag of clothes and Ho naked until W feels cold. Ho needn't bo afraid of catch.lug cold. If be hiwu't sense enough to «*** up and amuso himself and must he there and fight fbrsle«.p, ho will find that the old will materially assist hiai.'