Insomnia, Melatonin and Marijuana

Hi! Hopefully this is the right place, but here we go either way.

I've been trying to LD for a while now, or at the very least remember a dream to write in my journal, but when I sleep it's like a coma and I wake up remembering nothing at all. Insomnia is a huge issue for me and I will naturally only get a few hours a night so to help my chances I usually take 9 to 12 mg melatonin and a fair to large amount of smoking to send me off for the night.

Since I can't remember a single thing I've become a bit worried my self medicating may be impacting my short term memory too heavily or maybe the melatonin itself is preventing recall. I'm still really new to all of this so maybe I am just missing the boat entirely on some big step.

Any info or suggestions would be amazingly helpful! :D

Weed definitely effects dream recall in a negative way. Melatonin can also do this, because melatonin gives you longer deep sleep rather then REM sleep if your at all familiar with the 2. But it also has a rebound effect giving you longer REM sleep than normal.(Most dreams occur during REM sleep.) I'm not saying you should quit smoking, but if you don't go to bed high then chances are you recall might improve. If it still hasn't improved then I would suggest taking a little bit less mg of melatonin if you can do that and be able to sleep still. If that still doesn't help I really have no idea haha, but you said you only get a few hours of sleep? That could also be a reason to why you have bad recall, because you aren't getting past deep sleep to get to REM sleep. That's all the help I can give, I haven't had any experience with insomnia. But hope it helps.

Moved to Sleep and Health

Multiple topics though, but as the main topic was Insomnia :)

Thanks! :D

Don't smoke for a least a couple hours (preferably a few) before bed if you actually want to remember anything worthwhile, or usually at all. Also, smoking weed stimulates melatonin production like crazy, so the melatonin you're taking is fairly redundant (though it wouldn't necessarily be if you stop smoking right before bed). In the medical doses melatonin is fine and will mostly help more than hurt if you get enough sleep, but the amount from weed is likely what suppresses REM a lot and then the memory loss makes what you get even harder to remember.

Don't smoke at least 3-4h before bed, preferably not at all. As has already been said Melatonin suppresses REM so should also be avoided, even though you may experience a rebound. Also, 9-12mg is a rather huge dose of melatonin, 0.5-1mg is usually sufficient for positive effect. If this amount of melatonin and marijuana is needed to alleviate the insomnia perhaps try to avoid caffeine, TV, sugar and other stimulants at least 3 hours before bed and perhaps spend 20 minutes meditating followed by 20-30 minutes reading a book before sleep.

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Originally Posted by Arch

Moved to Sleep and Health

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I don't think it should have been moved to sleep and health. I think it should have been put in the dream signs/recall section because the main topic of this is his problem with recalling dreams. but I mean I guess it fits in the sleep and health as well.

So I went to bed melatonin free last night but still smoked my normal amount before bed. I didn't fall asleep nearly as fast but did eventually and managed to wake up with a small dream fragment and a sense that I'd definitely had more dreams I just couldn't remember them. I guess I'll just keep trying to cut back while exploring other sleep aid info from the forum. :D