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When it comes to insomnia treatment, you should always start with your lifestyle. Get enough exercise, reduce stress from your life, keep a regular schedule, stop drinking so much coffee, and you should be on your path to a healthy sleep habits. But, as a mother of 3 and business owner, I know that we can all use a little bit of help getting to sleep sometimes. That is why I turn to magnesium as an insomnia treatment.

Why Magnesium as an Insomnia Treatment?

Conventional pharmaceutical insomnia treatments work by altering your brain chemistry to induce sleepiness (definitely not recommended).  Even “natural” insomnia treatments like melatonin aren’t good options.  As a I talk about in this post about Why Melatonin Is Not a Good Insomnia Treatment, melatonin works by putting your body in a state of stress, which in turn makes it sleepy.  When you have insomnia, stressing out your body is not something you want to do!

By contrast, magnesium works by helping you relax. Considering that two of the most common causes of insomnia are stress and anxiety, relaxation is something we can definitely use on sleepless nights! Magnesium can also help fight depression, which is another leading cause of insomnia.

How Magnesium Helps Treat Insomnia

Magnesium is responsible for over 300 enzyme reactions in your body, particularly in the bones, muscles, and brain.  It has an important role in the nervous system for helping you calm down and be able to sleep.

Magnesium and the Nervous System

You might recall that your nerve cells “talk” to each other with electrical signals. Because there are gaps between your nerve cells (synapses), your nerves rely on chemicals to transmit signals across the gaps. Some of the chemicals hanging out in the gaps help signals cross the gap, whereas other chemicals stop signals from crossing. Magnesium is one of the chemicals which stops signals from crossing nerve synapses.

Magnesium hangs out with calcium and glutamate in the gaps between nerve cells. Calcium and glutamate are both excitatory.  Glutamate in particular excites your mood (anxiety anyone?). If we just had calcium and glutamate in our nerve synapses, we’d be in a constant state of excitation and this would lead to nerve damage and cell death.   To combat this, our bodies use magnesium. Magnesium binds to the same receptors on the nerves and prevents excitory signals from going past. In this sense, magnesium acts as a “gatekeeper” to regulate the amount of excitation and help keep us calm.

Magnesium and Stress Hormones

In addition to calming us, magnesium also has a reciprocal relationship with stress hormones. Magnesium can inhibit the hippocampus’s release of stress hormones, and also reduces the hormone ACTH (which in turn triggers your body to release cortisol and adrenaline). Magnesium is so powerful for reducing stress that an article in Psychology Today calls it “The Original Chill Pill.”

However, I say that magnesium and stress have a reciprocal relationship because stress causes magnesium depletion. When combating stress, magnesium is depleted from your body. Many of us are in constant states of stress, which means we are draining ourselves of the very mineral we need to reduce stress.

Finally, magnesium is one of the cofactors for dopamine and serotonin synthesis. These neurotransmitters are widely known for their roles in regulating mood. Is depression causing your sleep problems?   Consider this then:

Low magnesium = low serotonin = depression = insomnia

Magnesium and Muscle Relaxation

Are you feeling tense all the time and muscle pains are preventing you from sleeping? Magnesium may be just the insomnia treatment you need. Calcium in our nerve synapses signals muscles to contract.   Magnesium counteracts calcium and tells muscles to relax. Without enough magnesium, our muscles would be in a constant state of contraction. If you are taking a calcium supplement without magnesium, you should rethink it!

Dr. Hyman gives several examples of how magnesium was used in the ER where he worked. When someone would come in with life-threatening arrhythmia, they’d administer a dose of magnesium to regulate the heart beat. If someone was constipated and needed a colonoscopy, again they’d give magnesium to help with emptying the bowels. If a pregnant woman was having seizures, again can magnesium to the rescue.  As he says, you don’t have to be in the hospital to benefit from magnesium.  Increasing magnesium intake is an easy way to improve health and treat problems like muscle pains and insomnia.

15% of People Are Deficient in Magnesium

According to Dr. Hyman, about 15% of the general population is deficient in magnesium. The fact that most Americans eat a diet of white bread, sugars, and refined foods which are completely devoid of nutrients definitely doesn’t help the situation. Considering how important magnesium is for reducing stress, relaxing muscles, and regulating mood, you might want to consider magnesium as your insomnia treatment before you reach for those pharmaceuticals!

How to Use Magnesium as an Insomnia Treatment

1. Fix Your Diet

Always put food first! Popping pills and supplements are not a solution to a bad diet. For starters, I’d recommend ditching all that processed food stuff from your diet and replacing it with real foods. Definitely get rid of colas and avoid excessive amounts of caffeine (coffee, tea) and alcohol as these cause zinc depletion from the body. When my family and switched to a diet of real food our health improved dramatically.

2. Absorb Magnesium through the Skin

The digestive system is very inefficient at absorbing magnesium. We only absorb 20% to 50% of ingested magnesium.  So, even if you optimize your diet, you might still have trouble getting enough magnesium.

However, the body is very good at absorbing magnesium through the skin.  Skip the digestive system and absorb magnesium through your skin instead. There are two easy ways you can get magnesium through the skin:

• Epsom Salts: Epsom salt is actually just a fancy name for magnesium salts (because Epsom salts were mined from a spring in the town of Epsom, England). Here you can find a simple recipe for a relaxing Epsom salt bath. I like this brand of Epsom salts because they are high-quality and cheap.
• Magnesium Oil: You can also get magnesium transdermally by rubbing or spraying magnesium oil directly to your body. For insomnia treatment, apply to your temples. You can also apply magnesium oil to your palms, feet, or any aching muscles.  I like this brand of magnesium oil.  It also has the benefit of making your skin super soft.

3. Fix Your Gut Health

A lot of health problems (including insomnia) start because of nutrient deficiencies. And how do those nutrient deficiencies begin? Because the gut has become so damaged that it is unable to absorb nutrients properly.  In some cases, the gut can become so damaged that leaky gut syndrome occurs.

Good health begins with a healthy gut.  I recommend consuming quality gelatin to cure the gut.  It basically acts like Spackle to fill holes in the lining of your gut.  Gelatin also has many other benefits, such as for your bones, joints, teeth, hair, and even fighting wrinkles.

To learn more, read The Gelatin Secret. You’ll get information on how gelatin can improve your health as well as lots of great recipes.  You can buy it here.

4. Magnesium Supplements

The RDI for magnesium (meaning the MINIMUM you should be consuming!) is 420mg for adult males and 320mg for adult females. Again, this is the minimum amount to meet bodily functions. Most people can benefit from having 1000mg of magnesium per day. Since you should also be getting magnesium through food, magnesium supplement dosages are usually about 200mg to 400mg. I like this brand of magnesium. Two spoonfuls = 350mg magnesium.

Note: Excessive amounts of magnesium can cause loose stools. It takes 800-1600mg of magnesium to cause diarrhea but this varies per person.  To prevent loose stools as a side effect, you’ll want to start slowly with magnesium supplements for treating insomnia. Start by taking a smaller dosage and work your way up to the full dosage. You can also divide the dosage into parts, such as taking one part of the dosage during the morning and the rest before bed.

Want to learn more about natural ways to help sleep?

Order a copy of Go to Bed: 14 Easy Steps to Healthier Sleep.  Written by renown health expert Dr. Sarah Ballantyne, the guide gives you really valuable information about the science of sleep, why you aren’t sleeping, and how to get to sleep by taking a few easy steps.

Click Here to Learn More and Get Your Copy!

Now I’d love to hear from you! Have you tried magnesium for insomnia? What was your experience? Tell us in the comments below!

Resources for this article:
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/771121
http://drhyman.com/blog/2010/05/20/magnesium-the-most-powerful-relaxation-mineral-available/#close
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201106/magnesium-and-the-brain-the-original-chill-pill
http://www.ancient-minerals.com/magnesium-sources/absorption/

Image credit: Synapse illustration by Delldot CC BY-SA 3.0