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Insomnia: when sleep won’t come, night after night
For anyone who lies awake for hours, wakes in the night or far too early, drags through the day, or has been told they have insomnia. This page passes on, by name, what the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), MedlinePlus and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) say: what insomnia looks like, what can cause it, what a provider asks and checks, the sleep habits to try, the therapy that is usually recommended first, and what to know before taking a medicine or a supplement to sleep. It builds the questions to ask at a visit. Take only what you need today.
Right now
- Too sleepy to drive? MedlinePlus says insomnia could make you feel drowsy while driving, and that this could cause a car accident. If you can, do not drive right now.
- Took a sleep medicine and did something while not fully awake (walked, drove, cooked, took other medicines)? FDA says to stop taking the drug and contact your health care professional immediately.
- Taking a prescription insomnia medicine? FDA says not to drink alcohol before or while taking these medicines, and not to take them with any other sleep drugs, including those you can buy without a prescription.
- Thinking about ending your life? Call or text 988, at any hour. NHLBI lists thoughts of suicide among the things that may occur with chronic insomnia.
- Awake right now? Our page for the middle of the night is Can’t sleep?
“If you can, do not drive right now” is ours. This page is not for emergencies: for chest pain, trouble breathing, signs of a stroke, a medicine taken in too large an amount, or anything that frightens you, call 911.
More help
- Awake at 3 a.m.: Can’t sleep?
- Your nights, for the provider: Sleep diary.
- Snoring, gasping, or worn out all day: Sleep apnea: when breathing stops in your sleep.
- A mind that will not switch off: Worry time, Tense and release and Breathe.
- Mood: When the worry won’t switch off and When the heaviness won’t lift.
- Everything you take, in one list: My medicines.
- Pain that keeps you up: When pain doesn’t go away.
- Pregnancy and menopause: Pregnant, or with a new baby and Menopause and the years around it.
- Before a visit: Get ready for your appointment.
- No insurance: When you need a doctor and can’t pay.
- All our free tools.
This page and its wording were written with AI (Claude) for Scarlet Beast (our AI policy). No doctor, nurse or sleep specialist has reviewed it. The facts were read on October 9, 2026 on three government websites: the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute’s six Insomnia pages (all last updated March 24, 2022), read in English and in Spanish; MedlinePlus’s Insomnia summary (September 13, 2024), in English and Spanish; and the Food and Drug Administration’s “Taking Z-drugs for Insomnia? Know the Risks” (current as of March 6, 2024), in English and Spanish. The page says whose words it is passing on, and what is marked “ours” is our own. The institute and MedlinePlus say differently how long insomnia lasts before it is called chronic (3 months; a month), and the page gives both. What we left out or did not read: the name of every medicine and every brand, and every amount (the institute’s and FDA’s pages name medicines; they are linked from the guide); the side effects the institute lists for each kind of prescription medicine, other than the ones passed on here; part of MedlinePlus’s list of who is at higher risk; how many hours of sleep anyone needs; where to find the therapy, which online programs exist, and what anything costs or what insurance pays; steps for people who work nights (the pages read give none); insomnia in children and teenagers (MedlinePlus links to pages about teenagers); and the other sleep disorders a sleep study looks for. The institute’s pages are from 2022, and medicines change: ask a provider or pharmacist what is current. We called no number. It saves nothing and loads no tracking.