Non-Sleep Medications

Other medications can cause poor sleep and insomnia

Insomnia can be a side effect of many medications. Many prescription drugs and common over-the-counter medications can cause sleep problems.

Do you take medications that contain caffeine, ephedrine, or amphetamine? If yes, that might be the cause of your insomnia.

When talking to your doctor about your medications, indicate that you have seep problems. Often, there are alternative options that do not interfere with sleep.
For example, for treating depression, there are some antidepressant drugs that make you sleepy, others that tend to make you more alert, and still others have no effect on your sleep whatsoever.

If you use mood-altering drugs on a regular basis, you should consider that this might contribute to your sleep problems as well.

Here are just some of the insomnia-causing types of drugs:

Some antidepressants
Drugs containing various stimulants (such as some diet pills)
Some blood pressure pills (such as beta-blockers)
Drugs for treating asthma
Medications containing caffeine and amphetamine (including some painkillers)
Steroids
Some thyroids
Some cancer treatment drugs

These drugs can contribute to insomnia and cause difficulty falling asleep, frequently interrupted sleep, or early morning awakenings.

Check your medication's package inserts, ask your pharmacist, or do your own research on the Internet to see whether or not the medications that you are taking have sleep disturbing side effects. Also, keep in mind drug interactions. Perhaps two drugs taken alone do not cause the insomnia, but they do when taken together.

Aspirin

Although it is not considered a sleeping pill and is not commonly accepted for treating insomnia, aspirin helps some people to get better sleep at night.

Aspirin seems to result in relatively normal night sleep in some people, where none of the sleeping stages are disturbed. It also has no hangover the following day.

There is about a four-hour delay in its effect, positively affecting sleep in the second half of the night. So, if waking up frequently in the middle of the night is your sleeping problem, try taking two Aspirin pills (650 mg) before bedtime instead of a sleeping pill.
Try and see if it works for you.

Keep in mind that aspirin, as any other drug, may interact with other medications, and it has some side effects. It tends to thin the blood, so do not take it if you have an ulcer, other intestinal disorders or have tendency for bleeding.