I upped my nightly dose of melatonin based on some research after reading John_Hemming’s use of high-dose melatonin.
Melatonin in of itself does not cause sleepiness, it merely adjusts or resets your biological clock.
I too expected very high doses of melatonin to cause daytime sleepiness, but for me, it did not.
So, I think your daytime sleepiness after taking high dose melatonin may be psychological because you expected it to cause daytime sleepiness.
I have never experienced daytime sleepiness from taking melatonin at any dose.
I have moved from between 500mg to 1g of melatonin for a while so I can see the impact on my next sets of blood tests (these are weekly and I am next scheduled for a blood draw on wednesday).
There is no question that melatonin helps with oxidative stress and the consequential outcomes (cancer etc). However, I need to understand its broader effects including on SHBG.
My daytime sleepiness comes from a lack of sleep. When I take larger melatonin doses before sleep, i wake up in the middle of the night. If i don’t fall back to sleep then my day begins at 3-4am. By mid-afternoon, I can feel it. If I take caffeine to help the afternoon, then I’m not going to sleep until late unless I try the melatonin again…and around and around she goes. I haven’t had the nerve to try a big melatonin dose at 3am but perhaps that is the experiment to try.
Waking up in the middle of the night, middle insomnia needs an understanding of sleep cycles. It is best to wear a fitness/sleep tracker to see when you wake up. You need to recognise that probably the CAR (Cortisol Awakening Reponse) has kicked in. Hence you won’t get back to sleep until the next sleep cycle kicks in - normally 90 mins ish later.
If the next cycle kicks in in sympathetic mode you won’t sleep, but if it is in parasympathetic mode you might.
There are various ways of affecting this, my preferred route to take night time melatonin about 45-60 mins after waking in a middle insomnia sleep cycle. Because melatonin has a really short serum half life you need to make sure that it is not running out as you switch from one cycle to the next (this may mean taking it at 45 mins, 60 mins, 75mins and 90 mins. However, that should create an hour or two’s additional sleep and no day time sleepiness.
If, however, you are reading your phone as you switch from one cycle to the next then it won’t let you sleep. Orange glasses help, but the main thing is getting the sleep cycles right.
I never take melatonin before I go to sleep because when it runs out it creates the CAR. it also undermines endogenous production.
Most time release melatonin does not understand the interplay between the CSF melatonin storage and serum melatonin.
In another thread on this forum their are link’s’ and copies of Shallenberger articles and slide presentation and a link to a PDF copy of Reiter Professional Medical book on Melatonin.
This is the standard medical establishment view on melatonin. It ignores the issue about how much melatonin goes into the CSF (see the Melatonin megadose thread).
I do agree witth Andrew Huberman in that melatonin has anti puberty effects. Exactly what this means is more complex. I have five children and don’t intend to have any more so I have not checked whether or not it has any effect on fertility.
Joseph, consider taking 6 mg. for example in two parts. 4 mg just before bedtime and 2 mg at 3 ish when you wake up. This has worked for me for many years. Johnmacc
Thanks. For the last few days I’ve been successful in not taking any melatonin before sleep, and only taking it when I wake up at 2-3am. But I’m still getting up at 2-3am. Would your method work better to keep me from waking up at 2-3am?
Don’t know your age but I’m slowly (maybe not so slowly) towards 60 and if I don’t drink anything past dinner time, I usually sleep till morning without waking up at all during the night.
If I remember correctly you are fitness NUT doing a lot of exercise and I’m afraid you waking up at 2AM is your body saying to you, hey dude give it some rest because you are taxing me immensely, 1/2 of what you do is plenty. Just a thought!
If you wake at 2-3am then the likelihood is you have a sleep cycle which has gone into CAR at that point. You probably need to wait a bit. It depends on what options you have with melatonin, but if you have 5/10/12 mg pills start taking them 45 minutes after waking every 10-15 minutes and with a bit of luck you will catch the next sleep cycle. You can read/look at your phone etc (ideally with orange glasses) for the first 45 mins (if this is the end of a sleep/HPA cycle). After that best to aim to sleep.
For me this delivers enough sleep so that I am not tired until I go to bed the next day.
I’m just guessing you’ve already tried an extended release formula? I use pure encapsulations melatonin SR. Natrol make an exteded release formula as well. I take it right before going to bed. It has helped me sleep through the night. I also recently discovered my TMG was interfering with sleep. I was waking up way too early. I stopped taking it before bed a few weeks ago. It took a few days but it helped immensely. I would like to add it back. I might try taking it in the morning to see if I can take it without interfering with sleep.
I’ve been taking most of my supplements for quite some time with the exception of NMN and TMG. I take NMN in the morning, was taking TMG before bed. It didn’t happen right away but after about a month I started noticing I was waking up before my alarm clock (set for 5:30am). I was waking up between 4:30-5:00 (to pee) and couldn’t get back to sleep. Whoop app sleep scores were starting to decline. Even on days off when I would stay up late the evening before I could not sleep in. This is unusual for me. I started taking apigenin before bed since it was something I was interested in anyway. It didn’t help. I wasn’t stressed about anything. Couldn’t understand what was going on. I started looking at my stack wondering if something was causing the problem. I knew TMG was one of the most recent changes to my stack. I did a little more research and found it can cause problems with sleep. I quit taking it. It took about 3-4 days not taking it before I started staying asleep until my alarm clock goes off. I still wake up to pee but go right back to sleep after. Last weekend I slept two days in a row until 7:30-8:00 on my days off. I’ve considered taking TMG in the morning but I’m a little scared to. I might try that but a lower dose. I was taking 1gm before.
