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Comment by graeme | Hacker News Reader

Question for people on melatonin. I tried 0.5 mg does, from cutting a 1 mg pill in half. Didn't have much effect.

Had a concussion three months ago and started taking 2 mg based on a post concussion study I read. this did markedly improve my sleep.

1. Did anyone experience a good effect only at higher doses

2. I'm doing much better day to day on this dosage, but I don't want to impair my own production. Do I need to go down to 0.3 mg, or can I cycle it etc?

It's really been life changing. Will ask my doctor the next time I'm in, of course.

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I found no dose effect (weird, intuitively, I know). I ate a packet of gummy bears that, I didn't realize, turned out to be melatonin gummies! I think the packet had something like 15 mg. I was on a flight from china and had barely slept the night before (becuase of flight connections). I fell asleep for 2 hours and then I was awake for the flight. Conversely, I've taken 1.5mg and slept soundly.

As I understand it, Melatonin can be administered as a hypotic (taken in larger doses (1mg - 3mg) before bed), or it can be taken in smaller doses hours before bed to trigger the natural release of Melatonin and start the sleep cycle. (I mentioned this in another comment).

Oh, interesting. So 30 min or so before, 1-3 mg would be effective, but with a lower dose I should try 3-4 hours before bed or so?

Thanks! I'll try that and see what happens.

Yeah, you might have more success that way. I take 3mg right before bed and I find I fall asleep a lot faster than I do without it. Especially if I've been on a screen before bed or my brain just doesn't want to shut up.

if you're thinking about trying the option where you take it a few hours before bed time, make sure you're going to bed at a consistent target time (10pm for example). Since this method is more targeted at resetting your circadian rhythm.

If you feel like you have more serious sleep/wake problems I would definitely recommend seeing a specialist. I was surprised to learn that people who say things like "I can't go to sleep until x o'clock" or "I can't stay awake beyond x time" probably suffer from circadian rhythm problems that are treatable.. but the treatment isn't always as intuitive as you might think.

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