Magnesium deficiency and Insomnia

Insomnia: that’s the problem I had for so long. I couldn’t sleep through the entire night. Would always wake up in the middle of the night and couldn’t go back to sleep. I noticed that this problem started since I started having the thyroid issues. I thought it’s probably the side effect of the thyroid med I was taking every day. I mentioned this to the doctor and he didn’t support it. He said I shouldn’t even be thinking about not taking the thyroid medicine daily. 
Over the course of time, I’ve taken a sleep test. Nothing found there. Took Melatonin, if that’s deficient. Didn’t help. My dad has the same problem, so it was concluded that insomnia runs in my family and there’s nothing much I can do other than taking Diphenhydramine (benadryl) when it gets bad.

I started to do my research online. Read somewhere that hypothyroid peeps don’t have glycogen storages and the thyroid supplement that i take in the morning gets depleted by night and it’s then that the cortisones get released due to low glucose levels. So if one eats in the middle of the night, one can fall asleep again. Tried that. It did seem to help a little, but I was gaining weight fast. Not good. 

Then it happened that the topic came up in my college whatsapp group (when one checks whatsapp in the middle of the night, the folks in India are sure going to comment about it) and one of the friends wondered is it’s coz of Magnesium deficiency. She has the thyroid problem too and takes Magnesium supplements as her doctor told her that ppl with thyroid problems usually have Mg deficiency and needed the supplements. She Mg deficiency could cause insomnia and advised me to have my Mg levels checked. I didn’t do that and lo! I started sleeping like a baby! 7.5-8 hrs/ night with 1.5-2 hrs of deep sleep. My fitbit says that I am getting more than average sleep than the women my age. I still do get up in the middle of the night sometimes, but I fall asleep again and getting enough sleep. I am out of the tablets more than a week ago and slacked off buying them. Now I can see the difference again! The insomnia is back. I need to buy them asap. 

It’s surprising how my chronic sleep problems are solved with just one supplement. I’ve seen 2-3 PCPs since I started having the problem, but no one suggested this. grrr!! The docs in India are so much better. 

So yeah, if anyone you know suffers from insomnia and has hypothyroid issues, then Magnesium deficiency could be the cause. (Of course, dad has the same issue coz he has thyroid problems too. Hypothyroidism runs in the family, not insomnia). So glad I found the root cause and fixing it....finally!!!

Good of you to post this useful info. on insomnia (sometimes), due to lack of magnesium.