How Does Alcohol Impact Sleep?

People who consistently drink too much alcohol may eventually build up a tolerance to its initial sedative effects. Studies of chronic alcohol users have found that these individuals typically experience disrupted sleep patterns with less slow wave sleep and more REM sleep. If you’re regularly drinking alcohol to help you fall asleep, particularly if you have insomnia, it’ll probably make your sleep problem worse. Consuming alcohol regularly before bed can also make it more difficult to sleep, according to a 2016 study in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence. Researchers found that chronic or habitual alcohol use before bedtime led to bouts of insomnia. Sleep problems, such as difficulty getting to sleep, frequent waking during the night and difficulty getting up in the morning, were also more common in people with alcoholism.

During this stage, your eyes stop moving and your body temperature drops to prepare you for deeper sleep. Alcohol has been shown to consolidate the first half of your sleep and lead to more disruptions in the latter half of the night, which can change how much time you ultimately spend in this stage. Just because alcohol has a sedative effect doesn’t mean you’ll get better sleep, though. Research has shown that drinking messes with sleep cycles and leads to frequent awakenings in the night and early morning.

Can alcohol cause insomnia in young adults?

Alcohol may aid with sleep onset due to its sedative properties, allowing you to fall asleep more quickly. However, people who drink before bed often experience disruptions later in their sleep cycle as liver enzymes metabolize alcohol. This can lead to excessive daytime sleepiness and other issues the following day. Drinking to fall asleep can build a tolerance, forcing you to consume more alcohol each successive night in order to experience the sedative effects. These people will likely find they have to drink more and more as time goes by to overcome the tolerance they have built up to alcohol’s sedative effects. This issue creates a vicious cycle that will never leave a person feeling well-rested.

To get enough oxygen, you must work harder to inhale air, causing vibration and snoring sounds. It’s that transition period from wakefulness to sleep that generally does liquor help you sleep only lasts a few minutes. Alcohol has been shown to increase stage 1 sleep during the second half of the night, especially for those who’ve been drinking heavily.

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This can happen as your blood alcohol levels fall or with high doses of alcohol. Alcohol has biphasic effects, meaning some of its impacts have two phases, such as stimulating and sedating. For example, research shows high doses of alcohol may decrease your blood pressure for up to 12 hours and then increase your blood pressure after that. Alcohol causes a higher production of the stress hormone cortisol, which regulates the body’s stress response and initiates wakefulness. Disruptions to this hormone can lead to reduced quality sleep and cognitive difficulties.

She is also a fellow of the College of Chest Physicians, as well as the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM). Dr. Khosla runs a telemedicine outreach program that serves rural areas in North Dakota and has done so for the past decade. She is active within AASM and has served on numerous AASM committees, including the original Telemedicine Task Force. She also served as the inaugural chair of the Clinical and Consumer Sleep Technology Committee and is the current chair of the AASM Public Awareness Advisory Committee. Myrkl is scientifically crafted to help people who want to feel their best the morning after celebrating.