The body needs sleep. It is essential for good health on all levels: spiritual, physical, and emotional. One interesting fact of sleep is that your immune system recalibrates between 1:00 and 3:00 am to work optimally for you! Without a good night’s rest, you cannot have a strong immune system and your path through the day will be a rough and treacherous one. Amazingly, even doctors and researchers who are experts in the field admit that they do not fully understand the purposes and mechanisms of sleep.
We do know that somehow, while you sleep, your body reorganises itself from top to bottom. The organs cleanse themselves, the brain stores the day’s experiences, the skin regenerates, the day is neatly tidied, dusted, filed, scrubbed and sorted. Just as the night shift at a factory takes over from the day shift and starts emptying dustbins, washing bathrooms, effecting repairs, dusting and clearing papers, so the body utilises sleep. Interestingly, the body does not do less work while you are in dreamland, just different work.
How much sleep do we need?
Once again there is no correct answer. Generally, 7 – 8 hours a night are sufficient for adults, children require 8 – 10 hours, and toddlers and babies need 12 – 18 hours in a 24-hour period. While you sleep, your body moves cyclically in and out of phases of light and deep sleep. Deep sleep, also called the REM (rapid eye movement) phase, is the restorative stage of which you ideally need 4 to 5 stages of REM sleep every night to be full of energy and alert the next day. If you still feel tired after 8 hours of sleep it could mean that you did not get enough deep or REM sleep.
Too little sleep has effects such as memory problems, inability to think rationally, reduced concentration, tired muscles, dull skin, and scratchy eyes that lose their sparkle. Eventually the immune system weakens, and you become more susceptible to illnesses, your nerves are frazzled, and everyone and everything upsets you. This can lead to anxiety and even clinical depression. The longer the poor sleep continues, the worse the symptoms become and the more difficult your body will find it to function effectively.
With A.Vogel Dormeasan, you can help your body to rest optimally in a completely natural and safe manner. Research has shown how well Dormeasan works. A double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical study performed in 2007 and published in the European Journal of Medical Research in 20081 proved that just one dose of Dormeasan can improve the quality of sleep. The study was performed in a sleep laboratory in Germany, and 44 subjects with no pains or problems to keep them from sleeping, participated. Their sleeping patterns were measured with the ‘sleep frequency index’ (SFX). The first night they were monitored without having used Dormeasan, and the second night they were monitored after taking 30 drops 30 minutes before bedtime. The results clearly indicated that the subjects slept better and more deeply after taking Dormeasan. Deep rest is good rest!
So, how does Dormeasan work?
Dormeasan consists of two organic fresh plant herb extracts, valerian and hops. These two herbs have the following effects on the body:
- Valerian acid inhibits the breakdown of GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid), so that more GABA is present in the body. GABA is a calming neurotransmitter, which sends soothing messages along the nerve pathways to help switch the nervous system into sleep mode.
- Valerian also contains some GABA. Having higher levels of GABA available in your body helps to tip you smoothly over the threshold between the waking state and the sleeping state.
- Valerian also increases the levels of serotonin in the brain, where it is believed to be involved in the sleep-wake cycle.
- Hops have a similar gentle sedative effect on the nervous system. Valerian and hops work synergistically, together being an extremely effective means of inducing sleep.
With Dormeasan at your side, you will fall asleep more easily and your sleep cycle will improve with more time spent in the deep sleep phases.
Ensuring sound sleep
It’s worth keeping in mind that a bad night’s sleep may well be due to avoidable factors, caffeine consumption being a common one. Caffeine is a stimulant, and keeps you awake! You may be eating too much sugar, also a stimulant. Many people drink alcohol to help them relax, and although it may make you feel relaxed, alcohol in fact has the opposite effect when consumed frequently in larger quantities. Eating too late at night and going to bed with a full stomach can cause insomnia, as does drinking too little water and consuming unhealthy food and drinks. A bedroom that is not dark enough can also keep you awake, including the blue and red lights from devices that are on in the room to even the moon that shines bright through the curtains – the light stimulates the pineal gland to tell you ‘Time to wake up!’.
Factors you can’t avoid, such as nagging worries, emotional upheavals and traumatic experiences, also contribute to poor sleep. Then we can highly recommend combining A.Vogel Nervousness Insomnia Formula with Dormeasan to help you as the Nervousness Insomnia drops are specific for emotional ups and downs causing sleeplessness and nightmares. Should you have been through severe trauma, you might also want to use Pegasus Trauma Rescue Shock to help you overcome the trauma. Follow the directions as per the label.
In most instances, the recipe for a good night’s sleep is a simple one. Make the decision to eat earlier and more healthily and be sure to drink sufficient amounts of water every day. Listen to soothing and uplifting music in the evening, dim the lighting, and avoid television programmes that are unsettling or stimulate adrenalin. Avoid using devices that shine bright light into your eyes as the darkness of the night is pivotal to falling asleep and having a good night’s sleep. Switch off the Wi-Fi. You do not need Wi-Fi when you sleep and less electromagnetic waves and electric devices in and around the bedroom is another sure way to improve sleep. Make time for a warm bath or shower before going to bed and relax with a book. Take 30 drops of Dormeasan 30 minutes before bedtime and let the herbs help ease your body into a deep and refreshing sleep. As the study proved, the herbs work quickly, and one dose can make a positive difference. In very severe cases, 60 or even 90 drops can be used.
How A.Vogel Dormeasan Helped my Mom
You feel so helpless when someone close to you is ill and there seems to be nothing you can do to help them. I will never forget the day in 1987 when I returned from university at the end of the term to find my mother, Irma Schutte, at home – weak, in pain and sick. An inexplicable spasm and inflammation in her neck and right shoulder had completely incapacitated her. She couldn’t sleep, or even sit or move comfortably – let alone prepare a meal for our family of seven.
Our family doctor did what he thought was best, with pain pills, injections and eventually hospitalisation, where Mom lay in traction. Everything that was tried exacerbated the problem, and she realised that a solution was not going to come from the orthodox medical profession. A friend recommended that she see a homeopath, and she heeded the advice. I took her there because she did not have the strength to drive herself. The homeopath diagnosed an overworked liver and prescribed Natura’s Gallen drops to assist with liver detoxification. Surprised, she asked him how her shoulder spasm was connected to her liver. His answer opened a whole new world of healing to her.
Off we went to a health shop for the drops, prescription in hand. Mom asked the shop owner if he could also provide something to help her sleep, and he handed her a bottle. A. Vogel Dormeasan! Armed with her bottles, we returned home. That night Mom slept well for the first time in four months, not so much as opening her eyes till morning. She followed the homeopath’s advice, used her drops, and recovered stronger and healthier than ever before. We realised that there is a lot more in these natural products than we had thought!
The experience inspired Mom to visit the distributors of the A. Vogel range of products in Johannesburg to find out whether she could sell the products in Natal. “If I had such a bad time,” she thought, “how many other people must there be who also struggle with their health?” That day in Johannesburg she was given Dr Alfred Vogel’s book, Swiss Nature Doctor, and some products as a gift.
Back home she devoured the book. Six weeks later she returned to Johannesburg, saying ‘Here I am, use me!’ Invoice book in hand, they wished her well in her venture to sell Dr Vogel’s products in Natal. Now, 33 years later, SA Natural Products is the proud distributor of these products to the whole of South Africa. All thanks to that first bottle of Dormeasan!
*Please note – if you are or have been on sleep medication you will need to see a homeopath to help you should you wish to use something natural to aid your sleep. The above products are not indicated for people who are dependent on sleep medication. *
Listen to the podcast here: Sleep
- Dimpfel W, Suter A. Sleep-improving effects of a single dose administration of a valerian/hops fluid extract – a double blind, randomised, placebo-controlled sleep-EEG study in a parallel design using electrohypnograms. Eur J Med Res (2008) 13(5): 200-204.