Insomnia

Insomnia is the term used to describe either difficulty falling asleep when going to bed, or staying awake during the night. Many people, especially shift workers, suffer from sleep disturbances when they change their sleeping pattern after moving from night shift to afternoon or day shifts and vice versa. 
Insomnia falls into two usual categories - either chronic or ongoing inability to sleep through the night, or the occasional or episodic pattern of sleepless nights. Some of us manage to have full productive lives with less than six hours sleep each night; famous examples include Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. For the rest of us, after a night of poor sleep we feel exhausted and not able to function at a peak level of achievement. 
Insomnia is most commonly suffered by new parents - poor sleep patterns become a way of life for the first few months of their child’s life as they struggle to get four or more uninterrupted hours rest each night.  Others may suffer from insomnia when they are over-stimulated, by stress, too much alcohol or caffeine, drugs such as diet medications or cold remedies, noise or changes to the sleeping environment.

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