How Does Kratom Impact Sleep?
Kratom is an emerging plant from Southeast Asia that is gaining popularity amongst Americans. While many tout kratom as a healthier, natural alternative to traditional medicine or opioid drugs, the plant can cause adverse reactions and unwanted side effects, including addiction, dependence, withdrawals, and sleep difficulties. Keep reading to explore how your kratom use may be impacting your sleep.
What is Kratom?
Kratom is a psychoactive plant from Southeast Asia, where it is traditionally used by field laborers as a mild stimulant. In lower doses, kratom has stimulant effects, and can produce feelings of talkativeness, euphoria, or alertness, whereas at higher doses the plant acts as opioid, with sedative effects.
Kratom contains two psychoactive compounds, mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine, which have affinities for the opioid receptors in our brains. When these chemicals bind with opioid receptors, they produce kratom’s desired effects, but also lead to addiction, dependence, and withdrawals when used heavily. Kratom’s ability to bind to opioid receptors, however, can also have impacts on your sleep.
Kratom and Sleep
Depending on the dose, kratom can have different effects on sleep. Some of these effects, like insomnia, arise most often as a consequence of longer-term kratom abuse.
Increased drowsiness: in higher doses, kratom has sedative effects, which can make you sleepy. This may prove beneficial for people suffering from insomnia or other sleep disorders who struggle to fall asleep.
Anxiety reduction: many kratom users report taking plant supplements to reduce and self-treat their anxiety. For those whose sleep disturbances are anxiety-related, kratom may help induce sleep.
Prolonged kratom use can lead to increased tolerance and dependence. To achieve the above therapeutic effects, you may need to take higher doses of kratom over time. Any amount of kratom use is dangerous.
Daytime drowsiness: despite its sedative effects, kratom use can lead to poorer sleep quality. As a result, users often report feeling more tired than usual the day following kratom use.
Insomnia: many long-term and higher-dose kratom users report experiencing insomnia due to use. Poor sleep quality, as well as trouble falling and staying asleep, are also common symptoms experienced during kratom withdrawal and can last anywhere from a week to more than a month.
Withdrawals: because kratom acts on opioid receptors, ceasing use can lead to withdrawals – a common kratom withdrawal symptom is insomnia and poor sleep quality.
Remember, most kratom research is in its infancy. Purported benefits and drawbacks of use remain understudied. Do not use kratom to treat medical conditions without speaking to a healthcare professional. Kratom use can lead to addiction, dependence, and substance abuse disorder.
Kratom Withdrawal and Insomnia
Ceasing kratom use can lead to withdrawals, especially in those who abuse the plant chronically. One of the most common kratom withdrawal symptoms reported during detox is insomnia, or trouble falling and staying asleep.
Many heavier users report that after quitting kratom, they were unable to achieve meaningful sleep for a week or longer. Severe insomnia may last anywhere from six to fourteen days, and most users reported resuming regular sleep patterns around a month after stopping kratom use.
If you’re concerned about your kratom withdrawals, speak to your healthcare provider – they are an important resource, and may be able to write you a short-term prescription for a non-addictive sleeping medication.