There's one big reason you shouldn't use booze to help you fall asleep

By Julia Calderone

We've all been in this situation. It's late, you need to be up early for work, and you can't fall asleep.
You remember the bottle of bourbon sitting in your cupboard. A few swigs will do the trick, right?
Technically, yes. Booze is great at making you sleepy. Just ask that frat boy passed out on the subway.
But while it's an excellent ticket to slumber town, it's not so great at keeping you there, sleep scientist Patrick Fuller, associate professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, told Tech Insider.
"You get a mild elation at first, then you get sleepy. Yeah, great it puts you to sleep," Fuller said. "But the problem is that the alcohol effects wear off and you're stuck in the middle of the night awake, staring at the ceiling. You're already in withdrawal."
Scientists have been investigating this paradoxical relation between alcohol and sleep since the 1930s. To scrutinize how evening boozing interrupts this process, researchers have designed studies to replicate that evening boozing. They gather groups of volunteers, give them booze 30 to 60 minutes before bedtime (the amount can range from one to six "standard drinks." A standard drink could be a 12 oz bottle of beer, a 5 oz glass of wine, or a shot of hard liquor), and then see what happens.
In some studies, people fell asleep much faster than those who didn't drink alcohol — not surprising and, in some cases helpful. But what happened after they fell asleep was much gloomier.
Those who had larger doses of alcohol slept more soundly for the first half of the night, but were more restless and awoke much more easily during the second half of the night. This happens at the same time your body metabolizes and gets rid of the alcohol.
Other studies using polysomnography — a fancy term for a sleep study, where you get hooked up to a bunch of monitors and electrodes that analyze your brain waves and body movements — have found that a hit of booze just before bedtime suppresses your rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, particularly during the first half of your snooze.
The REM phase of sleep is deeply restorative and important. So when REM sleep takes a hit, so does your memory and concentration.
So if you're lying awake in bed and are wondering whether a hit of booze is a good idea, keep these things in mind.
"Alcohol is great for the purposes of going out and socializing, but it's a bad, bad medicine to use for the purposes of sleep," Fuller said. "If your goal is to get a good sleep, alcohol is absolutely the wrong choice."

http://www.techinsider.io/alcohol-bad-for-falling-asleep-insomnia-patrick-fuller-sleep-2016-2