Does Drinking Lettuce Water Really Help You Fall Asleep Faster? An Expert Explains

If you might be hunting for a quick, uncomplicated, and inexpensive way to fall asleep, probabilities are you’ve occur across the lettuce-h2o craze on TikTok. Movies tagged with #LettuceWater have amassed more than 43 million views.

Person @shapla_11 (Shapla Hoque) is just one of the many people who’ve posted a video clip on the snooze hack. “I was acquiring difficulties sleeping for a week and Googled ‘home snooze remedies’ and found out lettuce has some houses that support with snooze,” she tells POPSUGAR. The website didn’t say to make it into a tea, but because she isn’t going to like raw lettuce, Hoque states she boiled it with some water to make “lettuce tea.” Immediately after sipping a Superman-mug-total, “in 30 minutes, I was super drowsy and worn out,” she states. At the conclusion of the video, clearly looking worn out, Hoque states, “Your sis is gone.”

The caption on the video clip says, “if you are unable to slumber, try this” . . . but does it definitely perform? POPSUGAR questioned sleep specialist Michael Breus, PhD, to weigh in on whether or not lettuce drinking water basically allows with rest, and if it really is safe and sound to eat.

How Do You Make Lettuce H2o?

In most of the TikTok video clips tagged with #LettuceWater, the creators consider a substantial handful (or often an whole head) of iceberg, Romaine, or an additional form of lettuce, steep the leaves in scorching h2o for a number of minutes (up to 15), take out the lettuce, and then consume the warm veggie broth. Some users have included peppermint tea to the leaves to assistance with the taste.

Does Consuming Lettuce Drinking water Truly Aid With Snooze?

Sadly, you will find no conclusive evidence proving that ingesting scorching lettuce h2o will assistance with snooze, Dr. Breus states. In normal, we have confined study on the topic: there’s a person 2017 research that looked at the probable of lettuce leaves and lettuce seed extracts to induce lengthier durations of sleep in mice, and it found that may well enable. A 2018 research in people looked at the outcome of lettuce seed extract on being pregnant-similar insomnia and discovered that it did certainly lower sleeplessness and “could be advised as a safe organic remedy for therapy of pregnancy-associated sleeplessness.” And most just lately, a 2023 study on a variety of Korean lettuce known as Heukharang located that Heukharang lettuce leaf extract confirmed rest benefits in mice. While you can find potential that lettuce could support with slumber, we just never have the scientific studies in humans yet to back again it up.

Wild lettuce was when employed in folks drugs as a sedative in the course of the 19th century, precisely a dried milky substance secreted referred to as lactucarium. But Michelle Drerup, PsyD, says in a New York Occasions posting, “boiling a handful of leaves would not release more than enough extract to have an effect on you.”

So if the science is not there, why are so lots of lettuce-drinking water drinkers slipping asleep? According to Dr. Breus, “Folks are desperate [for sleep] and subsequent a craze.” He thinks it is a placebo effect. If you consume one thing you think (and hope) will make you sleepy, you happen to be additional possible to come to feel the dozing outcomes. It could also be the act of sipping on a warm beverage at night time that aids men and women fall asleep.

Either way, consuming lettuce h2o isn’t really destructive, so really feel free of charge to give it a test — just please, wash the lettuce effectively initial (the TikToks of persons ingesting buggy lettuce h2o are just way too tricky to belly). And if you do you commence experience sleepy, hold in head it could be your thoughts playing tricks on you fairly than the lettuce performing its position.

Other Recommendations For Much better Snooze

Though rest hacks are wonderful if they do the job, Dr. Breus believes in producing absolutely sure to build superior sleep hygiene. He implies including these five simple behavior to your everyday program to assist you get far better quality slumber: