It can be agonizing. You get in bed, turn out the light, and spend the next six hours staring at the clock.

You could take a drug to battle your insomnia, sure, but as desperate as you are, you've heard too many stories of people getting hooked on sleeping pills -- not to mention the other potential side effects.

So what do you do? Suffer through the night?

You might not even need to weigh the choice between sleepless nights and Big Pharma drugs, thanks to new research appearing the Journal of Medicinal Food. Researchers found that drinking 8 ounces of tart cherry juice in the morning and evening for two weeks significantly reduced the severity of study participants' insomnia.

Now, this was a small study, with only 15 people taking part. But there's certainly no harm in adding tart cherry juice to your diet (in fact, with their antioxidant content, cherries bring plenty of other benefits besides helping you sleep), and it might just work for you.

Tart cherries contain a substantial amount of melatonin, which we already know helps to moderate the sleep cycle. Our bodies make their own melatonin, but sometimes it's not enough, and the cherries could help to boost dwindling levels.

Melatonin isn't just involved in the sleep cycle -- it's also a powerful antioxidant that helps fight inflammation. Added to the other major antioxidant in cherries, anthocyanins, you've got an age-busting powerhouse on your hands.

Not only that, but cherries have already been established as a major player in eliminating pain associated with gout -- Dr. Wright has recommended 32 ounces of cherry juice (with no sugar added) at the first sign of an attack.

In the sleep study, the researchers used the juice product CheriBundi (cheribundi.com). Of course, there are plenty of other options when it comes to adding tart cherries into your diet, including supplements and the fruit itself.

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