失眠

• Pinyin: shī mián
• Hanzi breakdown: 失 = 手 + 乙 (to lose); 眠 = 目 + 民 (to sleep, to slumber)

Meaning

Insomnia; inability to sleep — experiencing difficulty falling or staying asleep, whether due to stress, anxiety, illness, or other causes.

A common medical and everyday term. Can describe a single sleepless night or a chronic condition. Common collocations: 长期失眠 (chronic insomnia), 严重失眠 (severe insomnia), 因压力导致失眠 (insomnia caused by stress), 失眠症 (insomnia disorder). Also used loosely in everyday speech for any night when one sleeps poorly.

Examples

1. 由于长期承受巨大的工作压力，他开始出现严重失眠症状，每晚辗转反侧，凌晨三点仍无法入睡。 Under enormous long-term work pressure, he developed severe insomnia—tossing and turning every night and still unable to fall asleep even at 3 a.m.
2. 研究发现，手机屏幕发出的蓝光会抑制褪黑激素的分泌，导致大脑误判时间，进而引发失眠。 Studies have found that blue light from phone screens suppresses melatonin production, causing the brain to misjudge the time and leading to insomnia.
3. 中医认为失眠与心脾两虚、阴阳失衡密切相关，主张通过针灸和中药调理以及改善生活习惯来恢复正常睡眠。 Traditional Chinese medicine holds that insomnia is closely related to deficiency of both the heart and spleen and an imbalance of yin and yang, and it advocates restoring normal sleep through acupuncture, herbal treatment, and better lifestyle habits.

Usage Guide

Context: health, medicine, psychology, everyday life, workplace stress

Tone: empathetic

Do Say

• 认知行为疗法目前已被临床证明是治疗慢性失眠最有效的非药物干预方法，其长期效果优于持续服用安眠药。(Cognitive behavioural therapy has been clinically proven to be the most effective non-pharmacological intervention for chronic insomnia, with long-term outcomes superior to the sustained use of sleeping medication.)
• 现代都市竞争压力与人际关系焦虑已成为导致越来越多人出现失眠问题的重要社会诱因，值得公共卫生层面的高度重视。(Competitive pressure and interpersonal anxiety in modern urban life have become major social triggers leading to increasing numbers of people experiencing insomnia, a trend deserving serious attention at the public health level.)

Don't Say

• 失眠 casually to mean being too excited to sleep on a special occasion — while colloquially understood, in formal or medical contexts 失眠 denotes a genuine inability to sleep; use 睡不着 for casual, light-hearted usage

Origin & History

失 (to lose) + 眠 (sleep, to slumber)

Cultural Context

Generation: All ages

Social background: Universal