I replaced my 3 a.m. wake-ups with mushroom adaptogens — did it actually fix my sleep?

On the left, a close up of a hand holding a pipette adding Reishi mushroom extract to a glass. On the left, sleep writer Ruth Jones sleeps in a dimly lit room. In the bottom right corner is a screenshot of a month of sleep tracking from a Withings Health app.

I'm a supplement skeptic but it might be time to eat my words — and drink my mushrooms. As evidence grows that mushroom supplements might improve sleep issues, I decided to give adaptogens a go. And my sleep tracker was impressed.

For 30 days I added functional mushrooms to my sleep routine. Sipping on lion's mane in the morning (to improve clarity) and reishi in the evening (to reduce stress) I was hoping to supercharge my sleep-wake cycle. I recorded the results with a sleep diary, which I cross referenced against my Withings Sleep Analyzer sleep tracker.