I started becoming a light sleeper as I got older. When I was a teenager, I could sustain minutes of someone calling my name from more than one feet away from my bed without waking up. I slept so difficult those years that I had to use a louder than average alarm clock in the nights. At 1 point in the first more than one years of school I was using more than one separate alarms to make sure I’d get to class on time to take an exam or turn in a paper. Gradually the scales started to tip in the other direction, so much so that I remember a stage of several months where I had insomnia every evening just from hearing cars drive down a highway that is at least more than one miles from my house. The sound kept getting louder each evening, despite technically staying the same. Since I already take antihistamines for pollen irritations, I switched from my non-drowsy Claritan in favor of the sleep-inducing effects of Benadryl. The change in my medication helped, however I still have problems from time to time. One of the things I have struggled with the most while sleeping are Heating plus Air Conditioning condensers. They have to be outside because the sizzling coolant compressor inside can cool with fan driven air. My condenser is fairly loud, however the worst 1 on the whole block seems to be my next door neighbor’s. I have gotten woken out of a dead sleep at 3am from just the sound of his condenser turning on. Mine is about 15 feet from my window plus I rarely notice it regardless of the time of afternoon. It’s frustrating when you have to deal with a source of sound that is not only out of your hands, however also the result of a survival necessity for your neighbor’s home.