[a20121997]

Hey there,

I am 22 and male, no underlying medical conditions and very healthy, if I may say so myself haha.

I’ve often had some form of mild insomnia (be it falling asleep or staying asleep), but for the last 1 or 2 years I’ve been waking up 2-4 times pretty much every night. I notice that almost every time I seem to be waking up after 90 min (approx. 1 sleep cycle) or 3 hours (approx. 2 sleep cycles). I understand, that one typically enters a brief “wake” phase after each cycle, so maybe I awake after a sleep cycle more than I should? Because, whenever I wake up, I tend to go to the toilet to urinate. It has become a persistent habit: sometimes I do indeed need to go to the toilet, but sometimes I simply go because I associate waking up at night with going to the toilet.

Been to a urologist, and there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong concerning my prostate, although my bladder muscles seems to be quite “strong”. But I do think my problem is a sleep issue, not a urinary issue. I only consume caffeine (green tea) early in the morning and don’t drink much water in the hours before bed.

I practice good sleep hygiene (little screen time and only with blue light filter, dark and cool bedroom, spend as little non-sleeping time in my bed as possible etc.) and have started supplementing melatonin (0.5mg – 1.0mg) + some herbal sleeping/relaxation aids. I have also started meditating approx. 20 min before bed to de-stress. But all these measures only slightly help. Some weeks are fine, while others are not good.

I assume that stress is the underlying cause of my problem, but I don’t know how else to de-stress…? I have noticed that when I actually feel slightly stressed before bed, I will end up awakening several times at night. BUT, even when I am quite relaxed before bed, I will still often awake at night, and almost always after 90 min or 3 hours (see above).

Atm i go to bed between 9 and 10 pm and wake between 5 and 6 am. Falling asleep mostly isn’t a problem (takes 15-30min) and I really don’t think there is an issue with my circadian rhythm, since I avoid lights in the evening and try to get sunlight in the morning. I also eat dinner around 5-7pm, so not very late.

SO, if you made it this far (thank you!!) and have experienced something similar, or have an idea what could help, I would be super happy to discuss with you.

Thanks!

AK

[Martin Reed]

Hello AK and welcome to the forum. It sounds to me as though hyperarousal might be playing a role in your current difficulties with sleep. That’s because it’s clear from your post that you are (quite understandably!) paying a lot of attention to sleep.

I can also see a lot of sleep efforts such as taking supplements, meditation routines, and the implementation of sleep hygiene techniques.

Unfortunately, all these things can actually make sleep more difficult!

First of all, I think you would find it very helpful not to check the time or pay any attention to the time between getting into bed and getting out of bed. Checking the time during the night rarely helps us fall back to sleep if we have any concern about sleep!

Bear in mind, too, that waking during the night is completely normal! Most people pay no attention to these awakenings so they fall back to sleep very quickly and rarely even remember them. Unfortunately, as soon as we become concerned with these awakenings, we activate the arousal system and this can make it harder to fall back to sleep.

Another thing that can be helpful with nighttime awakenings is simply to allot an appropriate amount of time for sleep. You mentioned a bedtime between 9:00 PM and 10:00 PM and a wake time between 5:00 AM and 6:00 AM. This means you are allotting between seven and nine hours for sleep.

I would suggest figuring out your average nightly sleep duration taken over a week or two, adding half-hour or so to that and allotting that much time for sleep each night for a few weeks. This should help build sleep drive and reduce the amount of time you spend awake during the night.

Getting out of bed when being in bed becomes unpleasant is also helpful over the long-term since it prevents you from reinforcing the idea that the bed is a place for unpleasant wakefulness rather than sleep.

I hope this helps.

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[a20121997]

Thank you for your elaborate response! What you’re saying makes sense and I will try and loosen up my pre-bedtime routine and not be so strict with myself concerning this.

[Author]

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