[Jen12345]

I have been following the sleep restriction for a week I averaged six hours and I need to get up at 6 AM so I started going to bed at 11:30 or midnight and I am sleeping for six hours solidly now I used to wake up multiple times (going to bed at 10) now I sleep thru. How long do I need to keep the late bedtime? I fell asleep by accident at 10 and then I woke up at four because that’s the six hours that I’ve been doing I did get out of bed did some things and fell back to sleep till six but I don’t know if I’m supposed to stay up late. I do feel sleepy in the day I know I could use more than six hours

[stevetheadi]

Hi Jen12345

I saw your post while browsing for answers to my sleep problem. I’m unable to answer your question unfortunately but I’m going to ask you one!

I used to go to bed about 10pm, sleep until about 3.30am then lie awake until my get up time of 6.30am so like you, I tried sleep restriction. But I found it impossible to stay awake until 1am!

Does it get easier? Any tips?

[Martin Reed]

It sounds as though you’re doing great, Jen! Typically you’ll want to add 15-30 minutes to your sleep window when your average sleep efficiency (measured over at least a week) is over 85%. It sounds as though you might be at that point right now.

There’s a sleep efficiency calculator on the sleep restriction therapy for insomnia page. You might also find this YouTube video helpful: How (and when) to change your sleep window when implementing sleep restriction for chronic insomnia.

@stevetheadi — If you typically get around five-and-a-half hours of sleep (you are sleeping between 10:00 PM and 3:30 AM), you’d likely find it helpful to start with a sleep window of around six hours or so to reduce the amount of time you’re spending in bed awake. In the short term, it can be hard to stay awake until the start of the sleep window — but that is something we want to achieve over the short term since sleepiness is the only thing that generates sleep!

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