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Hello Tommi!
My advice is just do what you feel like doing. If 8-10 hours makes you more happy and productive, then allow yourself to sleep this much while accepting that you are probably overdoing it and therefore making difficult nights down the road become more likely. 6-7 hours is the minimum amount of sleep that a majority of people need and is your core sleep, anything more than that is probably bonus sleep and discretionary which tend to manifests as more light sleep, lots of dreams and awakenings in between. There is no right or wrong here, trying to control sleep or anything related to it such as dreams etc is probably futile because ultimately it’s been always your own body that decides what kind of sleep and how much of it that you need and actually get.Greetings!
The symptoms you describe is normal because you are too well rested! Oversleeping is like overeating, it won’t make any normal person feel good. A normal lifestyle should incorporate balanced amounts of rest and mental/physical stimulation by being up and about during your wakeful hours.Hello Trish
Everyone’s journey to recovery is a bit different but ultimately the destination is the same: you started to care less about sleep and it just doesn’t bother you anymore. Or it can be said you simply got bored and fed up over it. For me, the initial stage of recovery was falling asleep really fast at bedtime, maybe I was so sleep deprived then and I would get really sleepy way before bedtime. Then as I slept more, I was alert longer into the night and this evolved into waking up earlier like one or two hours before my scheduled wakeup time, initially I thought I couldn’t sleep further so I just started my day early. But one day I decided to just sleep in because my bed was so warm and comfortable and I fell asleep almost effortlessly. Initially for 5,10 mins then slowly grew into 1-2 hours. So right now I am sleeping straight for 5-6 hours before waking up to use the toilet then going back to bed to sleep for another 1-2 hours. Occasionally I would also find it difficult to fall asleep initially, it would manifest as just light sleep for the first few hours of the night with frequent awakenings. This is just a sign of sleeping really well! Sometimes they happen several nights in a row but I am not bothered by them anymore. I think the more those difficult nights happen, the faster you get used to them, it’s just a fact of life. You may still think a lot about sleep at this point, probably because difficult nights haven’t occurred frequently enough to you yet but that sleep is still going to happen regardless of what you do or think. Eventually you come to a realisation like I did that obessesing over sleep has been a complete waste of time and effort.Hello Trish
Thank you for your kind comments. Have you been sleeping in lately? Because you were told that not caring about sleep is the solution to sleep anxiety and sleepless nights, are you now sleeping more than you usually do? So therein lies your “problem”. You are simply too well-rested! I see these events manisfesting themselves all the time, people developed some sleeping problems, managed to recover, begin slacking on the discipline and ultimately finding themselves back to having problems again because it becomes way too easy to oversleep when you start letting go and thinking you are recovered. So stop spending too much time in bed and being too relaxed about your wake up time. Or taking naps during the day. Or that if you can choose to be liberal about your sleep then you will find sleepless nights manifesting more often. There is no right or wrong because your average sleep duration will stay the same over the long term. If you prefer to have a decent amount of sleep consistently, you should stick to a similar waketime every morning. Everyone wakes up with a little bit of sleep drive left. That initial grogginess is normal and it takes a bit of time to go away, just make yourself your favorite beverage, head out and get some light exposure and start your day! Your sleep should get back on track when you consistently do this and then future sleepless episodes won’t bother you as much anymore because you then begin to understand exactly what’s going on and there never was anything to worry about. Good luck and best wishes to you.Hi Eric
I am glad you didn’t find my answer long-winded. Best wishes to you and I hope your sleep gets back on track soon.Hi Eric and greetings
I wonder why you call your “dilemma” a frustration? People who have sleep disruption tend to recover better and faster if they are willing to be more accepting and optimistic about their situation. Think of sleeping more like eating because essentially these two processes are the same to your body. Are you frustrated that you were hungry yesterday, last week, last month or months ago? Or do you get upset when you just ate a bit less on a certain day? Well it doesn’t matter because you will always make up for it the next meal and you don’t suddenly stop eating one day, so the opportunities for eating and sleeping in this case, are always abundant. Therefore how you eat or sleep for a certain day doesn’t matter over the long term, the body just know how to right itself over time. Sleep is something that you have absolutely no control over, it is an involuntary process just like breathing, sweating or regulating your body temp etc unlike other
actions which you can control and are voluntary such as flexing your arms, stretching your legs or moving your jaws to chew. So perhaps you should rethink your mindset about sleep and stop trying to control an involuntary process like sleep because you can’t and never will.Hello!
Greetings and welcome. What time do you go to bed and do you sleep at other times other than at bedtime?Hello Ryan and greetings to you!
My thoughts about sleep changed dramatically when I started realising that it is just a homeostatic process in the human body in the same way as eating, breathing, sweating, body temperature regulation, removal of waste products like urinating & defacating and of course sleeping (your body just takes care of all those processes by itself so there’s simply no point trying to control it because it would be like forcing yourself to breathe 300x per minute or eat 10,000 calories per day because you somehow became convinced that horrible things will happen to you or your health if you don’t). Instead the mistake that most insomniacs do is endlessly forcing themselves to control sleep as if it was a voluntary action like flexing your arms, walking, chewing etc). If you just allow sleep to happen, it just takes place naturally and only if you are sleepy enough which comes from being awake long enough. So the only explanation for not sleeping is you are either not sleepy from being too well rested or you are worrying unnecessarily and needlessly about it because you simply just can’t let go of control and are actively trying to override your own body. I hope this helps and best wishes to you.Hi Jacob
You sleep during daytime? And how do you feel during the day? Have you ever thought about sleeping in two distinct phases? It is something like this: begin first sleeping phase quite early in the evening (6-8pm), then sleep 4-5 hours, wake for couple of hours, then second phase for 2-3 hours. Remember you build sleep drive everytime you are awake so that couple of hours awake in between combined with your natural biological clock might help you fall asleep easier later on. You also seem to be an early sleeper and riser so when choosing the time, you need to keep this in mind as well as suitable to your current lifestyle. Best wishes!Hello Jacob!
That is old question which you keep asking over and over already. And unfortunately my answer is still the same and yes it’s me Chee answering you again ?. I would do absolutely nothing except just go back to bed and for me very often I am falling back asleep because I don’t give a crap if I can sleep or not. I have no issues waking up early I kinda expect it every morning now, I dont try to prevent it because it is futile and I cant control sleep or waking up. So I dont see it as a problem anymore and I dont care there’s light or what the birds will do outside. I set my alarm at 6 am and I stay in bed until the alarm rings and I have to snooze it 2-3 times before I finally get out of bed.Greetings!
Clock watching doesn’t really matter to me anymore. I look at the clock all the time when I’m awake and if it’s still early I just go back to sleep without a problem. I think the ultimate takeaway is being neutral in everything you do and not connecting what you think or do to sleep anymore, I hope that helps.Hi
Sleeping only 2-3 hours per night? I don’t think that’s sustainable in the long term. I bet you are slipping in some sleep during the daytime like napping or catching up on weekends by sleeping in. Either way, you are most likely sleeping more than you think. Sleep is just a part of the homeostatic process that your body controls like respiration, regulating body temperature, appetite, removal of wastes like urinating and defaecating, perspiration and so on. But sleep is a bit flexible because you can adopt a sleeping schedule that suits your current lifestyle and work. Just as long you allow sufficient time for sleep and not sleeping at other times and not wanting to take over control of sleep from your own body, like taking pills or doing a ton of other things to try to control it or getting frustrated/upset because you can’t sleep, you should do really well!The best natural remedy is self confidence. Normal sleepers don’t do anything special or take any pills to sleep because they really believe they can sleep. You need to regain this trust too in yourself by slowly tapering off your pills and be willing to experience some difficult nights in the beginning. Be brave, take that bold step and discover the new lushful bliss of natural restful sleep that lies beyond the horizons which you are so unwilling to venture into. Because you want to protect whatever sleep you have now and are unwilling to experience temporary unpleasantness, you are constantly missing the chance to improve your sleep forever. Short term pain for long term gain!
Hi Rmaas
I think you and most people over-catastrophize the senario that you will be facing. Because the truth is that people can function quite okay on little to no sleep for a few days as your body gets used to a new schedule. Based on your new work schedule, just select a time to get into and out of bed and do this consistently every day. Your body should respond within a few weeks if you are patient, disciplined and don’t cheat by sleeping in or taking naps. Adopting an optimistic, worry-free and can-do attitude helps too. But this may depend on the type of person you are and your personality. Good luck and best wishes to you.
