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Hi Mac,
Sounds like the vacation was good. Usually that seems to temporarily help us sleep a little better and longer after getting adjusted. Having fun and being too busy to worry about sleep does help. That’s nice you got 7 hours of sleep. I know you’ve mentioned it many times that you aim for 7 and 7 is what allows you to function. If you can reliably get 6-6.5 hours you are not far from 7 hours. In my case I am getting 5-6 and hope to push it further but I can’t. Sometimes I wake up and go back to bed without issues and sometimes like last night I was up at 5-5:30 am and was too alert to fall back asleep. The waking up and staying up early is annoying but I try to relax and go about my day and try to tire myself out for the next night.
Yes I think it will take awhile. As long as you follow the routine and keep at it things will improve slowly but surely.
That’s good you slept of the night. Sorry to hear it wasn’t deep. If your body is really tired it “should” have brought deeper sleep once you are asleep. It will take time. I had a 5 day streak of “decent” sleep but last night slipped a bit. I woke up around 4:30 and from then on until 7 was just laying, relaxing and maybe nodding in and out of light sleep. Hard to say. I remember my mind casually wandering to all sorts of neutral thoughts, being relaxed and really not worrying about what time it is or sleep but falling back to a good sleep didn’t happen. Today I am a little more tired and the band over my head feeling is back again.
Are you still logging your sleep in a diary, journal?
I agree Daf. Lately I feel as awake/tired as before this all started. The way I see it is if I am tired then Ill most likely end up sleeping better and deeper at bedtime. I would rather take the sleep I have now vs nil sleep or much less Worrying does make it worse. Relaxing, spending time with friends and family, working out, video games, reading etc everything I used to do before I worried makes things better because I am living. Living makes being mindful easier and being in the moment easier.
I think when bad things happen or we worry, it is easy to be mindful about that because of the way it makes us feel. That feeling over time builds up stress, fight/flight response etc. When good things happen we seem to have more of a choice in how mindful we are and not as automatic/wired as when bad stuff happens. If we choose to be more mindful when good things happen I believe it can ease the stress, fight/flight response, cortisol you name it.
Trying not to get too deep into this but when good things happen over and over we may get desensitized and the law of diminishing returns come to play. If every day is going to Disney World with unlimited money then after a few days the fun and magic will no longer be as profound. I wonder if the reverse can apply. If you are exposed to more stress and bad news if the law of diminishing returns also applies and after awhile you just don’t worry or care about it as much which makes good news or experiences have a higher value.
I guess that’s why a component of mindfulness is about gratitude. We live in first world countries, comfy beds, have air conditioning, not in war time, don’t have to make fire from sticks and rocks and hunt and gather for our food. We should be reminded how good things are even when things kinda suck as well.
Before I would go to bed around 11-11:30pm and wake up at 7:00am which is 7.5-8 hours in bed. Now I am going to bed at 12:00 or a bit later and out of bed at 7:00am. I’ve accepted the amount of sleep as it is and nothing is wrong. When my sleep efficiency is 85% or higher for a few weeks and compfortable, then Ill add 15-30 minutes. On occasion I can sleep for 8 hours. I just know that after a few nights of that I tend to relapse more.
Continue with the course!. I find mindfulness meditation helpful but I prefer to do it earlier in the evening to relax. If I do it right before bed, I find that I am associating it more with the act meditating to go to bed and not relax.
I am in Ontario and spring arrives in May and it is short. Summers can be quite nice. Fall I would say is the best time of year here.
It’s hard to say. I’ve been logging my sleep for months and average sleep is about the same. I would say maybe 5-10% better but I would have to look and analyze the whole trend since the beginning. At the moment I think I’ve plateaued as my body wakes me up when it feels like and during the day I am ok. I do get bouts of sleepiness and tiredness but I just move along. Ideally, if I could average another 30-45 minutes that would be nice. I just don’t see that happening in the short term. I do generally feel better during the day though which is important.
My goal is to continue to stabilize and reduce the incidence of relapse. 5.5-6.5 hours of sleep seems to be what my body is capable of at the moment. 8hrs is out of the question. If I can eventually get to 6.5-7 that would be nice but again, my concern is to try to have relatively predictable nights where I go to bed and wake up roughly at the same time without excessive tossing and turning.
I know all too well about being over tired and hard to relax. It feels like the longer I am up and tired, the more wound up I become. The past few days have been decent for me with over 85% sleep efficiency . Who knows how things will be tonight and the next few nights. If it’s good it’s good, if it’s crap it’s crap and Ill just keep moving forward. Glad you are over the bug. Weather does affect me. This fall and winter here was quite gloomy and depressing. It was getting to me. Being sleepy, frustrated, irritable and not having any sun and day after day of overcast.
*knock on wood* not trying to jinx myself but daylight savings time seems to be better for me. I am liking the later sunsets and I do almost always wake up earlier than I want to but that aligns better to my desired wake up time. So rather than it being 5:30, it is more like 6:30 which is better.
Sorry I jinxed you!
Martin posted a good video about this.
It’s ok for your mind to wander about not sleeping but the key is to just observe like you say and try to casually think about other things like camping, beach, a trip you took or what you did that day. It doesn’t seem to be effective if I try too hard to visualize. If I just think about a trip I took or whatever casually it does help a bit to make my mind off. I guess a way to explain it is I am thinking about a trip because I am in the mood and feel like it rather than trying to change my thought if that makes sense. If I had a fun filled day it is much easier because Ill reminisce about it. Another thing is if there is a thought, maybe not only observing it and just letting it come as much as it wants will desensitize you and make it less “powerful”. It’s like milk milk milk! in the GM book.
Hi Deb,
Hope you are feeling better. One day at a time. Sounds like you are on the right track. Remember that you will have bad nights. Treat each night as individual and just keep at it. I slept over 7 hours last night which I haven’t done in a few weeks. I accidentally slept in an hour + it’s daylight savings time which means another hour. I would like to say sleep is getting better (last 2-3 nights) but I know it will change. I just need to cope better when I do have a bad night so it doesn’t lead to subsequent bad nights.
When I had a cold/flu bug a few weeks ago I managed to get in 8 hours of sleep. It was a reminder that my body does know best even if it’s stubborn. I did wake up around 4am but relaxed and eventually slept until 7:15. I just let go and try not to care about anything.
I do think they are complimentary. There are some differences. Of course the big ones are staying in bed vs getting out and rules on napping. CBT-I is no or not recommended. ACT is if you feel like you need one then 20 minutes max before 3pm. Also the to bed and wake up times are looser as you know. I think a little wiggle is ok (say 30 minutes) but more importantly is consistency. All the other sleep hygiene rules are the same except that if you are mindfully doing a big routine, it will be counter productive and becoming reliant on wishful thinking say the lavender will make a difference. Both CBT-I and ACT encourage mindfulness. ACT more so.
For me I am overlapping with SC. If I wake up in the middle of the night I relax and see how things go. Sometimes within 5-30 minutes I am back to sleep and glad I stayed in bed. If I wake up alert or has been 20-30 + minutes and know sleep won’t happen. (tossing and turning and frustrated) I will get up for a bit. If I am in bed for awhile but not frustrated, Ill relax and maybe sleep will happen, maybe not. If not then not to be wound up about it.
I think us in this boat are past sleep hygiene (caffeine, TV, dark room etc). Consistency is key. Trust me that if your body is exhausted you will be able to sleep with the sun shining, techno playing and no AC in the summer. It would be uncomfortable and very frustrating but we will sleep.
I remember last summer a few months before I started having issues (I may have had a bit of issues then but did not bother me to freak out) I went to visit my sister in Belgium and although I didn’t really sleep on the plane which is normal for me I landed and spent the next morning awake. That afternoon in the car with her driving I felt really tired and fell asleep. That evening sleep was difficult for a few reasons. No white noise of a fan I am used to, a different bed, new environment, hot room, sun rising early and finally roosters doing their morning yelling. It was rough but I didn’t have anxiety about sleep or the next day. I was frustrated but not anxious. I just knew that based on the circumstances sleep would be more difficult and Ill make it up which I did.
It seems like our sleep drive needs to be quite high to drop off. As a teenager I could sleep whenever and nap whenever for however long I wanted. Mind you it had its disadvantages such as grogginess from oversleeping and general procrastination because I would sleep in until noon.
Finally, the fact that I want to control sleep isn’t helping.
Depending on your time to bed, 4PM coffee should have minimal impact. As GM says and I am paraphrasing “Good sleepers have coffee, have a glass of wine, watch TV and don’t think or worry about it and don’t have trouble generally”. If the cup of coffee was at 8PM then that would be a bigger factor. Caffeine does stay in your system long but by 10-11PM it should be a non issue. Personally I would think the same way. I may have a coke during dinner. Coffee I only have in the morning and maybe on rare occasions in the early afternoon (1-3PM) but inside I think about it when in reality it probably isn’t nearly as big of a factor as me thinking it is!
Glad to hear you slept well. I fell asleep quickly and slept from about 12:15 to 5:30. Sometimes when I am up, I am up. If I stay in bed I am just there relaxing but too awake to fall back asleep which sometimes I feel more than fine with. It’s like I am wired for 4-6 hours of sleep all of a sudden. On occasion Ill pull 6.5-7.5 once every few weeks. What I am trying to do is better stick with my wake up time more firmly (especially on weekends when I may stay in bed a bit longer) and try to stabilize my sleep. I know I am trying to control sleep when I should let go. If I wake up at 4am, I should just be like “okay… cool ” rather than me thinking “ok I have 3 hours, how can I maximize my time to ensure I feel the best today. Should I relax with my eyes closed? should I get out of bed? Should I get a glass of water and try to go back to bed? Should I try the couch?”.
I do avoid looking at the time but after awhile I give in if it’s been what I feel like a long time. I should put the time away even more so I have less focus on what point of the night I am at. If I don’t hear birds and the sun creeping through I am in for disappointment anyway.
I learned to ski when I was about 12 years old. The earlier you start, the easier it is to learn. I always say that when you are young you are more willing to fall down over and over again and it doesn’t hurt. Your center of gravity is lower so that also helps. Sking is one of the only winter activities I enjoy so I try to at least go a few times a season. I usually go to Utah but I passed this year in fear that it would be a bad trip due to my sleep issues. I went to Vermont instead. It wasn’t bad. There were struggles but wasn’t bad. Looking back I had a good time!
I slept better last night. I managed to get about 6 hours. After 4 I got up for some water and went back to bed and fell asleep after I guess 15 minutes or so. “Sometimes” I can tell if I will fall back asleep quickly. I genuinely feel sleepy hitting back on the pillow feels amazing. The nights where I struggle, I feel tired but not sleepy. Almost if someone injected 2 cups of coffee. A decent night for me these days is getting 6+ hours and if I do wake up, being able to get back to sleep without frustration, SC (getting out of bed intentionally) and in reasonable time. I woke up genuinely more tired but I believe when I am tired and not wired I am more able to fall back asleep if I do wake up in the middle of the night. I think lower stress through the day and just feeling better helps.
I would agree. I live in Canada anyway so the idea of going to the UK or spending a lot of $$ for remote support doesn’t make sense especially if it’s the exact same thing as the book.
One thing I am applying lately that is mentioned in the book is dealing with intrusive thoughts. When I recognize an intrusive thought is that I speak with it. “Hello (insert thought here)” and spend 10-30 seconds talking to it as if it were in person. “Sit down, what’s up? how have you been? I haven’t heard from you in a few hours”. It actually seems to work. I could be ruminating for 15 minutes and be unproductive but if I notice it and just talk out loud it seems to clear it up. So besides all the other tips and tricks, this one seems to help during the way. Not bulletproof but more effective than trying to change my thought or push it away.
Last night I heard a speaker/speech about someone who was fired from his job after 20-25 years and was in his 50’s and spoke about his negative thoughts “Who will hire me at my age, I am old”. He struggled for a few months and his thoughts were always nagging him. He then spoke about talking out loud and would talk out loud on the commuter train which people felt uncomfortable with lol but he says it helped him push those thoughts away.
