Why does it have to always hit me so randomly? Some nights I beg my brain to stay awake past 9 and then there’s nights like this where I’m wide awake for no reason
My rules to have a higher chance of falling asleep at 11-12
- always wake up early, even after I went to bed late, otherwise I won’t be able to fall asleep on time
- no active brain work (studying, working) after 8pm
- no food after 7-8pm
- no ceiling lights after 8-9 pm, only yellow dim lamps
- no staying in bed if I couldn’t fall asleep. get up, go to another room, try again in 15-20 minutes
one more thing: I have to limit the amount of stress inducing activities throughout a day/days so my brain is not in alert mode for too long. I have social anxiety so this mostly means spending enough time at home, not going to more than 2 different places during one day, etc.
You ever get it in weird way that you are just lying in bed, tired but awake, waiting for your body to go sleep, and you start dreaming before actually falling asleep? This happens to me from time to time
Maybe diary a bit, logging different aspects consistently for a couple weeks, and keeping a sleep log in the morning to see how well you did, if you continue to insomnia without correlation to anyone you’re tracking in your diary, change what you log.
I suggest food, social contacts, feelings during commute, future scheduling, hobby tracking.
You might not come up with the exact stressor at first, but if you find a pattern in something you’re tracking you may be able to determine what’s causing the pattern and be able to take corrective action.
If nothing else journaling can be fun!
I struggled with this for decades and ended up noticing a pattern with the food I ate for dinners that were high in glutamates. Glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter and thus if you are sensitive it will put your brain into overdrive and sleep is just not possible as basically you are drugged. Only effects a small portion of the population but I can tell you, I sleep very well now that I avoid high glutamate foods past 5pm as they tend to not make my mind race until several hours after consumption and once the effect kicks in, it does not wain off until 3-5am which kills my sleep. Avoiding glutamate has been the single biggest quality of life improvement along with focusing on my gut biome which when out of balance can make it harder to fall asleep as believe it or not, out guts make a lot of the neurotransmitters we need to function including melatonin which is the sleep neurotransmitters.
I wish you luck no matter the root cause. Feel free to ask me more about this.
I should also add that many food additives also can ruin my sleep, although not nearly as much as high glutamate. Red dye no 40 is particularly bad but so are many other additives with names few can pronounce.
I take melatonin daily, it works for me.
