Eat when hungry, sleep when tired

[drwex]

This is mostly me writing down things in case I have to look back later. I'm not looking for people to solve my problems. That said, comments are always welcome.

My sleep the past couple of weeks has been mediocre to poor. I'm not feeling tired when I ought to. Usually some time around midnight I notice that it's late and I should probably go to bed. Sometimes I don't notice until nearly 1A. When I do lie down I tend to fall asleep easily, which leads me to think it's not that I'm not tired - it's that I'm not noticing.

I'm having more trouble staying asleep than I usually do. Usually I stay asleep for 6-6.5 hours. The past couple of weeks I've been waking up once or twice a night. Last night was pretty bad - I was feeling crappy at work Wednesday so I skipped going out with coworkers; instead, I came home and napped. Woke up with a start after about 1h10, and managed to fall back asleep for another 1h10 at which point I realized if I didn't get up I was going to be completely frelled.

I went to bed eventually around midnight as I usually do, and woke up four or five times during the night - awake enough to be able to note the time and cognize "no, it's not time to get up. Go back to sleep." Each wakeup lasted no longer than a few minutes.

There are definitely environmental factors. I've been too hot or the bedroom AC is too noisy or I'm too cold or too sweaty or I've had body issues that aren't conducive to restful sleep. There are probably also psychological factors - I wake up remembering fragments of nightmares and the combination of messed up sleep and these fragments has led me to be moody and feel "off" for a couple weeks now.

I don't recall other summers being this bad. I generally like hot weather.

Comments

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

Meh. I have no real suggestions, but I have sympathy. My sleep has been a little messed up this week, too. I think it's probably mostly hormonal issues in my case, and hopefully we'll both be doing better soon.

[docorion.livejournal.com]

Pretty much all I got is sympathy, too. Personally I detest the heat (well, "heat" is fine, but humidity is hateful in almost all its forms. If it's hot but not humid life is generally fine; hot and humid makes me miserable), and it screws up my sleep. So I crank the AC to levels most people parse as "cold" and sleep OK, most of the time.

As for not noticing tired - well, the experts (of which I am not one, but I've consulted a few) will advise setting a time to go to bed. When it comes along, prepare for sleep and get into bed; if you don't fall asleep after a reasonable time (say 20-30 minutes), get up and do something restful for a set time, then try again.

I note for the record that I don't actually, you know, *do* this. But it's what I'm told works.

Sympathies in return

[drwex]

Sometimes when I'm being moody around that time of the month Pygment reminds me I'm not allowed to PMS for her.

Re: Sympathies in return

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

LOL!

[c1.livejournal.com]

Wow. My sleep has been crummy lately, but I've been chalking that up to school, mostly.

School?

[drwex]

What is school doing to you now?

Re: School?

[c1.livejournal.com]

I'm going full-tilt through the summer, trying to wrap up my degree by spring '11. (The department has an "alternate" graduation ceremony in August, but I'd be on the hook for tuition for that time.) The ceramics study has been quite rewarding, but the overall stress level of grad school remains the same-- maybe more so, as the summer courses try to cram an entire semester into an abbreviated schedule.
So yeah, it's fun, and I wouldn't trade it for the world, but I'd love to have a nice, uninterrupted night's sleep once in awhile.

Re: School?

[drwex]

Sympathies. Summer courses are indeed a bitch.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

I sleep - and remember to sleep - much better when I'm not hot. Perhaps it's time to figure out why the bedroom AC is noisy and fix it? If you can't use the AC, what's the point in having it. For a room unit, sometimes it's a matter of opening it up, figuring out what's rattling, and doing judicious bending or padding. But you have central... so I don't know.

I also sleep a lot better when I get exercise a few times a week.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

(although if the problem's noise from the AC, or anything else, some people use earplugs)

[chienne-folle.livejournal.com]

The usual advice for sleeping is to turn off all screens (computer or TV) at least an hour before bedtime. It's a lot easier to fail to notice that one is sleepy if one is highly involved in something. You might try getting several books of short stories from the library, and read those during the hour before bedtime. After each story, you can evaluate your state.

Staying cool is absolutely crucial to sleep for me and also for several other people I know, so finding a way to work with your bedroom air conditioner seems important. For a lot of people, they can sleep with nearly any steady noise; what makes them wake is noise that changes. Having an air conditioner's compressor cycle on and off can wake a person, and if you have the kind that turns the a/c's fan off when the compressor is off (supposedly to save energy, though it doesn't actually save that much), then the difference between on and off is even greater. You might consider adding a steady noise to your room, to cover up the a/c's cycling. A fan or an air cleaner or something like that should make the kind of hum that you can fall asleep to.

Poor sleep makes everything else in one's life worse, so I hope your troubles stop soon.

Also, any chance you have sleep apnea?

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Has no one mentioned upping the exercise? Or did I miss it?

[sariel-t.livejournal.com]

Sooooooo much sympathy.

I may have to give that a try

[drwex]

I know what's rattling. It's quite deep inside and I've found no way to stabilize it that doesn't impair the AC's intended function.

Apnea is possible

[drwex]

I mentioned it to my doc a couple years ago but he did not think it was likely. People with apnea tend to wake up feeling as if they have not slept - more sleep does not help them because they're not deeply asleep. Normally I'm quite deeply asleep - that's why the past two weeks have been notably bad.

I know I should exercise more

[drwex]

In the past I've experimented with various amounts of exercise and found no correlation between amounts and sleep patterns. I haven't tried it in the past couple weeks, it's true.

Re: I may have to give that a try

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

And now I'm curious. :>