Published on 12, July, 2020
I'm having yet another bad night, and it's all because I woke up at the wrong time. Do any of you have suggestions of tips for getting back to sleep again? I would love to know.
Reading a book, or listening to an audiobook. Also lavender oil, and a hot water bottle. Hardly original but these thinks do help me.
I struggle with this, too. One thing I've found effective some of the time is "cognitive shuffling". This involves distracting and redirecting your mind by scrambling your thoughts, so that they're not following logical sequences - which is what your brain does naturally during the early stages of sleep.
One way to do this is to think of a word (eg "forest") and then to work through it, letter by letter, coming up with other words that begin with each letter - including creating mental images to go along with each word (or just recalling each word, if you can't visualise things).
I learned about it in the book Self Care for Autistic People - 100+ Ways to Recharge, De-Stress and Unmask! .
If you feel like you'd benefit from having help with the process rather than just doing it all in your head, the author recommends the app mySleepButton (or others like it).
I hope that you got back to sleep. I am not an expert on getting to sleep. I'm very bad at it. I have phases of insomnia. Having one now, like you.
Phones are a very bad idea, when trying.
One thing that works for me more than half of the time is counting backwards from 1,000. Do it slowly. If your mind wanders (in a non sleepy way) then try to picture the numbers too.
Some milk seems to send me back to sleep. Hopefully sweet dreams.
Honestly outside of medicating, the best advice I can offer is don't let yourself linger in bed if you're struggling to sleep. Even if it's just for a little while, get up and find something to occupy yourself with. The tiredness should return soon. In the meantime, try not to stimulate yourself too much. Read something, walk around if you can, maybe find an easy chore to do. Flip the quilt and let the bed air so it's fresher when you come back. And of course if you do start to get tired again, nip in the bathroom real quick to make sure you don't have to get up again soon.