4am wake up call

[[he...]]

What do you do when you wake up at 4am every morning? Today it was 3am.  Do you get up and start your day? Try and go back to sleep. How do you handle this day after day. My eyes keep closing but am jolted back awake. So tired ...

[[Tr...]]

The adrenalin rushes, oh yes. Those were horrible and have evened out ever so slowly. They will slowly start to get better and this will pass for you. I just used to lay there and sometimes after 1- 2 hours I’d fall back to sleep. I didn’t get up as I wanted to retrain my brain that it’s still sleep time, and ever so slowly it got better. Now I wake up once around 3pm for a bathroom break and can fall back to sleep within 10-15 minutes and get a good 8-9 hours of rest. Hang in there.

[[Ta...]]

I still get these early wake-up calls and this is what I do: I lay there and listen to something soothing on YouTube and try to get back to sleep. Lately, this usually works. If not, I just lay there anyway. If you must get up and out of bed and start your day, it might be for the best, and you can try to take a nap or go to bed early when its that time.

Benzo-Related insomnia does not play by a normal set of rules and all the sleep-training in the world doesn't really help, in my opinion. Sometimes it is for the best to just lay there and try to fall back asleep, because you are resting your body and may in fact experience micro-sleeps. Try both and see what works best for you on any given day.

[[Sp...]]

I used to get those 4 AM wakeups!

 

I would keep my phone near my bed and when I woke up then I would put on a audiobook on an hour timer. (I keep the brightness on my phone on the lowest setting so that I am not shining a terribly bright light in my eyes.) Often I would fall back to sleep. But even if I didn't, it was a good way to just lie there and let my body rest. I'd be concentrating on the book rather than thinking about my symptoms or how I needed to sleep, which was a good thing all around.

 

Eventually I stopped getting those early AM cortisol rushes.

[[tr...]]

Just ride it out. I would stay in bed to "retrain" my body to stay in rest mode. Over time you'll most likely fall back asleep.

For the most part I sleep right thought now.

 

A far cry from the days where I jolted awake every two hrs with nightmares and surges all night long - absolute torture.

 

I even napped twice this week! Peaceful naps.

 

It will pass.