Having anxiety about not being able to fall asleep again.

[AwkwardMango]

So as some of you guys might now, I’ve been under an extreme traumatic and stressful situation. Yesterday, I only got 3 hours of sleep and attempted to sleep earlier in the evening. But I was doing meditation before my sleep to help calm down my anxiety. However I realize while I was trying to sleep, I kept paying attention to my breathing and then when I did doze off, it felt like I forgot how to breathe normally and jolted awake. It kept me awake the whole day today and now I’m even more anxious about going to sleep tonight. What if I can’t fall asleep again? What if I can’t ever sleep again? What if I can’t breathe properly? Can someone say something comforting so I can stop being so worried?

 

i tried everything to distract myself from taking Xanax (which led me to having a full blown panic attack) to calling a suicide hotline and my therapist to watching Netflix to crying my eyes out but I just couldn’t sleep. Someone how I became afraid of dozing off and being jolted awake again 

[Punk_PrincessXX]

I like to listen to slow songs while I lay in bed. I tend to be in my head all day and stress over every thing. When I listen to music I try to not think about my worries and focus on the music taking deep breaths in and out. 

[Gene_e]

Have you tried melatonin? It's helpful for me and it's natural. 

[HRH Ayyu]

ive always had trouble sleeping, for some reason night time use to be when i got most of my panic attacks, so i am always anxious before i sleep.

Watching ASMR videos, untill i get to the point where i notice im slowly not paying attention/ dosing off.

You will eventually tire yourself out and sleep, and its normal to wake up a few times during the night. and if you wake up in the middle of the night and get anxious distract yourself by watching a video on your phone, or read a random story online.

Basicly i learnt to distract myself if i feel my anxiety building up.

And if yo struggle to breathing while sleeping you will wake yourself up.There is no need to worry about it.

 

edit: ive learnt thinking "im going to sleep early/ this time" never works for me, i have to tire myself out.

 

Edited May 15, 2020 by HRH Ayyu

[Shalnark]

This used to happen to me when I was really stessed, what I used to do to distract me was listening to songs by kpop groups and making line distributions in my head, for example giving a song I like to another group I also like. I know it sounds a bit weird but it helped me. I got distracted but it wasn't something I had to put much thought into.

Also, not something good to recommend but I would keep my allergy meds near my bed. I knew it was in my head and not something physical but it made me feel a lot better.

Don't worry, it's probably going to last for a few days and slowly get better. 

[sdtwfs]

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Edited July 1, 2021 by rosienator