Waking up minutes or even hours before your alarm isn’t a new phenomenon, sleep experts tell CNN, but it can cause people incredible discomfort. Additional stressors from the ongoing pandemic have exacerbated our collective struggles to sleep.
Those who experience insomnia may have a combination of “nocturnal awakenings” and what is classified as “early morning awakenings,” according to a 2009 study from the Sleep Epidemiology Research Center at Stanford and other universities. The study finds that some people may experience early awakenings without other symptoms of insomnia such as “difficulty initiating sleep,” “nocturnal awakenings,” and “non-restorative sleep,” meaning sleep that is not substantial even at the recommended hours. “It’s a bit of a myth that insomnia is just falling asleep,” said sleep specialist Rebecca Robbins, an instructor in the Division of Sleep Medicine at Harvard Medical School. “A common complaint is excessive sleepiness and waking up not feeling very rested.”
While insomnia treatments include cognitive behavioral therapy and medication, other daily tips can have an impact on early morning awakenings. An acute sleep disorder could be at play for someone who does not experience chronic insomnia but who wakes up early.
“Sleep is an artifact of our waking life,” said Robbins. “If you’re experiencing hardship, trauma, or something unsettling…those events are important to our sleep.”
Constantly waking up to that everyday sound adds immense frustration for not falling asleep again. Stress can feel isolating and exhausting, taking precedence over the initial sleep problem.
“You start thinking about that, and then you start doing things that make the insomnia worse,” said Dr. Rajkumar Dasgupta, an associate professor of clinical medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. “Don’t start telling yourself… ‘I’m going to force myself to stay in bed until I fall asleep.’ “
So what can you do about it?
Don’t look at the clock or your phone
If you wake up suddenly, in what seems like the small hours of the morning, resist looking at the clock. Finding out that it’s 3 am when you set your alarm for 7 am can cause further stress about how much sleep you were hoping to get.
“Anxiety and frustration increase … Watching the clock becomes habitual, and that habitual response of frustration and anxiety also triggers a stress response in the body,” said sleep specialist Wendy Troxel, a senior behavioral scientist at Rand Corp.
When stress takes precedence, cortisol levels rise and the body becomes alert. This process is counterproductive to maintaining drowsiness; the brain becomes hyper-engaged.
“You look at the clock. It’s 3 a.m. like clockwork, and immediately the tension can make your teeth clench. You think about all the demands… how horrible it will be when you’re sleep deprived,” Troxel said. “Everything this mental processing and agitation is the antithesis of the dream state. It makes you more alert and aroused…instead of signaling to the brain that it’s okay to stray.”
If your alarm is on your phone, checking the clock can be an even more significant trigger. Consider getting an alarm that isn’t connected to your phone.
“Our phone is our strongest signal for our waking lives,” Troxel said. “You’re getting light exposure from your phone, which can directly stimulate your circadian signal to be alert. The content we consume on our phones can be very arousing, whether it’s browsing social media or reading the news. These can all stimulate emotional states that are more activating than relaxing.”
get out of bed
So, paradoxically, experts say you have to get out of bed. Yes, even at 3 am
“Give up the idea of going back to sleep,” Troxel said. “When you do that, when you let go of the pressure that sleep doesn’t take as much effort, you’re more likely to go back to sleep.”
In a stimulus control technique, you can distract your brain with a mundane task to help you recover from drowsiness faster than staying frustrated in bed.
“As soon as that little voice sounds, change the mood. Get out of bed,” Robbins said. “Try to reset your brain and keep the lights low.”
Mentally assigning the bed to sleep in helps people associate positive sleeping thoughts with their space. Leaving the room when the agitation begins can separate the frustration from the bed.
Anything from reading a book to knitting to listening to soft music (but not using a phone) can positively distract the brain. Once the drowsiness returns, go back to bed.
Record what works and what doesn’t
Dasgupta recommends tracking not only when you went to bed and woke up on any given night, but also what calming techniques, environmental factors, and even nutrition and exercise routines seemed to help you sleep that day.
“The perfect dream is like having a puzzle, and you need all the right pieces,” Dasgupta said. “People who have insomnia are missing one of those pieces of sleep hygiene. When you make your recommendation, like muscle relaxation, maybe that’s not what they were missing. Maybe the sound wasn’t the key part. Maybe time you need more of that heavy blanket.
It also depends on our given circadian rhythm, or the 24-hour solar cycle that the body runs in that alerts us when sleepiness sets in at night. If any environmental factors change, such as travel, work schedule or lighting, the body’s circadian rhythm may be off, indicating an uncomfortable early awakening before the alarm clock, Dasgupta said. In this case, changing the lighting in a certain room or getting alternative lighting could help.
Progressive muscle relaxation can work: Start at your toes, squeeze your muscles for three seconds, and release. Breathe through this process. The 4-7-8 breathing exercise in conjunction with muscle relaxation can be successful, Dasgupta said. You inhale for 4 seconds, hold your breath for 7 seconds, and exhale for 8 seconds.
Others may find that yoga, meditation, or reading can help when they wake up before their alarm clock.
The key here is also getting out of bed.
The same techniques don’t work for everyone, but practicing various strategies that can affect sleep is critical and ultimately creating a well-followed routine.
“Take it easy,” Robbins said. “That’s why we consciously use this ritual word before bed because ideally these are strategies that you incorporate into your routine. It’s your toolbox.”
If the problem continues beyond three times a week for three months, Robbins recommends talking to a sleep specialist. It may require more than a simple habit change.
Source: www.cnn.com