My sleep's been weird again lately.
I heard of another friend on Hive who's had sleeping problems and I guess it may affect quite a few of us even if we don't complain about it like I do.
I guess I've always had quite a bit of a weird sleep, I remember when I was younger I used to get excited at the idea of staying awake longer than I should and being able to "tolerate" it more than others would. For instance when I was around the age of 14 I'd go to this lan-party and stay awake the whole 72 hours without much issues while others would go and take naps in between.
I suppose when I first got a PC it affected my sleep quite a bit, the early days of internet were quite exciting for me. I remember excitedly looking at downloads, as in, the download of a movie itself being exciting early on. Downloading a 700mb cd rip of Lord of the Rings at 25 kb/sec, opening it up on VLC and watching it until it would shut down cause the download hadn't gotten further yet, then restarting the movie to watch 5-10 minutes further rather than waiting for the whole thing to be finished. It was hard to get sleep those early few days with a PC in the house.
I also remember the excitement of using it overwhelming anything else I should've done that day, my mom would tell my 10 year old self to move some CDs away from my brothers bed and I'd say "ye in a minute" while hours passed and it was time for bed again. Then in my sleep I'd remember my unfinished task, sleepwalk to my brothers bed and tell him to get up cause I gotta put the CDs away which most likely traumatized him.
While that excitement died down over time my "addiction" to the PC didn't, even if a lot of it had with gaming to do. The internet was pretty nice back then, MSN, IRC, access to anime, etc, a teenagers dream probably.
In high school my sleeping kinda took a turn for the weirder again, for some reason I started getting used to taking a nap after school which meant I'd sleep for way too long during the evening and wouldn't get sleepy again until 2-3 am but had to wake up at 7. I also got into the habit of lucid dreaming after reading up on it, while it helped me deal with some things back then (some random stutter I started getting), I can't say it helped my sleep pattern out much.
Fast forward to the steem/hive days and things got a lot worse. Most things and people were oversea's so the "happenings" would occur during my natural sleep time living in EU. This made communication, ideas and discussions hard to move forward when I was sleeping while people had their evening sessions and I'd do hive stuff while they were at work so it kind of forced me to change my pattern up to adapt to US timezones.
Now being in Asia that has an even bigger effect but these days I'd be happy to be able to go to sleep at the same hour rather than having the "healthy" rhythm of going to sleep before midnight.
I was talking to this friend recently about his sleep issues and he mentioned that taking pills made things worse for them and they got slightly hooked on it which made their sleep even harder to regulate. For the longest time now I've been in this phase where falling asleep is the hardest thing to do so going to sleep at the same hour every day is close to impossible as it always depends on how exhausted I am. If I'm not exhausted enough my mind keeps racing, trying to come up with solutions to current problems, trying to figure out what to do next and if that's better than the other options, etc. I don't even have a lot of things to worry about yet my brain won't shut down, maybe the past years of bull and bear cycles have put my brain on high alert constantly or maybe I have ADHD or something, dunno. It's hard to shut it off.
There's potentially a lot of solutions I could test such as meditation or physical exercise to help falling asleep but feels like I just can't get around to make time for it with all the things I got going on. I keep telling myself "okay just this one last week and then I'll go more passive and look for assistance to take over my part" or "okay just this one more project then I'm done and I'll focus on the big picture stuff" yet here I am daily doing stuff that's most likely affecting my health and sleep in bad ways for the future.
The thing about falling asleep first when you feel mentally exhausted is that you push your sleep forward by a few hours almost every day. As you can imagine this means that every week or two I have slept one night less than the normal person. Can't imagine what affect that'll have on my sleep's health down the line but I really wanna change that sooner rather than later. I'm hoping to get the energy and conviction to make time to fix it by alternative solutions such as physical activity and maybe post about how that's going. One thing about being anon is that you somehow have an easier time being true to yourself and others without the fear of them "judging you" based on your looks so I do feel some sense of comfort being able to post about these things more openly here, even if there's some people on here I know irl hopefully they won't get to read these posts as I'm posting more actively these days. Hidden in the spam I suppose.
I've been to doctors and they've of course recommended all kinds of medication but it's hard to feel like they're doing it for my health rather than for their own pockets. Maybe I'm becoming a bit of a conspiracy nut in that case. I definitely wanna be careful with such things though and at least try some more natural supplements before going down that route. I know melatonin doesn't do anything for me and coffee barely affects my sleep neither but I'll be trying to look for the healthier options before last resorting it to medication. I'm not too old or fat yet to try getting back into exercise so maybe that should be my next attempt at fixing my sleep. I know I've posted about this before but there's a lot of things losing a few kgs would fix at this point in time than sleep alone I feel like so I really need to step it up and just start doing it. Maybe posting about it might give me the motivation I need to keep it up too.
Anyway, enough rambling for one night.
How is your sleep?
I feel it is right and necessary to have a proper sleep time. I've always said that one of the things you never get back in life is sleep so it's always good to prioritize proper sleep hours so it doesn't affect day to day life. I think we all have experienced the same as you when we were young, I remember usually I would always wake up playing on my PC with my friends, all at their homes and we would connect through voice chat (How I miss those times), by that time I guess our internal system was much stronger and somehow it didn't affect us as much. Nowadays that is no longer the case, at least for me, I don't have a good time at all and for some time now I have been keeping sleep schedules that are affecting me, I feel more and more tired, the exhaustion is extreme and I'm sure I'm getting sick. Unfortunately it is something that I can not stop now, as it is an effort to try to find a little more stability in terms of income, it is not easy when you are waiting for your first child and live in a country where the economy is down, are situations that I do not wish to anyone (Socialism sucks). My lack of sleep starts from there, but as I have clear that I am losing many hours of dreams, somehow I try to alleviate it a little, when I can and I have, I try to make myself a glass of warm milk with a spoonful of honey, I take it before going to sleep and the truth is that it helps me a lot, at least I can sleep deeply for 5 or 6 hours, although lately I have felt depleted, I wake up and after about 3 hours I feel exhaustion.
I can only tell you that if you do not have so many worries accompanying you and in a certain way you are calm. Try to improve your sleep hours, don't use medicines, there are many natural drinks that can help you to sleep. Hibiscus tea at night is also very good, try also the glass of warm milk with a spoonful of honey, that can help you.
It was a pleasure to read your story, I hope you can soon improve your sleeping hours, greetings!
Haha, ventrilo or teamspeak? ^^
Yeah stability seems scarce these days. :/
Thanks for the kind words and suggestions, hope things get better for yourself as well!
We actually used Skype at first, but after a while we started using the internal voice chat of “Garena Plus”. I remember everything as if it was yesterday.
First of all, I'm blessed with fabulous sleeping genes. When I want to sleep, I sleep. It usually takes me just a few minutes to fall asleep.
Everywhere, everytime and under many different conditions. And I also don't wake up easily at night too, so I make long nights (when I go to bed early that is).
But this doesn't help you at all.
I guess you might have received quite a lot of these tips already, but maybe they can be of some use.
There are a couple of things that you better stop doing a couple hours before going to bed.
Eating, drinking coffee or alcohol and screens. So unfortunately no laptops, phones and tablets. You could also turn a blue light filter on when you do want to use your screens late at night.
As you mention exercising could really help. You don't have to run a marathon. Walking a couple of miles a day already can do the trick. Be sure to go outside and preferably in a natural environment. Don't use your phone and don't put any music on.
I read a nice quote once that said: Walk at least 1/2 hour a day in a natural environment. Unless you have a very busy or stressful day, then go for an hour!
Try to empty your mind at the end of the day. That means no more information. Have you already tried meditating? It can make you focus on your breathing which helps not to think about other things.
For me reading a book in the evening also helps.
You 'just' need to create some new healthy habits. It takes about 20 days for a new habit to stick around.
I hope these tips are useful for you 😊
Haha I used to know someone who could sleep almost instantly by command, such a super power. I do sleep quite deep too and don't wake up easily by noise/things, it's like my ears get blocked while sleeping, they turn annoying sound into muffled sound :D
Why no music? unfortunately there's limited "natural environment" to walk in here, or you can't really walk to such locations.
Yeah, might try and make it a thing where I post about attempting to create new habits here soon and document how I fail at it. xD
That's good. You do get more hours of sleep that way.
The less stimuli the better!
Nature is everywhere. It can also be just a small park. It is proven that even a little bit of green does good.
Make sure you don't put the bar too high. You can better set a low, but achievable goal to create a habit. Making a walk 10 minutes walk every day should be achievable. You'll see that in reality you will often walk longer than that.
Blogging or snapping about your goals might help too. Go for it!
Oh man exercise is your FIRST option! Any medication is just going to blindly stab at the symptoms and not the cause, and comes packed with a whole raft of side effects.
Then your primal soul is no longer screaming at you because your body has a purpose, things can change smoothly. Your physical being will be healing, resting, planning and going through the motions of the next anticipated challenge of a workout. Reduction in coffee won't hurt either and a tweak in your diet (not an overhaul necessarily) will just aid in the reset.
When your mind is back on the things you were programmed to do and your body is weary doing the things that promote health and well-being, then you can look at things that supplement and fine tune.
The hardest step is starting and adopting the "just 1 more" for the positive and physical things should do wonders for you.
I'm actually planning on moving this sofa I have behind me currently out of my PC room and getting the air bike up here instead. We rarely watch movies from the PC screen anyway but being able to watch something while biking might motivate me to do it a few times per day.
In my younger days I used to sleep a lot less but that changed after a hospital prescription for antidepressants (I think), to help with a condition I was experiencing at the time. After that I starting sleeping a lot but the funny thing is that whenever I miss the drugs sleep eludes me either partially or completely for days. I once went without sleep for 5 days after missing the drugs. But I'm learning to cope with the situation. I hope you find ways you overcome your sleeping problems. Thanks for writing.
dang ye that doesn't sound great going that long without sleep
IRC was so fun back in the day. I spent so much time on there myself. I was probably a little older though, like maybe college age. I recently got a machine for sleep apnea and I was really hoping it would give me a better quality sleep, but it really doesn't. I feel like I am up just as much as I used to be. I just don't have instances where I stop breathing now... The doctor said she could give me meds, but like you I don't really want to go down that road.
yeah it's scary with medication, especially when u look at statistics of people hooked on them in general
I feel like the only time I had a regular sleeping habit was during my primary and secondary school years. College days messed up my sleeping patterns, and they remain disrupted even to this day.
On weekdays, I get about 5-6 hours of sleep, which is quite short, but on weekends, it tends to reach 8-10 hours, including an afternoon nap. This pattern changes if I have other activities.
During college, I experienced insomnia (that time when I discovered the fun of playing DOTA) which I'm glad I've overcome. I never want to experience that again 😅.
PC and gadgets really affect one’s sleeping habit.
Yeah don't think evolution was ready for us to become such nerds
My sleep pattern changes a lot depending on weather and location mostly. Honestly, I sleep better when I am in a foreign place, like I've got nothing much to do or probably exhaust myself with a lot of walk. I also sleep less during hotter days because it's hot and it's harder to sleep.
Have you looked into the way you eat as well? I am not sure but eating random food and anything high MSG always helps me fall asleep faster than I'd like it to be 😄
I used to be able to stay awake for days but now, it's not something I do. Typically I am doing biphasic sleep where I sleep twice/day in shorter period. More often than not, I sleep when I want to rather than forcing myself to sleep based on a certain time of the day. And ss someone who exercise, I don't think it helps for me 😅 rather than making me tired, they're actually making me have more energy to do stuff.
I do sometimes eat a snack to help me fall asleep as well yeah, or if I'm hungry it's a lot harder to fall asleep
Hello, I also have trouble sleeping especially since about ten years ago, it all started in my college days the stress was too much for me so much that I was days without being able to sleep which forced me to seek help because I felt I was going to die in some way or another, I found a good mental health professional and gave me an approximate diagnosis to my situation, she prescribed me medication for sleep, I think it is something that helps me a lot to have a better quality of life, in fact I have felt much better after starting treatment, if you have the opportunity to talk to a professional then do not waste it, there is much taboo on the subject of medicines but first is our health and welfare before any opinion of people who are not qualified to talk about these extremely sensitive issues. I hope you feel better soon, I send you a hug 🤗
Thanks yeah, I might look to talk to someone and letting them know that I'm not interested in medication at this time.
Still wanna try one last time fixing it myself though!
Whatever is best for you is fine, there is always some solution to problems, I hope you can feel better and get some rest 🧡
Heck, those first pc experiences. My first online game was cracked WoW and that has stood out as something almost nostalgic over the years! Use to stay up late all the time too, playing games until 4 in the morning!
My advice, rather just sleep when sleepy, dont start taking pills.
myeah i mean that's what I'm doing now but feels like waiting til I'm proper exhausted mentally while having my sleep rhythm change daily can't be good in the long run either
Do you sleep at different times everyday? I don't usually find it hard to go to sleep, and maybe it's because I usually sleep at around the same time. It's become a habit/routine, and I get sleepy automatically near that time. I don't drink coffee, nor take naps. I stay up later when I do, and it messes with my sleep schedule.
In times when I find it hard to sleep, I watch some YT videos where I can turn my brain off, and I usually get sleepy soon after. I have also tried light exercises a few hours before sleeping. The adrenaline crash together with feeling tired can help. In that note, if you're not diabetic, try taking some sweets a few hours before sleeping. The sugar crash might help too. Some get are able to sleep faster after taking warm milk. My sister drinks wine to help her sleep haha.
I hope you can find what works for you.
yeah 😅 can't be good for my health longterm
Yeah, but I also think that can be a reason on why you have difficulty sleeping. If you can, try to sleep at a specific time everyday. Eventually your body will be the one getting sleepy around that time. If you take naps in the day, try avoiding that as well.
That is the root cause of the problem, and we have to consciously win over that, telling the brain not to think anything after a time. So a little discipline to start telling your brain that it's time to stop, before actually going to sleep. However, even if you do that sometimes the brain does not listen to your heart. And that is where exercise will come in help. Since you are not too old or fat, you must get back into exercise - a 20 minutes walk would suffice to start. Exercise has tremendous impact on our health, its difficult to do it dedicated.
I have gone through all this, and still dealing with it. My root cause was having another reason - drinking too much water...Know your body, and I think, you will sleep well. And tell your brain that, it won't survive without the body, so don't be stupid to not allow the body to take rest.
After reading this post and the comments, it seems that I'm not the only teenager with sleep issues...
(A bit relaxed to know I'm not alone)
Nothing beats that short-long nap after lectures, coming home by 5, sleeping by 6, waking up bleary-eyed around 8-9 and staying up till 3am.
That's my current cycle atm...
Haha yeah been there but I used to oversleep those naps which was not great, your 1h sounds better, maybe even better shorter if u can
I also have sleeping problem when I'm stressed. Lately I've been thinking about stopping staying awake--as has been my habit since I was a teenager. What you did when you had a PC is exactly the same as what I did when I had my first computer. I used to prefer staying awake because in the early hours of the morning, I would have lots of ideas to write into the fiction scripts that I was working on at that time. When I had to marathon all the drama episodes, I once didn't sleep until the next day, which was a bad investment for my body.
However, lately, I've been thinking about becoming a morning person by going to bed before 11 P.M., but that hasn't been possible because of the type of work I'm doing.
And about ADHD, I've been thinking the same thing lately because I'm not focused enough to make mistakes at work. Maybe this needs further checking.
Good luck to you. I think it's okay to not to be okay..
My sleep is also messed up just like yours xd. It's been a struggle actually. Some of my friends here on hive knows about it. The problem is unlike you I can't be productive after a particular time and it impacts my drawing skills. Every day I wake up tired and sleepy. Today I got really tired because of it and I just slept until noon after eating my breakfast. That really helped.
The last thing I want is to use sleeping pills. I know a friend who is on it and now needs it daily for the rest of their life if they wanna fall asleep. I think you have a bike for exercising, right? Better use it for an hour and take a nice hot bath before nap time. That should definitely help you fall asleep.
Yeah need to try at least, wish I had a bathtub though but unfortunately not. 😌
Buy one 😂. I have always wanted one. An evening hot bath everyday sounds divine hehe.
no room for it xd
Ah we also have the same issue but even if we had space we won't buy because we can't afford to have one person chilling inside the bath tub for hours haha.
You know thats actually a cute cat. My sleep pattern changed totally when i start taking care or bills and having kids, sometimes i wish to go back to the old days where i would sleep for hours without thinking about responsibilities. The moment you start having responsibility sleeping will never be the same.
Interestingly I don't have any issues with my sleep (currently in my late 30s). But there was a period a couple of years back that I would always wake up countless times in the middle of the night. Not sure why actually, my best guess was work stress. I didn't do anything significant about it and it just went away after a while.
Let's say that I also have periods where my sleep is extremely particular where I can go a long time without sleeping and it happens to me too but I imagine it is due to the accumulated fatigue that I can be sleeping more than midday but what is certain is that I try to be there most of the time active here in #Hive that's why I try to adapt to the different schedules, respecting rest times as much as possible.
At times I sleep well. At times I just can't sleep. My mother at times leaves a radio on during the night. That annoys me and I can't sleep. Other times I see a tiny TV light on one side and street light on the other side. At time that also annoys me and I fail to sleep again.
I smoke weed to stop thinking about 2,458 things at once.. js
i used to for a while a long time ago but weed has a bit of a different effect on me, my mind would usually go even more active with it and I didn't like eating or sleeping when high, but after it was fading I probably did sleep a lot better
Same. I have issues with sleeping not only because of PC but mobile made it worse. I have my mobile beside my bed where I check posts when I wake up at the middle of the night.
heh ye that's not good either, I open discord first thing in the morning as well for hive stuff
It seems that it is complicated to be an adult, that you improve...
I sleep excellently, I sleep a lot, if it were up to me I would sleep all day but I have schoolwork and I love to play, but otherwise I sleep a lot
I used to be great at sleeping. Then I had a child. My sleep cycle has yet to recover 😅
I'm not looking forward to that myself, lol
I don't blame you lol sometimes my son can go through his day like Taz from Looney Toons, nap for 5 minutes at night and be fully recharged 🤷♀️
TLDR hearted because of cute cat photo 😻
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It is very bad to try to tolerate sleep. The most important thing to maintain a healthy mind and body is to rest well.