When I’m exhausted but still scared to fall asleep, I end up fighting it until my body basically shuts down. The fear gets worse in the quiet, and every little sensation makes me check whether something is wrong. I’ve had nights where I kept the lights on and watched random videos just to avoid that moment of actually letting go.
The frustrating part is knowing I need sleep and still feeling like sleep isn’t safe. By morning I’m drained, but the next night the same thing starts again. Has anything helped you feel safer when falling asleep?
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Molly, keeping the lights on and watching videos makes sense in the moment, but it kept me alert enough that sleep felt even harder. One thing that helped was leaving a small lamp on and switching the video to a familiar, low-key podcast with the screen turned away.
I also started telling myself I didn’t have to force sleep, just rest with my eyes closed. That took away some of the pressure, and the sensations didn’t feel like something I had to keep checking.
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The “just rest” idea has helped me too. Telling myself sleep doesn’t have to happen right away takes some of the fight out of it, especially when I start scanning every heartbeat or muscle twitch.
A familiar podcast seems like a good middle ground. I’ve used quiet talk radio for the same reason, something predictable enough to keep my mind from making up scary explanations, but not interesting enough to keep me awake. Keeping the screen turned away probably makes a bigger difference than people think.
@Jean_Nguyen, turning the screen away sounds like a small change, but I can see how it would stop the podcast from becoming another thing to focus on. Familiar voices help me more than silence when my mind starts monitoring every little sensation.
The “just rest” wording has helped me too. I once spent most of a night trying to make myself fall asleep, and giving up on that goal made me noticeably less tense.