My sleep is wrecked - anyone else?

[RhubarbTea]

It has crept up on me but over the past two months I have started going to bed at 1 or 2am and waking at 8 or 9 feeling groggy and terrible. I don't think I'm depressed as such but just trying to carve out some me time after working from home and being with my child all day. But It's starting to do my head in. Anyone else in this position since the pandemic and did you manage to successfully reset your sleep again? I'm so sick of feeling like my head is full of cotton wool, I just want to wake feeling rested and alert.

Exactly the same. Caused issues with partner too because i wouldn't come to bed early enough for any chat or stuff. I just desperately wanted some time to myself, and that was 11pm - 2am unfortunately. Child and I are off for the summer now, so we've decided on some time during the day when we watch TV (on devices probably) that is out own choice, and some time during the day when we have silent reading. I'm hoping that will give me 2 hours when I can do some of the stuff I've been doing after midnight. Also going to make a concerted effort to leave the house when her dad is on bedtime duty (we take it in turns), even if it's just me going for a drive or walk with a podcast on.

Trying to get to bed by midnight. My issue before was needing to get up for work at 6.15, so only having 4 or 5 hours sleep. I need to do better than that, obviously, but now I dont need to get up until 8, I'm going to aim for the earlier bedtime.

My natural body clock is 2am bed, 9am wake up, so it's never going to be perfect.

My sleep is all over the place. I generally need a lot of sleep and usually function best on 10 hours. There’s been weeks where I’ve been doing 4 hours a night. Just finished work for annual leave and have had a good couple of nights, although definitely not 10 hours! And it’s been very broken sleep.

I’ve been really struggling with sleep. I think it’s a mix of changed routines, anxiety, unknowns. I’m sure I read an article about how lots of people have been struggling with sleep recently.

Yes my sleep schedule has shifted and I now fall asleep at 1-1.30am and wake up around 9. Same as you I just need a bit of time to myself and the only time is when everyone else is asleep. I haven't been in my house alone once since March and it's driving me a bit mad. It also doesn't help that my dog is going senile and keeps barking at random points in the night!

I'm comforted to know it's not just me. I started a new audiobook today (American Dirt) which is amazing and gave me a little window of space to myself while I was listening. I'm going to make myself be in bed ready to sleep before midnight and try and force myself to sleep then... Maybe if I do it enough times, it will click.

Oh me! It’s awful. Two dc under 3 and both dh and I working from home means no space for being quiet. I’m averaging 3 hours a night. And am wiped out. I need sleep.

My sleep has changed but in a different way, I am waking very early suddenly. I'm just not as content as I was so when I wake I can't get back to sleep.

I don’t think I’ve been asleep before about 1am since this started and ditto the waking feeling all groggy in the morning. Dh gets up at either 5am or 7am and I almost never sleep until the 7am alarm anyway so distinctly lacking in a decent nights sleep here! My mind is all over the place and I just stay up watching endless news and regretting it until the morning!

Regretting it IN the morning that should say!

I've been a lifelong sleep-avoider and now that dh is home every day I'm going to bed even later just to get some time alone. We get on very well and he used to work very long hours so I'm happy to see more of him, but this is too much togetherness for me.

Exactly the same here - the heat doesn’t help, it’s been very humid this week here. I’m so tired.

Yes the heat doesn't help. I don't have a DH to contend with so perhaps I should be grateful for that... I'm a single parent and now that DS is 12 he's sometimes going to bed at 9 or 10. I'm an introvert and need time alone or a feel like I'm slowly unravelling at the seams and get lethargic and weepy.

What is so frustrating is that I don't even DO anything in the evenings. I'm so zonked by then I just stare at the laptop or the telly, but now I'm struggling to even concentrate on that. I miss having my peace of mind...

OP being an introvert has come up in similar discussions on this forum. I'm an introvert too, and like you I often just scroll on my laptop, or do some catch-and-release shopping. I feel deep contentment being up late and doing what I like in my own time, it's really hard to give up.
I sometimes think of it as an indulgence like junk food, something that's compelling but not good for me, but that's not the whole truth. My brain needs it.

@labyrinthloafer

My sleep has changed but in a different way, I am waking very early suddenly. I'm just not as content as I was so when I wake I can't get back to sleep.

Snap!

Same here. I can still be awake at 3am. Then up between 8 and 9. Dreading when I return to work and have to be up at 6.30 am.

Also similar in that my daughter goes to bed later at around 10pm which means I dont get to start watching tv until after then. Another reason I'm up late. Then insomnia kicks in.

Me too. And I would have previously headed to bed between 930 and 10. But here we are at 130am. Again. It's great that I dont need to be on the 704 train but its still not ideal.

But what is wrong with your natural body clock?
Apart from getting up for work there is nothing else to do at 7am in the morning.

Mine is, I was awake until 2am then slept until 9 and went to 'read in bed' from 4-6 then went to bed at 10, I've just woken up.

Up at 5 again today I am an hour short every day, which over a week means a whole night's sleep goes missing.

for all the knackered people!

Slight success with trying to go to bed early last night even though I wasn't asleep til 1, again. But I made more effort to start winding down from 11. I've realised that one of the things keeping me awake til I drop is a kind of endless, 'running in the background' anxiety that I'm sure many of you will relate to. I think by sitting up endlessly scrolling facebook or news etc I have been feeding it and it's just got worse and worse. I'm going to make a conscious choice not to do that anymore, and try instead to get patches of alone time during the day so I'm not so thirsty for it by 11pm. I'm also going to try and encourage DS to go to bed slightly earlier

I found the Calm app helpful last night, I fell asleep listening to a 10 minute meditation with rain sounds in the background. And felt like I actually slept deeply for once this week.

I wake earlier than I care to at the moment and have a quick cross site news scroll, and then more often than not buy an actual paper in the daytime and have that in the kitchen and old skool flick and read through, I find it less anxiety inducing and that the previous day's headlines have been considered for a bit late longer plus I also read other articles that are just normal, sometimes feel-good articles.

Then have a book or two on the go, at the moment really enjoying Zadie Smith her use of language is superb.