A chance at some precious sleep... but can't!!!

[ethelfleda]

I am beside myself
I am beyond exhausted and have been for months (5mo DS)
Chance at a decent night sleep tonight as DH is doing night duty and I am in spare room. Have been awake for 3 hours and can't sleep. This is just cruel!!!

Has this happened to anyone else??

Why are you anxious?

I have no idea!
Maybe the pressure?? Lying here thinking I need to sleep as I will feel like crap tomorrow otherwise. I don't know. My body is aching with exhaustion and I just can't sleep!

Yes - it is hard to wind down from long term stress and sleep deprivation, one thing that helps is to agree with yourself that lying down with your eyes shut resting is the next best thing and then do that.

Whether you sleep or not is no longer an issue and the chances are if you just agree with yourself to be still then you will sleep without realising.

Hope that makes sense!

I also find an eyemask or scarf over my eyes helps.

You need something to distract your mind. When I struggle with anxiety, I have a story that I think about: it has 7 characters of different generations and different nationalities and I distract myself by thinking about it and assigning names and marital/familial relationships and what their ages should be for that to be feasible. I'm not explaining it well but basically it's complicated enough for it to take a little while in my head to establish and usually before I finish, I'm asleep

Or I try to put the kings and queens of England in chronological order. That distracts me enough to send me to sleep 😂

I didn't get my sleep patterns back until DD was 4. Sorry

I used to be a brilliant sleeper. I could fall asleep anywhere and sleep for 8 hours solid. Usually, I will 'walk' around my old house in my head and try to remember as much detail as poss in each room and that sends me to sleep. Nothing is working tonight. Ended up just swapping with DH and finishing off the night shift!!

Hope you've managed to drift off. I'm awake now - DS has a shitty cough and has been up coughing for the last hour and just nodded off again but I am wide wide awake. Sigh. I have late shift at work too.

Ooops cross.posted
Will you get a snooze in during the day?

Yes hopefully. Luckily it's the weekend and I haven't got to do anything tomorrow (other than be a parent!!)
I hope you get some rest too!

I feel your pain... Even when ds (5mo) sleeps "well" (That means 4 hours MAX), I don't, and I certainly cannot nap in the day. I think that besides stress, our sleep patterns have changed completely. We've forgotten how to sleep for more than 4 hours at a time! One day.....