Night waking but not sweats.

[Kemer2018]

Hi
I keep waking through the night. 12am, 2am, 5am then i have to wake at 7.00 for work.
I don't have sweats or palpitations but am under great stress at work.
What could be the matter with me?

Stress can do that IME. I am menopausal, and wake up more often due to that.

I'm 45 if thats relevant.

Could it be peri-menopause?

My sleeping is horrific and it does seem to sync with my cycle which is all over the place. I'm not at all stressed at the bottom and even sleeping tablets don't work on my "bad" weeks

I struggle with sleeping through the night. I wake up at least once (usually around 4am) but can wake many times. I'm also absoloutely rubbish at falling asleep. It can usually take me an hour when I first go to bed despite doing all the 'winding down' activities recommended.

I have always been a bad sleeper (since childhood) but things have got particularly bad this year. Perhaps it is no coincidence that I am in a stressful job and was recently signed off work by my GP with stress. I thought being off work for a short time might 'fix' my sleep but it hasn't.

I exercise 3-5 times a week (this used to help me sleep previously but doesn't seem to be working right now). I don't drink caffeine after 11am. I rarely drink alcohol.

I am 48 and peri-menopausal. Not sure if this is a factor combined with the work stress. Probably! I try to tackle it with exercise plus at before bed I take some anti-histamines (the drowzy kind) and recently started taking 5mg melatonin. I used to find that magnesium and L-Tryptophan knocked me out at night but sadly the magic doesn't work anymore.