What keeps you up at night?

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I was def like this when I lived with my parents. Part of the reason why was so we could avoid each other more. My mom was very stressed out working in in a job that was nice at 1st but had rapidly gone downhill the longer she was there. I'm disabled & I have worked some but the best jobs I could do were minimum wage type stuff & I was very lucky to even get those jobs. I almost never heard back after submitting job apps. My mom resented me for not working cuz she can NOT relate to being disabled & there's a huge generational gap from when she was looking for work after graduating high-school & me looking for work after I graduated high-school. She felt I was lazy & blamed me for her not being able to retire from a job she disliked & hated at times towards the end. I was NOT happy with the situation but my best efforts to try & improve & make progress were NOT working. I was just running in place & did not have any supports & services willing & able to help me with things. It was better for me to be up at night so I could avoid mom more. When she did see me she complained about me being a recluse & blamed my routine sleep & wake schedule for me not having a job which had nothing to do with the reasons I was not working. Yes the job I had the longest involved me working overnight but working overnight was NOT the reason why I took that job. The other two jobs I had involved me working in the day time & that was fine too. Anyways it was better for both me & mom when I avoided her more. I also really liked having time to myself knowing I would not be interrupted by my parents for anything.

Part of why I have this schedule nowadays is cuz I'm living with my girlfriend & she has weird fluctuating sleep & wake schedules. She generally likes having time to herself for a couple hours when she 1st wakes up. She likes spending time with me before she goes to bed in the early morning. She also tends to take a nap after being up a couple hours & that can make things more complicated. It works better if I go to bed a couple hours after she goes to bed in the early morning & when I wake up I just stay up till a couple hours after she goes to bed in the early morning.

I don't have much problems falling asleep & staying asleep nowadays but there were various times in my life when I did. The main cause was emotional stuff like my depression, OCD, & anxiety that were very bad. I was also very lonely & hated being single & sleeping alone. & when I wasn't single, being in a long distance relationship was very difficult as well & i hated being away from them & sleeping alone. I had some sleep disorders that were acting up including Sleep Paralysis & Night Terrors. I'm much better off in a serious romantic relationship that is not long distance. Being on the psych meds I'm on helps my OCD & anxiety a lot & probably my depression as well. Tiredness/drowsiness is also a potential side-effect of my meds.

Insomnia for no reason I can determine. Not usually any anxiety or racing thoughts or anything, I just can’t sleep, even if I’m tired. I’m guaranteed less than half an hour total of sleep a night if I don’t take medication (10mg melatonin and presently 200mg of doxapen, every so often I have to change meds because the last one quit working, then have to try several to find something that does work). Doesn’t matter how tired I am, how little sleep I’ve gotten the night before (or the night before that, or the one before that. Probably sometime I’ll try testing how long it takes for my body to finally wear itself out enough to sleep without meds, I don’t know and am curious.), how calm my mind is, how strictly I follow all the usual “sleep hygiene” recommendations… Even with medication it occasionally happens for a few nights.

hmmm that's interesting have you ever tried alternative medicine like yoga?

I haven’t looked into alternative medicine specifically. I did do yoga for a while, though not with the direct intent of improving sleep.

Its actually pretty good for sleep they have practices on YouTube. I often use mental techniques to sleep like traveling to a star or imagining a scenario of your choice?

Guided imagery? I’ve done that for relaxation but not for sleep. Often I’ll put on an ASMR video on YouTube, that helps me at least get to a state between being fully awake and fully asleep, which is at least somewhat restorative for me (though I’m sure actual sleep would be better).

That could be where the issue is you see sleep and relaxation as totally separate.it is a crucial part of sleep actually. Even if you could just relax the entire night you would be better off than no sleep at all. Or know that we are not supposed to sleep the entire night but in cycles actually. We are supposed to wake up and go back to sleep it's normal.

I know that the ASMR helps because it helps me relax. And I can feel myself relax when I turn on the white noise machine I’ve been using at night for years, probably because my body associates it with sleep now. Relaxation can happen without sleep (which is how I’ve done the guided imagery), but sleep can’t happen (naturally) without relaxation. And yeah, relaxing is definitely better than nothing, I know from experience. I’d forgotten that about the natural human sleep pattern, that is good to point out. But my main problem is getting to sleep at all to begin with.

I’m not meaning to sound contrary or anything, I do appreciate the advice