What should you do if you are constantly waking up at night?

Probably, everyone has had restless nights in their lives: you have just managed to fall asleep, and then suddenly you wake up. It’s quiet outside, everyone is sleeping in the house – including an overactive pet, but you fall asleep with difficulty. And then you suddenly jump up again. What’s the matter? What are these sudden awakenings?

A sleep physician

As strange as it may sound, the average person can wake up five times a night. And that’s normal.

Why do people sometimes wake up frequently at night?

Sleep is made up of cycles. In an adult, each cycle lasts about 90 minutes.

Daria: Normally, after each cycle, a person wakes up to look around, make sure they are safe and roll over to the other side. But the older we get, the less deep sleep we have, hence more surface sleep. Which means those very wakings in the middle of the night are more clearly felt and remembered.

If you don’t know anything about sleep and wake cycles, you are likely to feel anxious. You may feel like there is something wrong with you. But don’t jump to conclusions. Remember, it’s normal to wake up during the night. It’s just that for most, these awakenings are so brief that people don’t remember them.

When do night wakings become a problem?

It’s worth considering if:

• there are more than five awakenings a night;
• you can’t go back to sleep for half an hour or longer.

The reasons may lie on the surface: for example, you sleep in a bedroom that’s too hot or you spent all day the night before in bed, you’re sick or have a disrupted routine, you work remotely and spend a lot of time in bed, or you’re simply not tired enough.

But waking up in the middle of the night can also indicate various sleep disorders. For example, the syndrome of “restless legs”, when you have to constantly twitch your legs to get rid of unpleasant sensations. Or about obstructive sleep apnea syndrome, when you snore and periodically do not breathe – the body needs to wake up to breathe.

Daria: In any case, if you notice such abnormal awakenings – they are frequent, it is difficult for you to fall asleep again – I would recommend to consult a specialist.

What should I do to sleep well through the night?

Air out the room

Pay attention to the air temperature at which you sleep. The most suitable for sleep is considered to be 19-20 degrees. Therefore, before going to bed, you can open the window briefly to ventilate and cool the room.

Establish a regimen and don’t just lie in bed for nothing

Pay attention to your regimen. Do you always get up at the same time? Do you lie down? Do you get enough physical activity during the day? Do you spend a lot of time in bed?

The average sleep rate for an adult is 7-9 hours (you can find out how much you should sleep at different ages here). But this is with sufficient physical activity. To sleep well at night, find something interesting to do during the day. Spend time on something interesting and useful, and in bed spend exactly as much as you need to sleep – no more.

Give up gadgets before bedtime

With the modern rhythm of life, many people work until the last minute. Frequent checks of mail, messengers, etc. lead to an increase in stress levels, and therefore the hormone cortisol. We take its excess with us even when we sleep. And as soon as we recover a little physically, cortisol immediately makes itself known – hence the sudden awakenings.