Sleepless nights can occur due to a wide range of physical, mental, and external factors. The lifestyles of some people, like parents of young children, members of the military, and shift workers, can also affect normal sleep patterns.
If you find yourself dealing with a sleepless night, there are things you can do to help make you feel better.
4 Things to Do After a Sleepless Night
Regardless of the reason for your sleep problems, having just one night of sleeplessness can greatly impact your ability to function normally the next day. Use the following strategies to counter the effects of a sleepless night so you can make it through the next day:
1. Eat Healthy Meals
When your body is sleep-deprived, you are more likely to crave higher-calorie foods. Research indicates that the demand for increased calorie intake occurs as a physiological adaptation to provide the energy your body needs to sustain additional wakefulness. This may help to explain some of the reasons that insufficient sleep is associated with obesity.
While you may enjoy an initial energy boost from sugary foods, they can cause lower energy later on. Instead, opting for healthy foods such as whole grains, vegetables, fruits, and foods high in omega-3 fatty acids can help reduce the severity of chronic fatigue.
2. Consume Caffeine Strategically
Caffeine cannot replace healthy, productive sleep, but it can increase your energy, reduce sleepiness, and improve mood. Research on caffeine consumption indicates that it can improve your ability to stay awake and attend to a simple task. However, the same research also shows that caffeine is not effective in preventing the types of procedural errors that cause problems such as car accidents and medical mistakes.
While caffeine can be part of a healthy diet, it’s possible to overdo it. Most people can safely consume up to 400 milligrams of caffeine every day—about the amount in four to five cups of coffee. However, some people may metabolize caffeine faster than others. The substance may also contribute to anxiety and other physical reactions such as an increased heart rate, that can contribute to sleep problems in others.
3. Remain Active
Staying active can impact your brain by improving your ability to learn, remember, and pay attention. Exercise increases blood flow, which can boost oxygen circulation throughout your body while also supporting the production of mitochondria (the energy factories of human cells). The effects can help your body function better. Exercising can do the following:
- Combat fatigue
- Improve cognitive function (mental processes allowing for thinking, learning, and recalling)
- Increase levels of serotonin (a natural mood booster)
Just 30 minutes of exercise can help you feel more physically and mentally energized.
4. Try Power Naps
Power naps are short periods of sleep, typically lasting between 10 and 20 minutes. If you’re using a power nap to reenergize, it’s important to monitor the length of time you remain asleep. Sleeping for just 5 minutes won’t provide the restful benefits you need. However, sleeping for 30 minutes may leave you feeling foggy and interfere with your ability to fall asleep that night.
While power naps should not replace a good night’s sleep, they can be valuable if you’re unable to get the full amount of sleep you need. Taking a midday power nap has been linked with benefits that include stress reduction, better health, and improved focus and memory.
What to Do When Stress Causes Sleepless Nights
Chronic stress or anxiety can contribute to sleepless nights and other sleep problems. Stress triggers a physical response known as the fight-or-flight response. This reaction to stress triggers your central nervous system (CNS) so you can react to a perceived threat. Unfortunately, this state of alarm can interfere with your ability to sleep long after the perceived stressor or threat has passed.
You can help relieve stress before bedtime with the following techniques:
Gentle Breathing
Gentle breathing and other relaxing forms of breathing can help reduce your stress response, which can interfere with healthy sleep. This process of slow, calm, deep breathing can help you relax and prepare for a good night’s sleep. Research indicates that slow, gentle breathing may also help relieve insomnia.
Slow, gentle breathing involves any breathing rate from four to 10 breaths per minute. This is much slower than the average respiratory rate in humans, which ranges from 10 to 20 breaths per minute.
You can practice gentle breathing with many types of breathing techniques, including the following procedure for deep breathing:
- Begin by breathing normally, with special attention to each breath.
- After several breaths, start to breathe more deeply, taking longer inhalations and longer exhalations.
- Concentrate on breathing from your diaphragm, deep within your abdomen.
- For several breaths, place your hands on your chest, then move your hands to your ribs, and then to your abdomen. Concentrate on feeling your breath moving through your body.
- Focus all of your attention on each breath as you breathe slowly and deeply.
- As you exhale, imagine your tension and stress leaving your body.
Progressive Muscle Relaxation
Progressive muscle relaxation is a technique that involves tensing and relaxing all the muscles in your body, group by group, in a specific order. The rhythmic pattern of breathing and movement can support relaxation throughout your body and help calm your mind. To perform this technique, follow these steps:
- Start in a place where you can comfortably lie on your back and stretch out.
- Starting with your foot, inhale and tense each muscle group hard but not to the point of cramping or straining. Hole the muscle tense for four to 10 seconds.
- As you exhale, suddenly and completely relax the tensed muscle group.
- Relax for 10 to 20 seconds before moving up your body to the next muscle group.
- Move through the muscle groups systematically. If you prefer, start at your face and work your way down or start at your feet and work your way up. Work along one side of your body and then start on the other side.
- Return to alertness by counting backward from five to one.
Try to Maintain a Regular Sleep Schedule
Maintaining a regular sleep schedule can help you achieve a nightly pattern of healthy, productive sleep. Daily schedules that involve shift work or having jet lag can interfere with these schedules. The following strategies can help you prioritize sleep and set and follow consistent bed/wake times:
- Maintain the same bedtime schedule on weekdays and weekends to avoid disrupting your circadian rhythm or biological clock. This is your body’s natural cycle of physical, mental, and behavioral changes that your body experiences in a 24-hour cycle.
- Use bedtime reminders to ensure that you go to bed and awaken at the same times.
- Maintain a consistent nightly bedtime routine with activities that help you wind down for sleep. This can include bathing, reading a book, or listening to calming music, based on your preferences.
- When selecting your nightly routine, avoid activities that increase your heart rate for the two hours leading up to your bedtime.
- Establish a nighttime electronic curfew when you discontinue using your smartphone, laptop, or TV use at least one to two hours before bedtime. This reduces your exposure to blue light, which can interfere with levels of melatonin (the sleep-regulating hormone).
- If you read to relax before bedtime, choose printed copies of your favorite books or magazines to avoid exposure to blue light from electronic readers.
- Avoid taking afternoon naps. While they can help refresh you during the day, daytime naps can make it more difficult for you to fall asleep at the same time every night.
Why Can’t I Sleep? Potential Causes
Many factors can make it difficult for you to sleep. Identifying the cause of your sleep problems can help you reduce or eliminate the factors that make it difficult to fall asleep and remain asleep. Some potential causes for an inability to sleep can include:
Caffeine or Nicotine Consumption Too Close to Bedtime
Caffeine is a stimulant found in coffee, colas, chocolate, and certain teas. The effects of caffeine can take up to eight hours to wear off, so having a late-afternoon cup of coffee can interfere with your ability to fall asleep. Nicotine is also a stimulant. It can make smokers likely to awaken early when as nicotine withdrawal sets in.
Alcohol Consumption Before Bedtime
While alcoholic beverages taken before sleep may help you relax, having large amounts of alcohol in your body before bedtime can interfere with your ability to sleep deeply or achieve REM (rapid eye movement) sleep (the deepest stage of sleep). Alcohol may also interfere with normal breathing and sleep disorders like sleep apnea (a chronic breathing disorder), causing you to awaken in the middle of the night after the alcohol wears off.
A Bedroom Environment That Does Not Support Sleep
It can be difficult to fall asleep if your bedroom does not support restful sleep. The optimal sleeping environment includes a temperature set between 65 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit. The room should be free of noisy electronics, bright lights, and clutter.
A Mental Health Disorder
Having an undiagnosed sleep disorder can make it difficult to get a good night’s sleep. Up to 40% of people with insomnia have a mental health disorder, especially depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders.
A Sleep Disorder
Sleep disorders affect about 50 million to 70 million Americans. These disorders can be caused by factors such as medical conditions, neurological mechanisms, or underlying mental health issues. Some of the most common sleep disorders are:
- Insomnia: This is persistent difficulty in falling or staying asleep, which can occur with frequent early morning awakenings.
- Narcolepsy: This relatively rare neurological condition causes persistent excessive daytime sleepiness.
- Parasomnias: These disorders involve unwanted sleep experiences such as sleepwalking, night terrors, sleep paralysis, and sleep-related hallucinations.
- Restless legs syndrome (RLS): This disorder is marked by uncomfortable leg sensations accompanied by an uncontrollable urge to move your legs while falling asleep.
- Sleep-related breathing disorders: These disorders, such as obstructive sleep apnea, involve abnormal or difficult breathing, often with snoring or gasping, during sleep.
A Medical Condition
Some chronic medical conditions can occur or worsen during sleep and disturb your sleep cycle:
Medications
Certain medications can interfere with your ability to sleep. They may disrupt your sleep by preventing you from falling asleep, waking you up during the night, and interfering with a full night’s sleep. Some of the most common medications that can interfere with sleep include:
When to Contact a Healthcare Provider
While occasional sleepless nights are not unusual, persistent problems with sleep may be a sign of an underlying issue such as an untreated sleep disorder or a mental health concern. It’s time to contact a healthcare provider if you notice any of the following problems more than one night per week for multiple weeks in a row:
- Difficulty performing daily activities at home or work as a result of problems with sleep
- Episodes of falling asleep while watching television, driving, or reading
- Having feelings of excessive daytime sleepiness or fatigue even after sleeping for seven hours or more the previous night
- Needing to take daytime naps to feel adequately rested
- Reports from your sleep partner that you sleepwalk, act out your dreams, or make other abnormal movements during the night
- Reports from your sleep partner that you snore or gasp loudly in the evening
- Trouble falling or staying asleep on a regular basis
- Waking up earlier than you would like
- Waking up not feeling refreshed
Summary
Living with sleepless nights can be frustrating and exhausting. While anyone can have one or two sleepless nights, constant sleep problems can occur due to a wide range of causes.
You can work to offset some types of sleep problems by setting a sleep schedule, managing stress, and eating a healthy diet. Avoiding stimulants such as caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol can also help you fall asleep and stay asleep through the night.
Contact your healthcare provider if you have ongoing sleepless nights. Finding the reason for your sleep problems is the first step in treating the problem and restoring healthy sleep.