Sleep is Improved Now

[Claire]

I have recently been working hard on my trauma and my sleep is massively improved. The question is I now feel like I need loads of sleep eg. 10 hrs. I'm not complaining as I used to struggle every night and lived on very little sleep for years. This is quite a big change though. Has anyone else experienced this? I'm sleeping for England at the moment!

[2quilt]

Yes, Claire, I have weeks or months where I sleep only 2 hours a night, then my sleep cycle is 9 hours a night for months at a time, plus an afternoon nap.

For me, it seems to be caused by what stress is going on in my life at the time.

2quilt

[Lucky Laser]

Claire, firstly, great job on working so hard on your trauma. :0)

Second, I have also experienced strange sleep patterns. Mine tends to correlate with school stress though; I'll get about 3 hours of sleep per night until an exam is over, and then my body will make up for it by sleeping 12 hours two nights in a row.

[Lisa]

Claire - yes!

Not so long ago in fact... I was sleeping 12-15 hours a day. I couldn't work out if it was the meds or me... I still don't really know. If it was the meds, then that's what it was. If it was me, then it was because I was mentally exhausted (which I was anyway). It was great to be able to sleep so much... but it did get to a point where I barely had any hours in the day by the time I got up and showered and started my day, it was nearly bed time again!

What helped was allowing myself to sleep more than usual, but to gradually trying to wean back the sleeping hours even though I was tired. Eventually, it waned.

Well done for the major trauma work too :)

Hope you are well
L

[Lisa]

Oh, and Lucky Laser's comment was a good one to make... I don't know how you're sleep patterns have been recently, but there is evdence that the body builds up 'sleep debts', and that fits with Lucky Laser's post.