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Insomnia, anyone?
I keep reading about people getting "covid insomnia". You could say, it's keeping me up at night.
Really though, it's been getting pretty regular for me. I take xanax once in a while but keeping it to an absolute minimum (no more than 0.25mg, once a week or so).
I tried the Sleep With Me podcast mentioned by @noblepath. It sort of helped. I kind of like the experience of it, the mindlessness, but I didn't continue past the second night.
It did give me the idea to just run a youtube video of rain sounds on my tv though, a lot better than what I used to do (leave netflix on some rewatches I know by heart). This is the one I'm currently enjoying: https://youtu.be/_x3hVRSIe2g
Sorry scoots didn’t work for you. He doesn’t always work perfectly for me either (up for good since 3, after struggling all night).
Melatonin is an effective backup sometimes, but I don’t have any with me tonight.
Sorry this is happening to us all. Not sleeping is not so much fun.
The only issues I've had were fuelled by alcohol. I started drinking too much, would go to bed, knock out for a couple hours, and wake up feeling like I'd slammed a couple of cups of coffee the rest of the night. I backed off significantly, and got back to sleeping. I made the mistake recently of buying a big bottle of whiskey, cleared it in a week and a half, and wasn't sleeping for those 10 days. I share a bedroom with my brother, so I can't leave anything on like that.
I also give up on sleeping for a bit, go do something else, and go back to bed when I'm sufficiently relaxed.
In trying to solve my problem, the other best solution I found was going outside and getting exercise, just simple stuff like a 30-minute walk can do it.
What works for me most of the time when I am not really tired is holding my mouth wide open. This forces my body to yawn continiously and making it tired, which makes falling asleep much easier.
Another thing that helps sometimes are deep controlled breaths and letting my whole body relax with every breath.
When nothing works I just read a book, until I can't hold my eyes open anymore (nothing too exciting). This way the night does not feel completely wasted.
My sleep schedule has been a roller coaster during covid. I've found the best practices for myself in keeping a regular and healthy sleep pattern are -
like @knocklessmonster mentioned above, cut out alcohol as much as possible. This has made the biggest difference, but it's not very immediate.
Wear yourself out during the day- any exercise, the earlier the better. I've noticed that if I exercise too late in the evening, it has the opposite effect.
I've tried podcasts, music, white noise etc - and honestly, the best thing for me has been to remove distractions. If I use my phone for it, I usually just end up looking at that instead, so I've found that silence and kind of meditating in bed helps a lot.
But sleep is a fickle thing, and everyone's situation is different. Pre-covid, I used to visit a 24 hour diner when I really couldn't sleep, and aside from people coming from the bars, it was mostly fellow insomniacs who made conversation there. It helped me realize that sleep is something many people struggle with, and it's not just a morning person/night owl thing. Keeping a sleep/dream journal might help you identify patterns and better understand your needs.
I used to have trouble sleeping. Racing mind, brain wouldn't turn off, all the usual stuff. My time in the military beat it out of me and ever since I've been able to fall asleep extremely easily, which is a bit of a double edged sword. Now, if I'm even slightly drowsy while driving, there's a risk I can fall asleep, which is a surprisingly common problem in the military.
Do you reduce the blue light your brain gets after dusk? Many phones have a nightshift option built in these days to put a red/orange hue on the screen after sunset. I use f.lux on windows to achieve a similar effect on my desktop.
No screen time about an hour before bed. I like to throw on a podcast that is interesting enough to listen to but boring enough that I'm not super engaged with it and just fall asleep. For me I've used the Ubuntu Podcast, IRL and linux unplugged. I'm interested in linux and open source stuff, but not THAT interested so it gives me something to focus on, but it's not engaging enough to keep me up.
An audio book that used to work really well was Thérèse Raquin narrated by Kate Winslet. She has a fairly calm and pleasant voice, and I found the story interesting enough to listen but also kind of boring. I still don't know what that book is about as I always fell asleep after no more than an hour.
I was having problems with anxiety and sleeping a few months into the pandemic and I started taking CBD oil. I've definitely been less anxious and sleeping better in general since I started taking it. Only problem is it's expensive and figuring out the dosing is tricky.
Melatonin works well for me but I heard it's not good to take long term. So I use it only when I really need to sleep, maybe a few times a month.
I've had insomnia for decades, and only recently have I started to gain ground on it. Some people say no screen time, some people say make things as quiet as possible, some people say make things as dark as possible. None of this works for me... I have a RGB LED bulb that I keep tuned to a pale blue frequency (mimicking sunlight filtering through blinds), but what has helped me finally gain ground is rain and ocean surf sounds. It has to be just that though... living creatures in there keeps me up, and music is right out.
The reason why silence doesn't work for me is because my insomnia takes the form of my brain throwing looped audio at me that drowns out my inner "go to sleep" voice. Imagine trying to sleep, but instead you're laying in bed for three hours while five seconds of the chorus of a song you only heard once five years ago plays over and over and over...