Usually go asleep between 9 and 10. Once a month or so I wake up between 2 and 3. I flip and flop for a bit trying to get back to sleep.
No luck as I am wide awake. Usually have to sit up and watch TV and browse around here for an hour or 2 before I can fall back asleep.

Always annoying!

I'm right there with you. Recently unemployed. Had the same
schedule for 35 years. Now it's all out of whack.
Insomnia, I've slept about four hours in the last 3 days.
Just short naps. Very frustrating.

I know a number of people who nap during the day.

They all have the same problem as the OP.

Get back on a schedule. Napping during the day makes the sleep problem worse.

Welcome to old age.

Buy a text on matrix algebra.

I turn on a youtube video on rain sounds. There's plenty of them that goes on for 10 hours on a dark screen.

Before I was doing that, here are the things I do and it does work:

1) Take a deep breath, hold it, focus on the top of your head, and tense it up, breathe out and relax. Take another deep breath, hold it, focus on your face, tense the muscles that you can, breath out and relax. Repeat until you get to your toes.

2) I remember back to a time when I was sleepy and remember the environment (usually in a car taking a nap during lunch at work). I put myself back in that time and the feelings overcome me. Sometimes I have to remember a time when I was remembering a time I was falling asleep. And that's usually in a car remembering the times I was sleeping in the overhead on a ship catching a few Zs before my engineroom watch starts.

3) Now, I tell people I used to have trouble falling asleep until I started making sure that just before I get to bed, I have a clean conscience. When my niece heard this, she said, "you don't have any conscience!"

Let Lina talk to you. https://youtu.be/bFqEWrw6jyg

I used to do that shortly after my divorce and move. Sleep from 10ish to 2ish, then wide awake for an hour or so tossing and turning, then back to sleep until 6:30ish. Sleep quality was crap.

Here's what worked for me:

Exercise daily
No caffeine after 2:00 pm or so
Hot shower about an hour before bedtime
No electronic screentime within the hour before bedtime

Melatonin supplements also helped when first adjusting to this, but I haven't needed those in a while now.

Watching TV and browsing the internet in the middle of the night is only exacerbating your sleep issue. The light from electronic screens stimulates your body into being more awake.

Try a big shot of Zquil. I use it and it helps alot!

I am going through the same type of turmoil

Occasionally I fall asleep at 10 or so then wake up at 0200 to 0300 then I toss and turn.

Anxiety, stress, who knows...

Ever since I worked the over night shift at the Medical Examiner for those couple of years my sleep has sucked..

Especially when I try to work day shift..

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Get back on a schedule. Napping during the day makes the sleep problem worse.

Schedule is nearly identical 7 days a week. Go to bed about the same time every night.
Wake up at 0600 days I work and 0615 on the days I don’t.
Never take naps.

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:
I used to do that shortly after my divorce and move. Sleep from 10ish to 2ish, then wide awake for an hour or so tossing and turning, then back to sleep until 6:30ish. Sleep quality was crap.

Here's what worked for me:

Exercise daily
No caffeine after 2:00 pm or so
Hot shower about an hour before bedtime
No electronic screentime within the hour before bedtime

Melatonin supplements also helped when first adjusting to this, but I haven't needed those in a while now.

Watching TV and browsing the internet in the middle of the night is only exacerbating your sleep issue. The light from electronic screens stimulates your body into being more awake.

Been doing more reading before bed and that is over all helpful in giving a goodnight sleep. Usually if/when I wake up I am back asleep quickly.

Just seems that one a month or once every couple of months I wake up and am just wide awake. If I don’t turn the TV on or browse the web I will almost certainly not fall back asleep.
If I do turn the TV on I just kind of daze for an hour or so and fall back asleep.

Listening to Robert Miles Dreamland album almost always gets me back to sleep but my wife can’t stand it so I don’t turn it on.
Unless one of the kiddos is staying at the grandparents then I go in their room.

Have you thought about seeing a sleep specialist to be checked for sleep apnea?

I slept like shit for years and would be so tired some days driving home from work I'd feel like I was going to fall asleep and drive off the road.

Wife pressed me to to get this checked and it turned out I had a doozy of a case of sleep apnea.

The worst thing you can do is WORRY about it.

Learn to love it. It is a peaceful time you have to yourself to do things YOU like.

Insomnia is a GOOD thing!!

Since keeping a schedule is not a problem. Suggest sleep specialist as suggested above. Pulmonologists are the experts here.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Napping during the day makes the sleep problem worse.

Depends upon when you nap and how.

Napping in late morning and early afternoon is allegedly not necessarily damaging to obtaining a good night's sleep. Napping in later afternoon and early evening is allegedly much worse.

The length of naps matters, too. Short "power naps" of no more than fifteen-twenty minutes are believed to be non-harmful. Longer naps, such as an hour or more, more harmful.

Personally, I've found I can take power naps as late as just after dinner w/o negatively impacting my night's sleep. Conversely: I've sometimes had problems after inadvertently taking much longer naps much earlier in the day. (Timer goes off. I kill it. Fail to get up right away and drift back off to sleep.)

I disovered some time ago that what keeps me awake after waking in the middle of the night is my mind running. I found it can be as little as an ear worm--a song running and running and running in my head. I've learned that killing that mental noise allows me to drift right back into sleep again.

How to do that is another question. I learned mind relaxation techniques, years ago, upon taking self-hypnosis training.

quote:

Depends upon when you nap and how.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
The literature does not support your claim.

It sounds to me as if you're going to bed too early. If you didn't have to work and had no family obligtions, would you be trying to sleep at 9 or 10 at night?

Try to go to bed at the same time each night if possible.
The biggest one that is tough for most is no phone or TV in bed.
No caffeine after dinner.
Get 30 minutes of cardio.
Melatonin can help “turn off” your brain if you’re the type where you keep thinking too much.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:

quote:

Depends upon when you nap and how.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
The literature does not support your claim.

Cite(s), please?

These would appear to support my claims:
Does Napping During the Day Affect Your Sleep at Night? (Sleep Foundation)
Napping: Do's and don'ts for healthy adults (Mayo Clinic)
Effects of a nap on nighttime sleep and waking function in older subjects (NIH)
The benefits of napping (Harvard Medical School)