5 Tips for How to Sleep Better with Anxiety
{please note that this post was recently updated from 4 to 5 tips!}
Can’t sleep at night? Oh, hi, me neither. It’s a problem that's plagued me on and off for years, but in recent months it’s taken up residence and, like a bad guest, decided not to vacate the premises. Trying to pretend she’s not there or isn’t negatively impacting me doesn’t help. Yelling at her — much like at a toddler — only seems to backfire. Either she laughs in my face or digs her heels in harder.
So why can’t I sleep at night? And why, if I were to hazard a guess, can’t you?
Anxiety, friends. It's probably anxiety.
According to most medical professionals, anxiety, stress, and depression are among the most common causes of anxiety today.
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Insomnia Due to Anxiety
My anxiety levels started to spike back when the pandemic struck earlier this spring and the severity of its toll started to crystalize. It’s now the beginning of December, 10 long months later, and while there’s hope on the horizon with the promise of multiple effective vaccines, things are also looking bleak. The number of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths are starting to go through the freaking roof — and so is my anxiety.
I either find myself waking up multiple times per night, moving in and out of consciousness and never really getting a solid night sleep. Or my eyes flicker wide open at 3 am and, well, that’s it. Maybe I’ll fall back asleep for 30 minutes at 5:30 am. But then by 6 am, my toddler is usually awake (though these days, 5:39 am seems to be his preferred hour).
My mind fitfully churns through different fears and worries. I ruminate on and obsess over all manner of things, both in my control and not. I find myself get stuck, falling deeper and deeper into that dark, ladder-less chasm of anxiety. Oof, it’s gloomy, indeed.
Below, I offer my simple tips to help you fall back to sleep. Although these are first-step tactics, I find them to be highly effective. But first, I wanted to dig a little deeper into the nature of my anxiety. I do so because I've come to learn that they are pretty universal, and are probably plaguing you, too.
Sources of Anxiety
The pandemic has triggered some of my more tried-and-true anxieties while also introducing new ones.
- Money Concerns: I lost a lot of freelance writing and editing income back in April. Though my husband has a decent salary, he’s not in one of those “high-yield” professions and we don’t enjoy gobs of income coming in every month. We’re lucky to have savings to fall back on. But savings, by its nature, is limited. Constantly tapping into means that, at some point, it’ll no longer exist. Then what?
- Diminished Sense of Self: With the loss of my work, I feel like I’ve also lost a bit of myself. I feel useless, dare I say worthless — like I’m not contributing anything to the world and that my identity is ... beige. I'm a non-thing. A nothing. (My rational mind knows this is not true.)
- Health Fears: I’m scared for the health of family members and friends, especially those who are older or who have underlying conditions. I haven’t been scared for myself until recently. I’d love to have another baby soon, but what are the implications of getting infected as a pregnant person? How will that affect my growing baby, especially if the infection happens in the first trimester — a crucial period for organ development?
- Motherhood (or Parenthood) Anxieties: I’ve never been what I’d call a patient person. You’d think that by now motherhood would have helped me learn how to be more patient. Well, maybe I have become a smidge more patient, but I feel like the pandemic has undone a lot of my hard work and progress. With my anxiety levels amped up, I find I’ve been losing my cool with my toddler more often. This then starts a vicious cycle: I’m tense, I yell, I feel awful and remorseful. These feelings then feed my tension and general sense of anxiety, positioning me so that I’m ripe for more yelling.
A Note on Rising Anxiety Levels at Night (and Making Mountains out of Molehills)
How often do you turn something relatively small into something massive and scary at 3 am?
This happens to me all the time. Clinical psychologist Michael Breus, PhD, has an explanation for us over on Well and Good: "[Night is] when you’re first alone with your thoughts, and the entire day’s worth of thoughts come[s] into your mind, which causes a level of anxiety.”
Recently, I happened to lose sleep over mold. Yes, you read that right: mold. Back in February of this year — so this was PRE-pandemic craziness, mind you — I lost sleep ruminating over f*cking mold.
This is a fun one. Mold in your home can indeed impact your sleep (and your health more generally) by affecting your respiratory system. But what was keeping me awake wasn’t the physiological impacts of mold, it was FEAR of the physiological impacts of mold. It was anxiety over what I thought was surely an impending onslaught of asthma, fatigue, headaches, and so on, thanks to the mold that was slowly building up on the wooden windowsills in our crappy rental.
In any case, I shouldn’t have been losing sleep over this. Mold didn’t (and still doesn’t) coat our walls. Our home is safe. We have a home. A roof over our heads. Nobody is sick. Tomorrow, we will have food for breakfast.
The point is, it's easier for our anxiety levels to become heightened at night. Even my more “serious” worries seem less grave in the morning. There is something about the quiet, dark, introspective hours of night that magnifies them, giving them five heads, sharp teeth, and a gnarly hunchback.
5 Simple Tips to Help You Get a Better Night Sleep Again
I started making some big wins in my sleep this fall but started to regress shortly before the holidays.
As I type this, I feel like a zombie. My limbs are flooded with that slightly electric, oddly pulsating feeling of insomnia-induced exhaustion. I didn’t sleep well last night, yet again. It was the type of poor sleep where a worry kept pushing me toward the surface, toward consciousnesses, before releasing me back down. Then my toddler woke me up at 4:40 am. The night before, I was up at 3:28 am (or at least that’s when I looked at my phone) and never managed to fall back asleep.
I’m returning to some of the tactics I was using earlier this fall that were massively helpful. Here are 5 tips I turn to to help me sleep when I'm struggling with anxiety and insomnia.
1. Practice SIMPLIFIED Mindfulness Meditation
"Mindfulness" and "meditation" are two buzzwords these days. But what do they mean and how can we use them—in this case, at the same time—to help us overcome anxiety-related anxiety?
My GP recently introduced me to Dr. Mark Williams, who has a simple yet incredible effective approach to mindfulness meditation.
The goal is to simply focus on your breath, letting your thoughts come and go but attaching no judgment or meaning to them. Let them exist in your mind but focus not on them and what they're doing but rather on your breathing. Bring your attention back to your breathing every time your mind wanders.
Your mind, you may discover, may come to be like a still pond.
God, I love that image!
I practice this type of simple mindfulness meditation when I'm lying in bed and my mind is racing. It's hugely calming and also, over time, empowering. Over time, you come to see how your thoughts aren't facts. You don't have to let your thoughts have power over you.
2. Start Insomnia Bullet Journaling
Journaling has had a noticeable impact on my sleep by helping me manage my anxiety. If you’re the kind of person who rolls their eyes at the idea of keeping a journal — don’t worry, I’ve got you. This is a very directed, structured type of journaling, and it takes mere minutes.
How to keep an insomnia bullet journal
Get a journal dedicated specifically to your insomnia.
Every night before bed, write down the following things:
- A brief to-do list for tomorrow. You don’t need to go into crazy detail (unless you want to), but list the main things you want to achieve and any goals or priorities you have. You could also note important appointments or other items you’re worried about forgetting (like paying your credit card, emailing Janice back, etc.)
- Your fears or concerns. What are you worrying about? Is it the interview you have in three days? Your uncle’s health? If you’re going to get a refund on your deposit? If your friend Elizabeth is mad at you? Mold? Write everything down, no matter how frivolous it might seem to you. If it’s keeping you up at night or has the potential to do so, its impact on you is not frivolous.
- Things you can let go of now. Think about it. Is there anything on the above list that you’re ready to let go of at this moment, for good? Or is there anything you can shift your perspective on so that it’s less of a draining force in your life? Don’t worry if you’re not ready to do this. The point is, if there is something that you can let go now, do it!
The benefits of insomnia bullet journalling
Writing down my to-dos for the next day makes me less likely to wake up in the middle of the night thinking, Oh shit, is that doctor’s appointment tomorrow? By writing everything down, I don’t wake up fearing that I’ve forgotten to do something, or that I’m about to forget to do something.
Recording my worries before bed helps me ruminate on them less at night. By physically putting them on paper, I’ve taken them into account, acknowledged their existence, and shifted some of their burden on my psyche for the time being. By writing them down, I know that I can revisit them in the morning, when I can work through them IN MORE PRODUCTIVE WAYS. 2 am, on the other hand, is my time to rest.
Simple lined journals are my favorite journals for this exercise are. I am obsessed with the journals from Papier. They are remarkably high quality, feature gorgeous cover designs, and can even be personalized. Their softcover journals are typically $20.99 while the hardcover journals usually run $26.99.
3. Practice Visualization
I'm not sure if this is the best term for this tactic, but I'm going to go with it. Visualization is what I do when I wake up in the middle of the night. As soon as I recognize that I’m slipping into an obsessive thought pattern, I stop myself by substituting language-based thoughts with amorphous, ideally abstract imagery.
I turn to images because I know my mind needs something to engage. Telling myself to “stop thinking” is akin to somebody telling me to “calm down" when I'm really worked out. It’s NOT going to happen; in fact, it's just going to make me feel even more agitated. So while I can’t just turn off my brain like a meditation zen master, I CAN give it something to help it tap into a sort of modified mindlessness that’s at the heart of mindfulness.
The best images for visualization
My go-to image is a softly pulsating, somewhat gold light against a dark sky. It expands and contracts with my breath, helping me become aware of my body, find a sense of calm, and create less and less room for obsessive thoughts. I focus on its rhythm and its warmth as I let it lull me to sleep.
Sometimes I’ll think of a wave rolling toward a beach, softly crashing, and then rolling out again. I find, however, that I don’t love naturalistic or realistic imagery for this exercise. It’s too distracting for me, but it may work for you. So instead of envisioning an actual wave, I’ll reduce it down to a softly glowing line — again against a dark background — and watch it come coursing toward me. Then, when it reaches the “shore,” it flips over on itself and spins a few times before being pulled back out to “sea.” For me, the rhythm is the reason this exercise is so effective.
If you're interested in meditation, check out my review of Headspace vs. Calm.
4. Limit Alcohol
I know. "Don't even start with me," I can hear you saying. But also—hear me out.
Sure, alcohol can offer you a pleasant, calming feeling that can help you relax, tune out, and fall asleep. But that doesn’t mean it helps you stay feeling calm or that it positively impacts the quality of your sleep (or that it helps you stay asleep, for that matter). On no. Too much booze can interfere with REM, the cycle during which people typically dream and which is thought to be restorative.
Alcohol's connection to anxiety
Anxiety and alcohol are often connected. First, people who have anxiety are more prone to use alcohol, since alcohol is able to calm the body and mind by mimicking a neurotransmitter in the brain known as Gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA).
This ultimately backfires, however, because when you stop drinking, you become vulnerable to withdrawal symptoms. Your anxiety returns, perhaps magnified, and you start to yearn for your "crutch" in order to get by.
I don’t drink every night, but when I do (sorry, not sorry), I would typically drink two glasses. But in recent months, I’ve started limiting myself to one glass. In fact, I've even stopped "everyday" drinking and switched over to what's known as Mindful Drinking. Let me tell you, this has been near life-changing. With this one tweak, my sleep improved markedly.
It wasn’t easy. Once you have that first glass, you’re feeling delightful and don’t want that buzz ever to wear off. “I deserve this,” you think. “I’m so stressed!”
What does it mean to "deserve" alcohol?
There are two implications at work in this statement: either (1) you deserve the wine in the sense that you are “worthy of” it just by being you (it’s true — you are amazing!), or (2) you deserve the wine in the sense that you merit it as an award for something you’ve gone through/accomplished. But in both cases, wine (or your choice of boozy bev) can be substituted with something else: a bath, a face mask, a book, meditation, Netflix, a cup of tea, hot chocolate. Also, you don’t need to earn these things. You should give them to yourself, freely, when they help you feel good AND offer you balance in your life.
But, if we’re still working within this mindset of “deserving something,” you could even go a step farther and say, I deserve NOT to drink. I deserve not to drink because I know it will make me feel better than if I were to drink. Mindblowing!
If that works for you, amazing. There is real truth in that for a lot of people. I myself believe it as well. But I also know that if I push myself there (at least right now), it’ll backfire. You know what they say about abstinence...
So I don't abstain from my admittedly beloved vino (I had a sublime Chilean Carmenere the other night). Instead, I no longer drink most nights — it's no longer a habit. When I do drink, I try to cap myself to one glass.
This leads me to the second half of the “one and done” approach:
5. Limit Coffee (more specifically, caffeine)
"Duh," you say. "But also, no." OK, again, hear me out.
I had been drinking two cups of pour-over (which is pretty potent stuff!) in the morning, the first around 6/6:30 a.m. and the second around 9 a.m. I’d then make my third cup of coffee around 2 p.m. What offers more succor to a tired mama at 6 am than the smell of freshly ground beans? Nothing, I say... except maybe more sleep.
Coffee and caffeine's connection to alcohol
As many of us know, coffee is a mega stimulant thanks to its high levels of caffeine. While caffeine alone doesn't cause anxiety, it can amplify it. That jittery feeling you get after a few too many espressos is actually a sign that your fight or flight response has been activated. Subjecting your nervous system to these physiologically taxing "survival mode" episodes over and over again can deepen your anxiety and even lead to anxiety attacks.
I could really start to feel it after my second cup of coffee. I experienced those tell-tale jitters, the curious telescoping of my attention, and the head rush as the caffeine coursed through my bloodstream. But I also thought that this second cup was necessary to counteract my fatigue, poor concentration, and lack-of-sleep-induced headaches.
It really wasn't.
What I needed, I learned, was the ritual of another cup of something warm and tasty as I set up for work. So, instead, I’ve been opting for decaf black tea (my favorite is from this organic brand) or mint tea for a nice little zing.
Introducing matcha, my new BFF
The 2 p.m. coffee was harder to give up than my “top up” cup at 9 a.m. But I persevered and swapped it for matcha. Though matcha contains caffeine, it has less than coffee (one cup of matcha has about 70 mg, whereas one cup of pour-over can have 145 mg — *cringe* but also, ILY). It also contains the amino acid L- Theanine. Rather incredible, controlled scientific studies have shown that L-Theanine can actually help reduce stress in humans. It can also reduce the jitters triggered by caffeine by releasing it more slowly into your bloodstream. Win!
My favorite matcha brands are Kyoto Dew and Matcha Moon. Both are "ceremonial grade" and come from Uji, Japan. They both are pretty aromatic and have that classic green tea-flavor, though Matcha Moon is slightly more bitter. The biggest reason I love these two is that they don't clump. I've wasted a lot of money on matchas that don't fully dissolve in your hot water, leaving behind unpalatable clumps. Blegh.
A note on the above two recommendations
It's true, reducing your intake of or straight up eliminating alcohol and coffee are obvious if you want to beat anxiety-induced insomnia. They are the “low-hanging fruit” of insomnia relief. But sooo many people struggle to commit to these strategies, turning instead to others that might be more complicated, less effective, and more expensive. Nobody is saying that these are easy commitments, but they are obvious, simple in theory, and ultimately so, so powerful.
Reassessing your alcohol and coffee intake is a great first step toward interrupting the chicken-and-egg cycle in which anxiety begets insomnia, which begets more anxiety, which begets more insomnia, and so on.
In Sum: Achieving a Better Night Sleep with Anxiety
2020 has been a bitch. It's unleashed huge amounts of anxiety and, as a result, has had a markedly negative impact on our ability to sleep.
There are tons of wonderful sleep aids on the market. But mindfulness meditation, insomnia bullet journaling, visualization, and my "one and done" approach to coffee and alcohol are my favorite simple, no-frills, and free (or inexpensive) tactics for combatting anxiety-induced insomnia. Godspeed.
