Overcoming Anxiety Attack Symptoms

Sleep can become a major worry for people with Anxiety. Some people find it hard to get enough sleep because their mind is racing and their body on full alert. Others are so exhausted from the constant tension of Anxiety that they sleep for much longer than they normally would.

These are sleep problems which can be dealt with as part of your Anxiety treatment program. There are also sleep disorders, such as sleep apnea, which need medical help. If you suspect that you have a sleep disorder, then you should talk to your doctor. If you’re not sure you could try the self-help methods that we suggest first and see if they help.

Worrying About Sleep

Anxiety Treatment - More Sleep

As with most aspects of Anxiety, sleep problems can form a vicious circle. Tension and worry can affect the amount or quality of sleep you get, but lack of sleep in turn reduces your energy and ability to cope the following day. This builds up more Anxiety, making for another bad night, and so on. Also, with certain types of Anxiety, worry about not sleeping itself becomes part of the problem.

Similarly, dozing on the couch all day and sleeping through the night can actually leave you feeling lethargic and without any energy, so that you want to do the same thing the next day. Worrying that you aren’t strong enough to stay awake all day only adds to the problem.

We tend to think in terms of eight hours a night, but this is only a rough guide, and people vary in their sleep needs. We are programmed to sleep when it is dark and to be active when it is daylight, so we may sleep more in winter. Also some activities are more tiring than others, so that we sleep more some nights than others.

Task – Deal With Your Sleep

Start by keeping a sleep diary for a couple of weeks – use your notebook to record when you sleep, and how long for. Make a note if you take a long time to get to sleep, if you wake up frequently during the night, if you wake up in the early hours and can’t get back to sleep.

Make a note of the times you sleep during the day, even if it’s only a cat nap.

Once you have a record of your sleep over a period of time you can examine it to see if there is a pattern. If you are worried about lack of sleep, check to see that this really is the case – you may be surprised at how much sleep you’re getting.

Compare Your Diaries

Since you are already keeping an Anxiety diary you can compare the two and see if there is a connection. Do you sleep less after a bad day for Anxiety, or does the exhaustion mean that you sleep more?

When you are lying awake, are you troubled by anxious thoughts and/or physical symptoms of Anxiety? Do you have dreams or nightmares? Do you have some good nights and some bad, and are they connected to anything which has happened in the day? Or to the weather, temperature in the bedroom, time you go to bed, what you have eaten or drunk before bedtime?

If you are troubled by anxious thoughts, either while you are settling down to sleep, or when you wake during the night, you will need to devise a strategy for dealing with them.

In a future article I will explain how Anxiety affects your thinking, and cover some techniques for reducing anxious thoughts. In the meantime, put the rest of the sleep program in place so that you start to form good habits. The next step is to see what changes you can make to improve matters. It’s largely a question of training yourself and, of course, being patient while you wait for the changes to take effect. Use the checklist below to make sure you’ve done as much as possible.

• Make sure your bedroom is as comfortable and peaceful as possible.
• Don’t use the room for anything else – remove any TVs, computers and other distractions.
• Make sure the room is at the right temperature for you, and is well ventilated – open the window during the day to let fresh air in.
• Make sure the bed is comfortable, with clean warm bedding and a supportive mattress. (If you can’t afford a new mattress, try putting a board under the old one.)
• Make sure the room is dark enough for you – if the curtains or blinds let in light, then add linings or buy blackout blinds. If you prefer a little light that’s fine.
• Decide how long you need to sleep for, and add a little time for your preferred before sleep activity (reading, sex, relaxation etc). Tell yourself that is all the time you will spend in bed.
• Have a wind-down period of at least half an hour before you get ready for bed. Complete any chores or tasks, let phone calls go to voicemail and spend the time with some relaxing activity.
• Do not have a heavy meal within three hours of going to bed (make your supper something light). Avoid drinks containing caffeine and alcohol.
• If you can’t get to sleep within 30 minutes of going to bed or of waking up in the night, don’t stay in bed – get up and go into another room and do something calming and relaxing until you feel sleepy.
• If you are sleeping a lot, consider reducing the amount of sleep you have during the day. Do this slowly and allow yourself to get used to each reduction. Also try going to bed later and getting up earlier.