Coping with nightmares.

It is now 3am, and I have been awake for half an hour.  To be perfectly honest -- I don't mind being awake in the middle of the night, on the condition that I have absolutely nothing to do during the following day.  However, that condition is rarely the case -- and sometimes, even when it is, I know that being awake from now until bedtime tonight will make me really over-the-top exhausted, so I'll most likely try to get some sleep once I feel relaxed enough to do so.

Why am I up this early?

I have nightmares regularly, and sometimes they're bad enough to make me need to get up, distract myself, reorient myself to place/time/the fact that I'm okay, etc. (although what causes them to be bad enough on the "nightmare spectrum" seems not really be "sensible" since some of my scariest nightmares are not one that cause me to have to get up).

If I wake up in a panic, but can calm myself down in 2-3 minutes and turn over and go back to sleep, then that's fine.  But if I wake up, and am lying there, in the dark, feeling wide awake, anxious, and scared, then I get up.

What do I do when I wake up, though?  Isn't the computer something that people generally advise you to avoid if you're trying to get back to sleepyland?

Well, generally the computer is my go-to soothing tool.  I have Spotify, and although during the day I listen to an eclectic mixture of Scadawegian rock, classical, acoustic, and other genres, the two artists I always listen to when I need to feel soothed are either Yiruma (calming piano) or Enya (new age but very peaceful).

Another thing that works well for me, when I'm struggling with anxiety -- whether it's in the evening, in the wee hours of the morning, or during broad daylight -- is typing.  It generally helps me get rid of some of the nervous anxiety/tension in my body; I'm not really sure why this is the case (I'm guessing because I type fast and maybe some of the sensory stuff about typing too -- fingers hitting the keys, the clattering noise...? is soothing and grounding), but it's something that works and I'm glad that it does.  I usually always have something to write -- generally a journal entry or some posts on forums where I am a member -- and by the time I'm done with that, then I'm sleepy enough to go to bed.

While yes, there are things I avoid doing on the computer in the middle of the night -- at least, if I'm planning on going back to sleep -- such as gaming or getting really involved in anything that involves creative thought processes (e.g., writing fiction, poetry; listening to the music tracks I've recently recorded to see what I can learn from them, etc.) -- the computer/Internet also offers a multitude of soothing things to do.

Some of my absolute favorite sites for when I need to just do some self-care and soothing:

The Thoughts Room -- Quiet Place Project

This is a "room" where you can go, type out your innermost thoughts, worries, struggles -- no one can see it except you.  There is soothing instrumental music playing in the background, and as you type, your words disappear into shooting stars.  Sometimes this is not the best thing to do in the middle of the night as sometimes you can uncover "stuff" that you were not aware was bothering you -- but in times of high stress, it has been invaluable for me to go there and just type madly before I go to bed... I tell myself, "Okay, so there's some new material that has come up -- things I didn't realize I was worried about or something like that -- but I'll deal with that in the morning.  Right now it's just important to feel like I've gotten the uckies out and can sleep."

This is Sand

This site is a place where you can go and make "sand creations."  It's soothing for me, but I can also see why it wouldn't be the best thing for a super creative person to do in the middle of the night (or even right before bed) since it might be too much fun.  The point of the site is to be able to layer "sand" -- in various colors and thicknesses of layers -- to make original creations.  It also has a (soothing to me) noise of sand falling as you layer the virtual sand in your creation.

Calm.com -- Guided Meditations

This is one of my very most favorite sites.  I am not very good at all at meditating, but for a time, a few months back, I was doing either the 2-minute-long or 5-minute-long guided meditations on this site prior to going to bed.  That, combined with The Thoughts Room, composed my sleep hygiene routine for awhile when I was really struggling with sleeping at night.  There are longer guided meditations there too -- I believe for ten minutes and twenty minutes -- and if you don't need or want guided meditations, you can do any length of time of meditation just with the background music playing, and as an "alarm," the woman's voice that narrates the guided meditations will speak in the non-guided meditation portions a few seconds (I believe) before the meditation time is up that you have chosen.

(Note -- the latter two sites I posted are also available as apps for iPhones, I believe -- I am not a Smartphone user so I just utilize the websites, but for some of you, the apps may be handier.)

Generally, by the time I've done a combination of the above websites, possibly plus typing out a journal entry or something similar, then I'm ready for bed.  For example, right now, I think I'm ready to go try and get some more sleep.  I've been up for an hour, which is usually the longest I try to let myself stay up in the middle of the night...

Here's hoping for peaceful sleep the rest of the night!

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