Anyone else wake at 3am and start overthinking?

I very often wake up around 3 ,I lay there thinking all sorts of things and getting un comfortable so i get up and have a cup of tea and about half hour i go back to bed and i am soon back to sleep until 6 when i get up

I’ve been there done that. I have decaf drinks but not past 3pm. I have a camomile tea before bed plus ashwaghanda and magnesium before bed too.

I have the Calm app too which is great for stories adapted for sleep with narrators with fantastic voices. I try not to use my phone otherwise.

Exercise during the day also helps with sleep.

I hope that some of these suggestions help.

Have you tried getting up the following morning, having your breakfast or first cup of tea and coffee, then looking at that "to do list"? Or writing it down, if it only exists in your head.

Then you cross out anything on it that is not essential, and go on to either do the thing that worries you most at 3 a.m. or the thing you least want to do.

If you adopt this strategy, you will probably then be able to deal with a few more things on that list, and sleep better the next night.

Yes, this happens to me, I actually wake to go to the loo almost every night at this time.
I switch on Radio 4 Extra and often listen for an hour or so, there have been a few Poirots and Wimseys recently, and I think that the radio stops me thinking about anything else.
My husband gets up at 5am so I do have a couple of peaceful snoozing hour after that.
I think that the trick is not to worry about waking up, fretting about it makes it worse.

Slow deep breathing and a repeat mantra

Please dont go there, its driving me mad, cold and in the dark, brain won't switch off, good and bad stuff, someone suggested magnesium before bed, any suggestions gladly welcomed....HAPPY CHRISTMAS

Frequently. I usually try Zen music or Calm on my Alexa and it mostly works. Other times I just cannot switch off the worrying and I also go back to the past and think that I could have done things better like getting rid of my ex husband so much sooner. Hey ho.

Yep. No tips sorry

Have tried magnesium for several weeks but it hasn't helped. If I'm desperate for an unbroken night, I take a Phenergan tablet, which works, but gives me a bit of a thick head next morning.

I often cannot fall asleep, so I do deep breathing exercises.

Breath in for count of four, hold for count of four and long breath out for count of four.

Really concentrate on the breath distracts the mind.
I have to do this quite a few times and usually it relaxes me enough to eventually drop of to sleep.

I find switching on lights of any description wakes me up so tend to lie in darkness doing my breathing.

Apparently many years ago, people commonly had two sleeps of equal length and got up in between to do things so it’s not as crazy perhaps as it sounds!

I make up stories, maybe I should write them down.
After a few sleepless nights I take 1/2 of a Boots 2 a night sleeping pill.

Stillness, I have read just that! Apparently Pepys wrote about it in his diaries and there is other evidence. It was supposed to be the industrial revolution that pushed us into shorter sleep cycles of about 8 hours without the break in the middle. 🤔

Check your blood sugar levels
whenever I wake it’s because I have low blood sugar.
It’s worth checking out.
I now have a little snack before bed and all is good.
I am not diabetic but get low blood sugar at night until I started bedtime snack usually 2 small crackers and a slice of ham or a little cheese I think it needs to be a little carb and protein

MOnica I do the same. Would be lost without my kindle. Gets me to drop off every time.

I listen to favourite TV or radio programmes, preferably with a cast of softly spoken people. I listen to QI episodes and usually miss the last 20 minutes as I have fallen asleep!

I've been listening to bedtime stories on my phone every night. I don't wear headphones but I sleep alone so it doesn't disturb anyone. I use Insight Timer which is a paid app. Audible is OK but the great thing about the Insight Timer stories is that they stop at the end of an individual story, rather than carrying on through a whole book which you'd not know where you'd got up to when you fell asleep. I enjoy the Sherlock Holmes stories read by Amadeus Astefanesei. He has a very soothing voice. I don't think I'd like the female voices. Occasionally, if I'm very stressed or worried, I get to the end of a story (none of them is longer than an hour). Usually, I drop off about five minutes in! I listen to the same ones over and over. If I wake in the early hours, I just set Amadeus going again.

Judging from the lights on in the houses round me there are lots of people awake at 3 am. Sometimes I do my ironing.

I take magnesium and glycinate an hour before bed; drink hot milk, honey, turmeric and ginger before bed. It helps me to sleep.

Yip, sounds familiar!

If I wake in the night I find myself puzzling over the oddest things. The other night I lay awake for ages trying to remember who it was who got so drunk he ended up in hospital with alcohol poisoning at a teenage party when I was 16, I'm almost 78 now. Weird.

I read somewhere recently that we used to have two sleeps. Bed when the sun set, then up again about 11pm or later, having a snack, doing some jobs, seeing to the animals for example. Then sleep til sunup. Are we actually fighting against our ancient body clock?

I wake up sometimes at 3-4 am then go downstairs read my book and have de caf tea by the Aga for a while then go back to bed and sleep . When I did night duties for 12.5 yrs that was exactly the time I most wanted to sleep but couldn’t of course .

As someone with very long sleeping problems, always hated taking any sort of tablets (even half tablet at night during difficult times), I read about a new well tested medication called Quiviviq that might help, but without the ghastly 'next day effects of the old-fashioned sleeping pill'. Our surgery didn't know about it (and I know that one or two doctors are insomniacs), so learning more, am taking half pill the evening before a difficult day ahead. I am able to sleep for at least seven hours without stirring. My work requires full attention, so at least I am not thrashing about at 2/3am the night before. Check with your surgery.

Down side I wake up at 3am, wash, dress, coffee then get to work for 4am. Plus side, it's only for three mornings or 4 every other week. One day I will give it up