Experiencing and having anxiety is not ok as it leads to one being irritable and tired in most cases. Considering how important sleep is for both your mind and body, getting to the root of why you aren’t getting any (or enough) is key. Here we explore what triggers sleep anxiety, how it can affect your health, and what you can do to combat it. Our Sleep Needs Change a Lot as We Age—Here’s How to Get Proper Sleep in Your 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s
Common Sources of Sleep Anxiety
Sleep anxiety can often find its way into your life, thanks to genetics. “If many people in your family have anxiety and sleep problems, that can place you at a higher risk of developing it,” Runko says.
But really anyone can feel an overwhelming pressure to make sure they get good sleep—sometimes to a fault. For example, buying all the latest products on the market promising to cure insomnia; or being very rigid with your sleep habits. The irony is that these efforts or beliefs can sometimes sabotage our shut-eye. You’re so worried about sleeping well, that you worry yourself into not sleeping well. “That pressure, stress, hypervigilance, and effort can ramp up anxiety,” explains Runko.
Another reason might be, “if something particularly bad happened after a poor night of sleep—that can ramp up sleep anxiety even more,” she adds. And unfortunately, once your bed has been associated with things like worry and a quickened heart rate, which are essentially forms of conditioned arousal, Runko says “the bed itself can start to be a cue to automatically elicit those physical symptoms and worrisome thoughts to some degree.” In other words, you might start to associate your bed and bedtime with feelings of anxiety.
Typically, the thoughts that come into your head when you lie down at night are the ones that are “unfinished business” for your mind, explains Aeva Gaymon Doomes, MD, a licensed psychiatrist in Washington, D.C. “If you cannot stop yourself from thinking about them in detail before bed, they’re likely going to keep you up at night.”
While Dr. Doomes says that some pillow thoughts can be about an upcoming exciting or milestone event (think a big vacation or a reunion with a loved one), “the thoughts that are not so easy to sort out are the ones that generally lead to increased feelings of restlessness and anxiety, and the result can be insomnia.”
The Repercussions of Not Resting
The obvious: You’re not getting enough sleep thanks to sleep anxiety. But that comes with more than just a morning of grogginess. “Sleep anxiety or insomnia can have devastating effects on your wellness,” says Dr. Doomes, which leads to health concerns such as obesity, heart disease, increased irritability, risk of depression, trouble focusing, decreased motivation, lower energy, and suppressed immune function. “In the end, a lack of sleep can shorten your overall life expectancy.”
Being anxious and unable to sleep can also lead to increased anxiety, and thus cause even less sleep—a cycle that’s not only frustrating, but overwhelming. It exacerbates an already decreased ability to deal with stress in general, as well as causes feelings of “losing control” over even the simplest parts of your life, like bedtime, Dr. Doomes adds.
Strategies for Less Anxiety—and More Sleep
Pinpoint what’s triggering your sleep anxiety.
To counter these worrisome thoughts and feelings that inhibit your ability to snooze, Dr. Doomes says it’s useful to understand the source of ongoing or recent anxiety and to employ tools that may reduce this anxiety. “Processing and thinking [objectively] about the thoughts that are keeping you up during the night, [especially] with the assistance of a therapist or counsellor, may be helpful as well,” Dr. Doomes says.
Replace worry with positivity and gratitude.
For example, training your mind to focus on positive thoughts and expressions of gratitude, which, she says, research has shown reduces sleeplessness. In fact, one study in the Journal of Psychosomatic Research—that included about 400 men and women, 40 percent of whom experienced sleep disorders—found that those who practiced gratitude had fewer negative thoughts at bedtime, and more positive ones, which was associated with not only falling asleep faster, but better sleep quality and duration.
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