Hi everyone,

Im having really big problems with my sleep patterns.

Basically what is happening is that I don't fall asleep easily. Generally it takes me between 45minutes to 2 hours to actually fall asleep. Once I'm asleep I am fine, I will sleep soundly and without problem. This has been the way for as long as I can remember. As a result I find that I tend to sleep quite late on the days that I don't have any commitments. I can sleep anywhere up to 16 hours at a time and so far nothing that i have tried has been successful in regulating my sleep patterns. Here's a bit of a run down of what i have tried:

- Regular bed time (10pm) and wake time (6am)
- not eating from 6.30pm until breakfast approx 7.30am (someone told me this would work)
- staying awake for 24 hours to re-establish sleep times
- writing down things on my mind in a notebook to clear my head
- removing all technologies from my nightly routine

Basically I am at my wits end here and I am wondering if anyone else has had this problem and has found a solution.

Thanks everyone.

I found the methods at this site worked very well for me.

Have you seen a doctor about the hypersomnia? 16 hours sleep every night is far from normal.

My sister was the same way and she got diagnosed with hypersomnia.

Thanks for the replies. That link looks really useful too so thank you again. I have spoken with my doctor and unfortunately she wants to eliminate weight as the cause before preceeding with anything else.

I should probably also add that that 16 hours a night is very rare, maybe once every two months or so. lol. I just reread my post and it sounds like I have no commitments in life, I do work and study so generally I find that I am lucky to get 6 hours a night because of the time it takes me to fall asleep.

When do you work out during the day? Some people have trouble falling asleep if they've just did a tough work out.
I understand your frustration as a fellow insomniac.

I'm the same way. But my body is on a routine that once I fall asleep it takes like 3 alarm clocks to wake me up... I have to be up by 7 for work everyday and it takes 3 alarms and a small army to move me... but on my one day off a week I am up by 7... lol
Weird body of mine!
But at night when I try to sleep by 9, I am usually laying there till at least 1130...
Good luck! I'm hoping weight loss helps me, not sure how, but I'm praying!

Hey, thanks for the replies.

IsobellaOlivia: I actually do all of my hight intensity work outs very early morning, starting between 5.30 and 6am. At night I tend to do low intensity stretching, pilates or yoga.

Mhill0823: I hope it gets better too. Congrats on the 20lbs lost! that is so fantastic

I have trouble getting to sleep. Sometimes it will be 6am before I finally get to sleep. I have found that melatonin helps a lot when I remember to take it. You can buy it almost anywhere vitamins & supplements are sold. It's worth a shot if you haven't tried it.

Snap. Last night I was out cold by half 11, and then it took 3 alarms to wake me at half 7. Yet last Sat & Sun I was awake before half 7 having gone to bed after midnight. My boyfriend's the same!


Alwaysbeenbig - I definitely found that my sleep improved with my weight loss but until now I never attributed it to it. I just assumed it came with me being a bit older, working full time and having a routine. I now get an average of 8 hours a night, and fall asleep within 10 mins.

I find reading in bed tires my eyes out and distracts me from whatever could be ticking around in my brain.

I find that dawn simulation is good for helping me get up in the morning, which I too am lousy at. I have this one.

My partner does pretty well with it as well, he's no more a morning person than I am. He still has his phone set for three separate alarms, but he likes being able to get up slowly (and since meeting me, snuggle in bed together), and the alarms all play different songs so that he knows exactly how much dozing time he has left. I've noticed that he's a lot more awake when he does get up since we added the dawn simulation, and far less likely to end up turning off the alarms and going back to sleep without realising.

As for me, before the dawn simulation I'd end up being woken up when he was getting up for work and then going back to sleep and dozing fretfully for a while, but now I get up when he does. It's weird how I can go from wanting to stay in bed and sleep to properly awake quite suddenly. If I haven't had enough sleep that night, I'll usually end up having a nap after lunch to make up for it, rather than going back to bed in the morning.

Sleep deprivation can wreak havoc on your body, especially the immune system. I'm not going to go into the details, but sleep deprivation was a major factor in my autoimmune disease, fibromyalgia and other health issues (if you for some reason are interested, if you search on sleep deprivation, you'll probably find some of my posts in which I go into the whole complicated story). For decades, I worked 60-80 hours a week (often swing shifts) and it was a luxury to get even 6-7 hours of sleep. The chronic sleep deprivation eventually caught up with me.

As a result, I am now very protective of my sleep. It always takes me at least an hour, usually two or more to fall asleep, so I go to bed early enough to compensate.

Right now I need 9-10 hours of sleep, so if I need to be up at a certain time, I need to go to bed 12 hours before I have to get up. Sounds like a lot of sleep, but when I was still working, on the weekends I would sleep up to 20 hours. For me, it ended up being due to sleep apnea and a brain wave anomoly during sleep (I was getting virtually no deep, restorative sleep. So no matter how long I slept, I wasn't getting true rest).

If you can get a sleep study done, I'd highly recommend it. However, if your problem is that it takes you longer to fall asleep, can you go to bed earlier? If you can get even an extra hour of sleep, you may find yourself feeling a whole lot better, and not feel the need for compensatory sleep on the weekends.

I find that my pain levels go through the roof if I don't get enough sleep. Other symptoms worsen too but pain is the big one.

Something worth mentioning, if it hasn't been brought up already, is that sleep apnoea is relatively common in general, and is far more common in people who are overweight. So it's very much worth being screened for, especially if you snore or your bed partner reports that you stop breathing during the night.