One of the best ways to cure panic attacks is to improve the quality of your sleep, and here are 3 methods for doing just that.
Okay, method number one is simply to eliminate negative thoughts that you experience in your bedroom.
You experience far more worrying and anxious thoughts when you’re awake in bed than you do in any other situation. That’s a weird situation to be in when you think that your bedroom should be the place where you are most relaxed.
I’d feel confident guessing that worrying in bed bothers you most when you’re trying to fall asleep when you first get into bed, in the middle of the night if you wake up, and first thing in the morning before you get up.
So what’s most important in this situation is quickly stopping as much of your worrying in the bedroom as possible, and the easiest area to solve this problem is with the worrying you do when you wake up in the morning. The answer? Get up imediately, as soon as you open your eyes.
This is a very simple idea, but it’s amazing how much anxiety this will remove from the start of your day. Getting up before your mind has a chance to remember all the things it could be anxious about will give you a better start to the day than you’ve had in a long time.
As for the times when you wake up during the night and start to worry/panic well, this one’s slightly trickier. But there are things you can do! First of all, if you’re awake longer than a few minutes and you feel your anxiety increasing, get up out of bed. Being in bed in the silence will just make any anxiety you feel seem even worse.
Have a warm shower or wash your face with warm water, potter around for 10 minutes doing something that doesn’t need much focus (a bit of tidying, listening to some soft music, skim-reading a magazine etc.), and then go back to bed. The key here is to recreate a “natural” going-to-bed routine.
This entire appraoch has to beat lying in bed for hours on end, with nothing to do but worry. And when you eventually go back to bed, you’re much more likely to drift off to sleep without any problems.
Okay, now time for the 2nd way to get the kind of sleep that cures anxiety attacks, and this one is about creating and sticking to a consistent routine.
If you’re suffering with a sleep problem for any reason, not just one that’s caused by anxiety and panic, then sticking to the same schedule every day is great advice.
And yes, by doing nothing more than going to bed and getting up at the same times, every single day, your internal clock will go back to normal and your sleeping cannot fail to improve. You’ll also correct any problems with things like irregular hormone release, which can be affected by poor sleep habits.
Do you ever feel burnt out? In many cases, that will be because your adrenal glands are active at times when they shouldn’t be, and this is frequently caused by irregular sleeping cycles. If you can get your sleeping habits into a predictable routine, problems like this will usually disappear all on their own.
So try your best to get to sleep every night at the same time, and also get up in the mornings at the same time. Be wary not to undo your good work by sleeping in late on weekends or on days when you don’t need to be up early.
Right, now the 3rd and final way to get better sleep, and this one is all about stopping all stimulants in the lead up to bedtime.
A lot of the problems that you currently have with your sleep could be to do with what you do right before you go to bed. Fast-paced TV, loud music, heavy reading, and playing video games are all very bad ideas in the last hour or two before you try to sleep.
So the first thing to do is eliminate anything stimulating for at least an hour before you go to bed. You should also not do any exercise at all for at least a couple of hours before bed. And try to develop a new pre-bed routine a “slow-down” routine, as I like to call it.
So go out of your way to take it easy. Behave like you’re on a vacation without a worry in the world. You know what relaxes you, so do that! Have a favourite bed time drink, do some light reading, sit outside in the fresh air if it’s warm. Anything to relax.
I know that what I’m saying here sounds like it’s too simple to work, but I can guarantee that this does work. And can you honestly say that you give yourself quality time like this?
If you’re a bath-taker, then whenever you can take one right before you get into bed. Make it warm, but never too hot. A warm bath has been proven in many studies to put the body in just the right state for great quality sleep. So make this slow winding-down hour a new part of your pre-bed routine. It can work unbelievably well when you’re not sleeping.
tips for panic attacks