A quick way for a person in recovery to assess how well they are managing their self-care is the HALT test. If you’re hungry, angry, lonely, or tired, you’ve got an unmet need. At Safe Harbor Recovery Center in Portsmouth, Virginia, we support people in recovery, and we know how important rest is for sustaining long-term sobriety.
Why Does it Matter?
Perhaps you’re wondering why it’s a big deal if you’re tired. Lots of people don’t get good sleep, or they don’t sleep for enough hours. Sleep deprivation (insufficient sleep) and sleep deficiency (poor quality sleep) can interfere with:
- Social functioning
- Learning
- Focusing
- Reacting
- Understanding other people
- Your own ability to regulate your emotions
- Your physical health, increasing your risk for heart disease, kidney disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke, and obesity
- Your mental health, especially placing you at a higher risk of depression and anxiety
Given that a big part of recovery is learning new coping skills, developing new social networks, changing how you react to things, and learning to regulate your emotional state, none of which is easier with medical or mental health concerns, sleep is a pretty big part of recovery. No one makes their best decisions when they are tired and irritable.
But I Don’t Want to Go to Bed
If you find yourself wanting to stay up after a long day of dealing with other people, so that you can get some quiet time for yourself, you might be struggling with revenge bedtime procrastination. Whether you’re naturally a night owl, forced to be an early bird, or you feel like you should “reward” yourself for getting through a chaotic, busy day, cutting into your sleep isn’t a good idea.
Sleeping Successfully
A lot of people struggle with sleep in early recovery, but there are things you can do to maximize your chances of getting good sleep.
- Reduce or eliminate substances that interfere with sleep, such as nicotine, alcohol, and caffeine.
- Talk to your doctor about how some medications can interfere with sleep. These can include blood pressure medications, antidepressants, pseudoephedrine, and cold and allergy meds.
- Shut down electronics. The blue light your phone emits, the bad news on the television, reading a late-night email from work that keeps your brain from turning off, or doom scrolling through Facebook until you lose track of time are all habits that can mess up your sleep cycle. An hour or two before you want to go to sleep, disengage from electronics and do something else.
- Skip the nap. Try not to sleep during the day. If you do need a nap, try to limit it to 30 minutes and keep it early in the day.
- Eat light. Avoid heavy evening meals, which can make your sleep restless.
- Work off excess energy. Make it a point to exercise regularly, to burn off extra energy, but not too close to bedtime.
- Create sleep rituals. Parent yourself like you would a small child. Start a routine that you follow every night. You can keep your evening activities calm and peaceful by meditating, lowering the light levels, having a bath, reading yourself a story, and going to sleep at the same time every night.
- Address disorders that interfere with sleep. There are mental health and medical conditions that can make it difficult to get a good night’s sleep, but getting rapid intervention will get you back on track for some much-needed shut-eye in no time. Some of these disorders include anxiety, depression, sleep apnea, restless leg syndrome, and nightmares.
- Reserve the bed for sleep. If you use your bed for work, doomscrolling, or watching television, you are training your brain that the bed is a place for doing wakeful activities. If you want your brain to recognize that bed is a place to sleep, then you need to do those other things somewhere else.
- Have a cool, dark, quiet sleeping area. This may require some additional effort or thought, especially if you work a non-traditional schedule.
- Blackout blinds or a sleeping mask, if you need to sleep during daylight hours.
- A fan, white noise machine, or earplugs if you live with loud people.
- Put your pets outside the bedroom if they tend to wake you up.
- Put your phone on “do not disturb” or place it in another room, so it doesn’t wake you up with notifications.
At Safe Harbor Recovery Center, we believe in setting our clients up for success. Our programs are offered at several different levels, each providing individualized care plans to facilitate long-term recovery.