Waking up in middle of the night

Have you always done it? One of my sons has always slept in two batches. As a little kid I would sometimes find him asleep on the floor, collapsed face-first into his toys. As he got older half the time when I got up I'd find that he was asleep on the couch instead of his bed. He's 22 now and he still does it....gets up around midnight, stays awake for about 30 minutes, and goes back to bed. I think it's just how he's wired.

I think it’s due to COVID. I’ve always slept through the night until COVID started. Now, I often wake around 3 or 4 a.m. our minds are worried and wake us up. Just a guess.

It is a common trauma response or if you have ptsd or cptsd. But anxiety can cause it, or even change of diet people who do keto have this problem where they just are awake and with energy

I agree, I think it's really quite common but most people don't realise it. For years growing up I used to wake up at 3:30 and then just be awake for around half an hour before going back to sleep. Now as an adult I go through stages of doing this for about a week at a time.

i do the same sometimes. try increasing your activity level some.

Start with the point made by @Deviette. It’s normal. The “problem” if there is one, isn’t waking up, it’s about getting back to sleep.

If you have a reliable routine for that I’d just stick with it. Don’t fight and make this into a stressor. Stress is the enemy of sleep.

I usually wake once during the night, sometimes more frequently. And sometimes it takes an age to get to sleep. What I do not do is get up, read, make a cup of tea or whatever. If I need to get up for the bathroom I keep the lights as dim as possible and go straight back to bed. I may check the time once, but don't keep looking at the clock. I lie in bed in the dark, resting and maybe doing some sort of meditative type thoughts. I keep stress levels as low as possible and figure I am at least getting rest, if not sleep.

I also sleep in the 4hr cycles that seem pretty common in this forum. Some nights it's easier to fall back asleep than others. I can fall back asleep faster if it's an environment issue that can easily be fixed; room too hot, too loud or bright outside. The main thing that wakes me up early is if I'm really hungry, then I can't fall asleep until I've had a snack.

If you're able to go back to sleep and it's not impacting you during the day then it's just one of those things. Sleep patterns often change as we age, and you're doing exactly the right thing instead of laying in bed being annoyed you can't sleep, and perpetuating it, you do something else for a bit then sleep again. Sounds ideal!

Since I hit my 30s I became an early bird incapable of lying in. Previously I could quite happily sleep for 12+ hours a day if I chose to! I do get some early waking insomnia (can't go back to sleep for love nor money) but thankfully that's been improving since I started seeing a women's health specialist.