Most of the nights I don’t get any deep sleep. This causes me to feel extremely tired during the day and it’s super hard to push through such days. Is this a form of insomnia? How can I solve this. Your suggestions will be really helpful for me, thanks a lot!
Hi Varada, You know I think this below can help! There are in principle two forms of fatigue. One is the straightforward feeling of fatigue that you have when you have run a half marathon. It behaves in a very predictable way. You rest, you sit down, you don’t do much, and you feel rested! Then we have the type of fatigue that behaves more like an emotion. You can think of it as emotional fatigue. It’s a heavy feeling that comes from deep within. And this is very common when you have trouble sleeping. This is feeling drained and exhausted as if you have no energy. It’s often coupled with frustration and sadness and exhaustion. Now here’s the thing - emotional fatigue comes from the struggle, it comes from having tried and tried and tried to do something and feeling like you’ve failed repeatedly. Like there’s no way out, that things are hopeless. This struggle is the source of the exhaustion. Now three things here are important. Firstly, seeing that the thing you couldn’t achieve, sleep, is impossible for all humans to achieve! Nobody has control over this. So there’s really no reason to criticize oneself. Secondly, it can be confusing because it seems like the reason for the fatigue is that you slept little. And surely this plays some role, but think of a time when you stayed up all night because you had fun. There’s no or little fatigue the next day, because there was no struggle! This is so helpful to see because we can get into this loop where we think we need to sleep more to feel less tired. Which creates pressure to sleep. Finally, as the name implies this fatigue acts like an emotion! If we think of another emotion like feeling anxious, then the more you want to feel calm and the more you try to make yourself less anxious, the more anxiety you end up having! And this is how the emotion fatigue behaves as well. The more you try to figure out why you are so tired, the more you think you are disproportionately tired or “too” tired and that something is wrong with you, the more you want it to go away the more sticky it becomes! On the other hand, when you recognize that you are tired but you don’t think that you shouldn’t be, because you know where the fatigue comes from, and you also allow yourself to be tired then things will change. Because just like when you were no longer trying to make yourself calm you experience less anxiety, when you’re no longer pushing yourself or doing things to be less tired, when you sit with it without judgement, you experience that emotion less and less.
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 thank you so so much for this explanation! Super helpful. Just to be clear, are you saying that I am most likely getting deep sleep and due to sleep state misperception I feel like I haven’t (Due to my emotional fatigue)? or that the lack of deep sleep is due to my severe emotional fatigue ? Thanks again, you’re the best!
Anytime! Glad it made sense and I would say this - everyone with insomnia has sleep state misperception and underestimates how much sleep happens. And when we are judging ourselves, we have this emotional fatigue - and the interpretation for why becomes “I didn’t get enough restful sleep”. In reality when we aren’t judging ourselves, the emotional fatigue fades and we see that how much or what type of sleep we had didn’t really matter!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Thanks a ton! So, essentially the core problem is insomnia. And yes, I am reading your book "Set it and Forget it" and its been really useful for me - not caring is the goal I want to achieve:)
Anytime! And I would say the core problem is trying to control something that becomes more slippery the more we try to control it - and yes insomnia is an example of this. So glad you got the book and it’s been helpful 😊 and yes, when we are less attached, when we are more ok with uncertainty and even some discomfort… everything changes!
I am desperately seeking help. When i dont sleep well for several days i can sort of manage Even though tired etc and thrn the night that i sleep long and deeply i wake up feeling like crap the whole day... And for the days after as im getting long amounts of sleep i feel ao larthagic and super super anxious from extreme tiredeness.. is this normal part or sleep deprived person? Been having insomnia on and off all my life
By not trying to increase your deep sleep continuality. It sounds like a not very helpful answer, but it’s the only way. Peaceful, restorative, deep, refreshing sleep only comes to you when you’re not trying to get it. Like love. Thanks for the comment and be in touch!
I started taking ionic magnesium. My problem was that I flipped between rem, light sleep and awake - almost never went into deep sleep ( 4% total, 38% rem) Magnesium gave me almost an hour of deep sleep. Still tired a lot, but much better than before. I'm not sure if it would work the same on you.
Hi Mandar! How do you know this? The sleep stages I mean? I’m guessing that you’re using a tracker, and that’s big opportunity! Thinking that there’s something wrong with your sleep cycles or your circadian rhythm is very common. One common concern is that you have a sleep cycle that is beyond 24 hours. Some feel like they have more of a 36 or even a 48 hour cycle. Another concern is that there’s something wrong with the type of sleep you get. For example that you’re not getting enough REM sleep or too little deep sleep or something like that. As for sleep stages there is no evidence actually that they correlate in any way with how we feel or function during the day. When you look at sleep studies you can see that someone may have what looks like a textbook example of perfect sleep cycles but feel really crappy! On the other hand you can have someone who has what looks like a very fragmented and poor quality sleep but actually feel great! Furthermore there’s nothing you can do really to make yourself have more or less of a certain sleep stage. They are sort of like the composition of gases in room air. There’s really nothing wrong (at least not at sea level under typical circumstances 😝) and there’s nothing you can do about it either! When you take steps in the direction of not tracking, of not looking for a problem with sleep, then that’s helpful because there’s one less thing then brain needs to process and spend energy on. Now how about not feeling refreshed? This often is a form of emotional fatigue. There are in principle two forms of fatigue. One is the straightforward feeling of fatigue that you have when you have run a half marathon. It behaves in a very predictable way. You rest, you sit down, you don’t do much, and you feel rested! Then we have the type of fatigue that behaves more like an emotion. You can think of it as emotional fatigue. It is a heavier feeling from within. This is feeling drained and exhausted as if you have no energy no matter what you do or how much you sleep. It comes from the same place insomnia comes from, wanting to get away from discomfort. With insomnia, the more we try to escape the fear of a perceived threat, the more fear we have. And emotional fatigue acts like this as well. The more you try to figure out why you are so tired, the more you think you are disproportionately tired or “too” tired and that something is wrong with you, the more you want it to go away the more sticky it becomes! On the other hand, when you recognize that you are tired but you don’t think that you shouldn’t be, because you know where the fatigue comes from, and you also allow yourself to be tired then things will change. It’s in a way a form of self-compassion to not criticize oneself for feeling tired. And just like when you are no longer trying to make yourself calm this leads to peace of mind, when you’re no longer pushing yourself or doing things to be less tired, when you sit with it without judgement, you experience that emotional fatigue much less. Hope this helps!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Hey thanks for the Insightful answer :) True, there's nothing that can be done to get a certain type of sleep so I'll leave it up to the brain because it knows better. Some nights the rem is more than deep and vice versa but you're right if I keep thinking about it then I feel drowsy and a short afternoon nap (as short as 20 mins) makes me feel great, besides I'm not even sure if my fitness watch is giving me accurate numbers lol, so I'm gonna trust my body on this one
Hi Alan. You know REM behavioral disorder is when we act out our dreams... insomnia is when we have a fear of being awake at night, when the brain has started to thing wakefulness is a threat... which disorder had you heard about?
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Hi, I'm really quite worried. I get immensely low REM sleep and my restfulness scores. I'm realising I'm moving a lot in my sleep. I understand should your brain not subdue your body during REM this is a bad sign. Every day I wake up know I'm short of a good 1/2 hours REM my body needs
Hi Alan, thanks for being in touch. I will see you whenever you are worried about your health, always talk to your doctor. This said, I’m guessing that you are using a tracker. Those are very often things that lead us towards worrying and being anxious. We often look for strength in the things that weaken us. We look for control in things that bring insecurity. Using a tracker often feels like it could be a way to get some control, but in reality, none of us can control our sleep stages or sleep in general. And when we try, that’s when we can really frustrated and anxious! So often a really good way it’s not track come on not know what time it is overnight come out and not keep track of how much you’ve slept, that leads to liberation and feeling good!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 this is so true. I spend my life worrying about every metric. It’s fucking futile. Your videos and thoughtfulness in this space is remarkable. I love what you’re doing. Keep it up
@@spo0ny2k 100% It’s unfortunate how the world is going towards more tracking, big data, metrics when it’s the complete opposite we need. Thanks Alan for sharing 👍
Hi there! How much deep sleep we have depends on a lot of things, predominantly age. A 3 year old will have often like 40% deep sleep. A male starts having less deep sleep early and typically have only a few percent starting from like age 45 or so. Elderly typically have no deep sleep. And guess what, an elderly person and/or a middle age male can feel amazing! This is what matters the most. You can feel great, sleep great and have an amazing life with all kinds of sleep stage varieties. The problem often happens when you desire a certain amount of a certain sleep stage. When you start tracking it and you think you'd feel better with more deep sleep and you try things to change it. This often starts a loop of effort and suffering. Someone said that worrying about sleep stages is like worrying about the composition of gases in air. It really doesn't matter and there's nothing we can do about it anyway! Sorry if this was a bit over the top :p just felt it was important to share!
Most of the nights I don’t get any deep sleep. This causes me to feel extremely tired during the day and it’s super hard to push through such days. Is this a form of insomnia? How can I solve this. Your suggestions will be really helpful for me, thanks a lot!
Hi Varada,
You know I think this below can help!
There are in principle two forms of fatigue. One is the straightforward feeling of fatigue that you have when you have run a half marathon. It behaves in a very predictable way.
You rest, you sit down, you don’t do much, and you feel rested!
Then we have the type of fatigue that behaves more like an emotion. You can think of it as emotional fatigue. It’s a heavy feeling that comes from deep within. And this is very common when you have trouble sleeping. This is feeling drained and exhausted as if you have no energy. It’s often coupled with frustration and sadness and exhaustion.
Now here’s the thing - emotional fatigue comes from the struggle, it comes from having tried and tried and tried to do something and feeling like you’ve failed repeatedly. Like there’s no way out, that things are hopeless. This struggle is the source of the exhaustion.
Now three things here are important. Firstly, seeing that the thing you couldn’t achieve, sleep, is impossible for all humans to achieve! Nobody has control over this. So there’s really no reason to criticize oneself.
Secondly, it can be confusing because it seems like the reason for the fatigue is that you slept little. And surely this plays some role, but think of a time when you stayed up all night because you had fun. There’s no or little fatigue the next day, because there was no struggle! This is so helpful to see because we can get into this loop where we think we need to sleep more to feel less tired. Which creates pressure to sleep.
Finally, as the name implies this fatigue acts like an emotion!
If we think of another emotion like feeling anxious, then the more you want to feel calm and the more you try to make yourself less anxious, the more anxiety you end up having!
And this is how the emotion fatigue behaves as well. The more you try to figure out why you are so tired, the more you think you are disproportionately tired or “too” tired and that something is wrong with you, the more you want it to go away the more sticky it becomes!
On the other hand, when you recognize that you are tired but you don’t think that you shouldn’t be, because you know where the fatigue comes from, and you also allow yourself to be tired then things will change.
Because just like when you were no longer trying to make yourself calm you experience less anxiety, when you’re no longer pushing yourself or doing things to be less tired, when you sit with it without judgement, you experience that emotion less and less.
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 thank you so so much for this explanation! Super helpful. Just to be clear, are you saying that I am most likely getting deep sleep and due to sleep state misperception I feel like I haven’t (Due to my emotional fatigue)?
or that the lack of deep sleep is due to my severe emotional fatigue ? Thanks again, you’re the best!
Anytime!
Glad it made sense and I would say this - everyone with insomnia has sleep state misperception and underestimates how much sleep happens. And when we are judging ourselves, we have this emotional fatigue - and the interpretation for why becomes “I didn’t get enough restful sleep”. In reality when we aren’t judging ourselves, the emotional fatigue fades and we see that how much or what type of sleep we had didn’t really matter!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Thanks a ton! So, essentially the core problem is insomnia. And yes, I am reading your book "Set it and Forget it" and its been really useful for me - not caring is the goal I want to achieve:)
Anytime! And I would say the core problem is trying to control something that becomes more slippery the more we try to control it - and yes insomnia is an example of this.
So glad you got the book and it’s been helpful 😊 and yes, when we are less attached, when we are more ok with uncertainty and even some discomfort… everything changes!
I am desperately seeking help. When i dont sleep well for several days i can sort of manage Even though tired etc and thrn the night that i sleep long and deeply i wake up feeling like crap the whole day... And for the days after as im getting long amounts of sleep i feel ao larthagic and super super anxious from extreme tiredeness.. is this normal part or sleep deprived person? Been having insomnia on and off all my life
How would u increase my deep sleep continualtiy
By not trying to increase your deep sleep continuality.
It sounds like a not very helpful answer, but it’s the only way. Peaceful, restorative, deep, refreshing sleep only comes to you when you’re not trying to get it. Like love.
Thanks for the comment and be in touch!
I started taking ionic magnesium.
My problem was that I flipped between rem, light sleep and awake - almost never went into deep sleep ( 4% total, 38% rem)
Magnesium gave me almost an hour of deep sleep. Still tired a lot, but much better than before.
I'm not sure if it would work the same on you.
Be careful not to overdo it.... Your stomach will not like it. ( tho I'd take that over not sleeping)
Sleep Studies Show I Never Reach REM Sleep. Yet I Fall Asleep Fast And I Dream Allot !* Lucid Dreaming Most Of The Time. Can ANYBODY Explain ???*
I have only 1 hour of deep sleep and 3 hours of REM despite sleeping for 8 hours, is that normal? I don't feel refreshed as I should
Hi Mandar!
How do you know this? The sleep stages I mean? I’m guessing that you’re using a tracker, and that’s big opportunity!
Thinking that there’s something wrong with your sleep cycles or your circadian rhythm is very common.
One common concern is that you have a sleep cycle that is beyond 24 hours. Some feel like they have more of a 36 or even a 48 hour cycle. Another concern is that there’s something wrong with the type of sleep you get. For example that you’re not getting enough REM sleep or too little deep sleep or something like that.
As for sleep stages there is no evidence actually that they correlate in any way with how we feel or function during the day. When you look at sleep studies you can see that someone may have what looks like a textbook example of perfect sleep cycles but feel really crappy! On the other hand you can have someone who has what looks like a very fragmented and poor quality sleep but actually feel great!
Furthermore there’s nothing you can do really to make yourself have more or less of a certain sleep stage. They are sort of like the composition of gases in room air. There’s really nothing wrong (at least not at sea level under typical circumstances 😝) and there’s nothing you can do about it either!
When you take steps in the direction of not tracking, of not looking for a problem with sleep, then that’s helpful because there’s one less thing then brain needs to process and spend energy on.
Now how about not feeling refreshed?
This often is a form of emotional fatigue.
There are in principle two forms of fatigue. One is the straightforward feeling of fatigue that you have when you have run a half marathon. It behaves in a very predictable way.
You rest, you sit down, you don’t do much, and you feel rested!
Then we have the type of fatigue that behaves more like an emotion. You can think of it as emotional fatigue. It is a heavier feeling from within. This is feeling drained and exhausted as if you have no energy no matter what you do or how much you sleep.
It comes from the same place insomnia comes from, wanting to get away from discomfort. With insomnia, the more we try to escape the fear of a perceived threat, the more fear we have. And emotional fatigue acts like this as well.
The more you try to figure out why you are so tired, the more you think you are disproportionately tired or “too” tired and that something is wrong with you, the more you want it to go away the more sticky it becomes!
On the other hand, when you recognize that you are tired but you don’t think that you shouldn’t be, because you know where the fatigue comes from, and you also allow yourself to be tired then things will change.
It’s in a way a form of self-compassion to not criticize oneself for feeling tired.
And just like when you are no longer trying to make yourself calm this leads to peace of mind, when you’re no longer pushing yourself or doing things to be less tired, when you sit with it without judgement, you experience that emotional fatigue much less.
Hope this helps!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Hey thanks for the Insightful answer :) True, there's nothing that can be done to get a certain type of sleep so I'll leave it up to the brain because it knows better. Some nights the rem is more than deep and vice versa but you're right if I keep thinking about it then I feel drowsy and a short afternoon nap (as short as 20 mins) makes me feel great, besides I'm not even sure if my fitness watch is giving me accurate numbers lol, so I'm gonna trust my body on this one
This is the way!
I'm waking in the night and can't get back to sleep. I'm fearful its a REM disorder
Hi Alan. You know REM behavioral disorder is when we act out our dreams... insomnia is when we have a fear of being awake at night, when the brain has started to thing wakefulness is a threat... which disorder had you heard about?
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 Hi, I'm really quite worried. I get immensely low REM sleep and my restfulness scores. I'm realising I'm moving a lot in my sleep. I understand should your brain not subdue your body during REM this is a bad sign. Every day I wake up know I'm short of a good 1/2 hours REM my body needs
Hi Alan, thanks for being in touch. I will see you whenever you are worried about your health, always talk to your doctor. This said, I’m guessing that you are using a tracker. Those are very often things that lead us towards worrying and being anxious.
We often look for strength in the things that weaken us. We look for control in things that bring insecurity.
Using a tracker often feels like it could be a way to get some control, but in reality, none of us can control our sleep stages or sleep in general. And when we try, that’s when we can really frustrated and anxious!
So often a really good way it’s not track come on not know what time it is overnight come out and not keep track of how much you’ve slept, that leads to liberation and feeling good!
@@thesleepcoachschool8192 this is so true. I spend my life worrying about every metric. It’s fucking futile. Your videos and thoughtfulness in this space is remarkable. I love what you’re doing. Keep it up
@@spo0ny2k 100% It’s unfortunate how the world is going towards more tracking, big data, metrics when it’s the complete opposite we need. Thanks Alan for sharing 👍
So if you get a decent night's sleep is 25% of it being deep sleep normal?
Hi there! How much deep sleep we have depends on a lot of things, predominantly age. A 3 year old will have often like 40% deep sleep. A male starts having less deep sleep early and typically have only a few percent starting from like age 45 or so. Elderly typically have no deep sleep.
And guess what, an elderly person and/or a middle age male can feel amazing!
This is what matters the most. You can feel great, sleep great and have an amazing life with all kinds of sleep stage varieties.
The problem often happens when you desire a certain amount of a certain sleep stage. When you start tracking it and you think you'd feel better with more deep sleep and you try things to change it. This often starts a loop of effort and suffering.
Someone said that worrying about sleep stages is like worrying about the composition of gases in air. It really doesn't matter and there's nothing we can do about it anyway!
Sorry if this was a bit over the top :p just felt it was important to share!
This is super good information, Daniel.