People can feel anxious at any time, and for many different reasons. People often suffer from prolonged anxiety, which can affect many different areas of life. One major way you can be affected by anxiety is in your quality of sleep. People with anxiety often have negatively affected sleeping habits. Some may not be able to fall asleep, others may not be able to stay asleep, and many even may wake up feeling anxious. Having your anxiety affect your quality of sleep is tough to cope with, but there are things you can do if you tend to wake up feeling anxious.
Tip 1: Understand Why You Feel Anxious
It is not common for a person to wake up feeling anxious without it being triggered by a stressor. Often those who wake up anxious have something on their minds that they are struggling to cope with. This could be due to many different types of situations, including:
- Unresolved interpersonal issues
- Concern or discontent about a life stressor
- Apprehension about the future
- Being overwhelmed with day-to-day responsibilities
- Experiencing a grieving or mourning process
- Posttraumatic stress disorder
- Experiencing night terrors or nightmares
Each of these reasons would cause a person to wake up feeling anxious. They are impactful issues for a person to go through, so it makes sense why it would affect you so much that you wake up feeling anxious.
Tip 2: Be Mindful Of Your Diet
Your diet plays a major role in not only your overall anxiety, but also your quality of sleep. There are dietary elements that can cause you to wake up feeling anxious. For example, consuming too much of the following foods and beverages may result in an anxious state of mind when waking up:
- Coffee
- Sugar
- Carbohydrates
- Alcohol
Each of these severely affects your anxiety and your quality of sleep. In order to minimize the way your anxiety affects your sleep, minimize these substances. Try to only drink one to two alcoholic beverages only 1-2 times per week, and eliminate any coffee, sugar, and carbohydrates after 3 pm.
Tip 3: Stay Sober
Every substance in your body will affect your anxiety levels and your quality of sleep. Substances like alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, amphetamines, benzodiazepines, and hallucinogens, will all cause your anxiety to spike and depreciate sporadically. It will also cause your body to enter a depressed state (which increases anxiety) as it regulates itself in the sobering up process. Substances of any kind will severely affect your mood, anxiety, and state of mind because they are designed to affect your brain chemistry. If you are abusing drugs or alcohol, it is important to take the necessary steps to quit the use. Quitting is the only way to ensure that your substance use is not causing you to feel unnecessary anxiety or an interrupted sleep cycle. If you feel it will be a struggle for you to quit, consider consulting a doctor or mental health professional, who will be able to direct you to the help you need.
Many medications may also affect sleep and anxiety. If you take any medications may that affect your mood, anxiety, sleep, or biological functions, be sure to promptly discuss your concerns and complications with your doctor.