Not a real suggestion for something covid related but I have a tendency to wake up around 2:30 and toss and turn. I have to turn off my brain at that time. My answer is Antiques Roadshow. Sends me back to sleep within one program.
But seriously the longer Covid is around the more I find friends who have had long term issues. One friend is only now able to taste food almost normally after having a "mild" case of Covid a year ago. Another has long Covid which has really disabled him and and another has developed heart issues. All are on the older side but were active and fit and had no major health issues before. There's so much we don't know about that disease and I am afraid that researchers will not be able to touch it during the next administration.
The best sleep remedy I've experienced is retirement. If I wake up at 3 AM, which has been the norm for me for my entire life, I can lie there and read, watch a movie, listen to a boring podcast or just get up for awhile. There's nowhere I have to be (most of the time)
Nearly everyone I know struggles with sleep of one variety of another. I heard a number of years ago that waking up in the middle of the night is normal and happened long before the advent of artificial light. People would refer to nighttime sleeping habits as "first sleep" and "second sleep."
I found that really helpful -- not something I had to worry about but something to learn to adapt to. That and a cup of hot cocoa near bedtime at this time of year.
Thank you. It is useful perspective. I believe that my good friend Scott Stossel, who wrote a powerful book about his lifelong struggles with anxiety, wrote a short article about how the "second sleep" was a taken-as-normal part of life in the pre-electric age, very much as you say. I may check that out again.
This is not meant to be snarky. Have you considered old age to be the cause and as a solution, some very strong drugs gone from your system when you wake up. Klonopin, the highly addictive and effective son of Valium, and Seroquel, lulling even the mood disordered into sleep. Just sayin'.
Bill, thank you — and, yes, this is part of my assessments too. (The suddenness of the change, before and after Covid, has made me think: Something happened. But the background is of course the ticking clock.) Appreciate it.
First, mirtazapine. Second, I've kept a large basket full of icosahedrons formed from sonobe units. Third, I'll come back with more detail on my successful sleeping routine if I'm confident that won't trigger anxiety about snapping wide awake at 2am.
I remember coming home after midnight curfew, and Dad was awake, sitting in a dining room chair talking to himself about work tactics and strategies. Not good for me :)
Today, I’m often awake at 4am or earlier — today, around 2:30.
I often blame it on circadian rhythm, especially because I’ve lived in so many different time zones. I know I’m in one that’s against my own rhythm now. The light outside is against me.
A thought provoking distraction from the other news of the day.
Like others I cannot resist trying to help you with suggestions:
I have sleep apnea which can wake you with a dry mouth if untreated.
Worth keeping track of the humidity in your bedroom - you don't want it too dry - but maybe that's not a problem in the DC area. When we lived in the Northeast we had a humidifier attached to the furnace.
I have found Sleep Medicine doctors to be very helpful.
Thank you! As I should have noted earlier (and added in an update), whatever is happening appears *not* to be apnea/breathing related. And will add humidity to the check list.
I must admit that I was relieved that this did not lead to a more serious medical announcement, but that might also be because I share your difficulties when waking at 3 AM for whatever reason and then not being able to return to something resembling sleep beyond the exhaustion of the "very long day" that I often experience, too.
I've lived with this for many years, Jim, and the onset of distressing tinnitus around 2019 did not help... nor did the stress after Nov '16, of course. I have tried a number of solutions, but I basically OD'd on Melatonin which had accumulated in my system and led to substantial gall bladder and liver symptoms that took six months to resolve after I had stopped it altogether.
I had found that apparently yoga-related breathing exercises helped get to sleep (see https://health.clevelandclinic.org/4-7-8-breathing), but the renewed stress since Nov 5 led me to try something that I had resisted: cannabis edibles 'designed' to help relieve sleeplessness. I have been consuming a "gummy" every night and it does seem to help me get to sleep both initially and then back to sleep after I inevitably wake up at 3 or 4 am due to other imperatives related to age... 'nuff said?
Fwiw, I hesitated for a very long time even though I have a family member who has been using legal cannabis medically for over 15 years after a personal tragedy. I'm not sure I will continue for long, but I am still prone to dark thoughts about our collective predicament whenever I am awake and not preoccupied by other matters. That's bad enough while driving on the highway or while trying to read or watch something complex, but it's particularly unsettling in the middle of the night when sleep is elusive...
I lost my Partner of 44 years almost two years ago. (You met her in San Diego a couple of times. She and I read China Airborne because of that) And when I lost her, my sleep patterns were awful. So bad I went to the ER at 4 A.M. thinking I was having a heart attack. MAJOR anxiety.
And then read an NYT article about sleep. And the VA has an app to help veterans sleep better. PTSD and such. Load you sleep times into it, and it gives you recommendations. And it works.
For my frequent middle-of-the-night wakefulness, I find that putting a basketball talk podcast on quietly—familiar, friendly voices chatting and joking inconsequentially—usually sends me back to sleep in about 10 minutes. I think Adam Gopnik uses this trick also. Good luck!
PS: British news chats—FT, Guardian, News Agents—also work. Like sports, matters of mild interest, nothing urgent or stressful, amiable conversation—far from more upsetting US matters!
With you Jim and Deb. Thank you so much for opening a new field for thinking. Feel like I have some things in common ~ flying (my father, not me, but learned a lot from flying with him), Erie PA (my husband’s family), China (my husband is visiting professor).
JIM, If I have trouble sleeping, I take a lick of a melatonin pill. (Very small dose.) That does it for me. But sleeping has never been a major problem for me.
Book Rec--which might just help you sleep better. WHY WE SLEEP: Unlocking the power of sleep and dreams, by Matthew Walker, PhD (2017). He's head of the Human Sleep Science Laboratory at UC Berkeley, and you'll learn a lot of fascinating info, including that good sleep is necessary to absorb new information into your permanent memory. (I must have slept exceptionally well as a small child, because I have lots of memories from my earliest years.)
Vitamin D is involved with regulating sleep. I honestly don't know how important it is for proper sleep, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's at least somewhat important. It's also VERY important for proper functioning of the immune system, as the latter has hundreds of vitamin D receptors, and studies have clearly shown that people get well more quickly whether the problem is COVID, colds, or other infectious disease. My one case of COVID was a nothing and along with the D, I've kept up with my vaccinations, and since I started taking D in 2004, I can count my colds on one hand.
In Wash. DC, you can't get any from this sun this time of year, so you need to take it. I'd recommend AT LEAST 2000 IU/day, and at your age and size, you'd probably do better with 3000 IU (21,000/week). I take 5000 IU five days a week (25,000 a week) and I'm smaller and slightly younger than you.
Sex is also a good way to help a person get to sleep. Just sayin'!
At 91 I am old enough to have been a dog person, a cat person, and now a dog person again. I was a night person, then, by necessity a night and early morning person. After four compound fractures of my lower back and a few other Jiffy Lube physical problems, I write when the topic triggers a riff and my energy is up to it. Seldom does this last more than 20-30 minutes, and not infrequently it occurs when I read a Fallows or Richardson post or when the NYT prompts a prompt riposte.
What hasn’t changed is my commitment to the Constitution and the core principles of the United States for which I voluntarily was a ‘sucker’ and almost a ‘loser.’
I was brought up to believe in the checks and balances of the Constitution. During Watergate, as 1 of 500 members on the Nixon White House Enemies List, this caused me inconvenience with the CEO of the corporation who spent 30 minutes praising Nixon in my two hour job interview.
This was a personal inconvenience, but I never.was frightened. While Nixon, KIssinger, and the Plumbers Unit went against Nixon’s ‘enemies,’ Judge Sirica, the Erwin Senate Committee, Elliot Richardson as Attorney General (two of his predecessors went to jail,) and, ultimately, the Supreme Court assured that I needn’t be frightened by a rogue president.
Now, with my wife, our dog Bruno, four children, and five grandchildren, I AM FRIGHTENED.
While I physically am no longer able to fight 24/7 for the democratic America that I wish my grandchildren to inherit, I continue to fight to the best of my ability for the principles of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, FDR, LBJ, and Joe Biden, who have nobly placed country over self
Once again our country is at a crossroads. Jim Fallows expresses this more eloquently than can I. But, at 91, I am committing my remaining years to restoring the checks and balances upon which our country was constitutionally founded.
The clearest distinction between democracy and authoritarianism is JUSTICE. What I observe in Trump’s appointees is the trashing of core American justice.
The Senate has a constitutional responsibility to ‘advise and consent’ on presidential nominees. If they fail to exercise their constitutional right, then my country is on the slippery slope of potentially irreversible authoritarianism.
It certainly is all of our fight! Thanks Keith, for your wisdom! Oh, and, what kind of a dog is Bruno? My Natalie is a border collie, who used to work on a farm. Now she runs with me almost every day.
Given the thousands of years during which H. sapiens coevolved with dogs, I just take it for granted that we're far better off with them than without them. It probably doesn't matter much the breed--they're all good for love and joy! My sister, and my cousin and her daughter have dachshunds, and they get plenty of love and joy!
Jim Dogs have to be taken out during the day. Also, in dog walking I encounter a number of interesting people (whether it’s me or my dachshund that fascinates them I leave to your imagination).
My grand kids are split between cats and dogs. None have gold fish or turtles.
I'm in favor of most animals. (As a kid I had dogs, cats, a barnyard assortment in the next door lot, pigeons, hamsters, and chickens. In favor of them all.) In our frequent-travel mode, it hasn't made sense for us to have a pet in recent years. But a highlight for Deb when she was until recently visiting her late mother, on Manasota Key in FL, was watching the sea turtles come ashore to lay their eggs — and the lucky ones among the hatchlings making their way back into the water.
Thank you, Jim, for being so open. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy helped me learn to greet unpleasant thoughts and then say good-bye to them, knowing they will return and I'll repeat the drill. At my age, 79 this month, I notice how all the forgetting mercifully includes some of the things I used to worry about. Your life is busier than mine, do when I awake, I often have time to read the Times on my phone in bed and then top off, occasionally until most people's lunchtimes, followed by enough energy to enjoy the day. Sometimes I hold my breath to fall asleep. One time I realized I was starting to dream and was still holding my breath. I try to stop worrying about getting enough sleep--that helps. <3 to you and Deb
Not a real suggestion for something covid related but I have a tendency to wake up around 2:30 and toss and turn. I have to turn off my brain at that time. My answer is Antiques Roadshow. Sends me back to sleep within one program.
But seriously the longer Covid is around the more I find friends who have had long term issues. One friend is only now able to taste food almost normally after having a "mild" case of Covid a year ago. Another has long Covid which has really disabled him and and another has developed heart issues. All are on the older side but were active and fit and had no major health issues before. There's so much we don't know about that disease and I am afraid that researchers will not be able to touch it during the next administration.
The best sleep remedy I've experienced is retirement. If I wake up at 3 AM, which has been the norm for me for my entire life, I can lie there and read, watch a movie, listen to a boring podcast or just get up for awhile. There's nowhere I have to be (most of the time)
Nearly everyone I know struggles with sleep of one variety of another. I heard a number of years ago that waking up in the middle of the night is normal and happened long before the advent of artificial light. People would refer to nighttime sleeping habits as "first sleep" and "second sleep."
I found that really helpful -- not something I had to worry about but something to learn to adapt to. That and a cup of hot cocoa near bedtime at this time of year.
Thank you. It is useful perspective. I believe that my good friend Scott Stossel, who wrote a powerful book about his lifelong struggles with anxiety, wrote a short article about how the "second sleep" was a taken-as-normal part of life in the pre-electric age, very much as you say. I may check that out again.
This is not meant to be snarky. Have you considered old age to be the cause and as a solution, some very strong drugs gone from your system when you wake up. Klonopin, the highly addictive and effective son of Valium, and Seroquel, lulling even the mood disordered into sleep. Just sayin'.
Bill, thank you — and, yes, this is part of my assessments too. (The suddenness of the change, before and after Covid, has made me think: Something happened. But the background is of course the ticking clock.) Appreciate it.
First, mirtazapine. Second, I've kept a large basket full of icosahedrons formed from sonobe units. Third, I'll come back with more detail on my successful sleeping routine if I'm confident that won't trigger anxiety about snapping wide awake at 2am.
Thank you! Appreciate the details and the tone!
I remember coming home after midnight curfew, and Dad was awake, sitting in a dining room chair talking to himself about work tactics and strategies. Not good for me :)
Today, I’m often awake at 4am or earlier — today, around 2:30.
I often blame it on circadian rhythm, especially because I’ve lived in so many different time zones. I know I’m in one that’s against my own rhythm now. The light outside is against me.
That makes me think of you two, Jim. But Covid.
Thanks for your gracious thoughts. I really appreciate it.
A thought provoking distraction from the other news of the day.
Like others I cannot resist trying to help you with suggestions:
I have sleep apnea which can wake you with a dry mouth if untreated.
Worth keeping track of the humidity in your bedroom - you don't want it too dry - but maybe that's not a problem in the DC area. When we lived in the Northeast we had a humidifier attached to the furnace.
I have found Sleep Medicine doctors to be very helpful.
Thank you! As I should have noted earlier (and added in an update), whatever is happening appears *not* to be apnea/breathing related. And will add humidity to the check list.
I must admit that I was relieved that this did not lead to a more serious medical announcement, but that might also be because I share your difficulties when waking at 3 AM for whatever reason and then not being able to return to something resembling sleep beyond the exhaustion of the "very long day" that I often experience, too.
I've lived with this for many years, Jim, and the onset of distressing tinnitus around 2019 did not help... nor did the stress after Nov '16, of course. I have tried a number of solutions, but I basically OD'd on Melatonin which had accumulated in my system and led to substantial gall bladder and liver symptoms that took six months to resolve after I had stopped it altogether.
I had found that apparently yoga-related breathing exercises helped get to sleep (see https://health.clevelandclinic.org/4-7-8-breathing), but the renewed stress since Nov 5 led me to try something that I had resisted: cannabis edibles 'designed' to help relieve sleeplessness. I have been consuming a "gummy" every night and it does seem to help me get to sleep both initially and then back to sleep after I inevitably wake up at 3 or 4 am due to other imperatives related to age... 'nuff said?
Fwiw, I hesitated for a very long time even though I have a family member who has been using legal cannabis medically for over 15 years after a personal tragedy. I'm not sure I will continue for long, but I am still prone to dark thoughts about our collective predicament whenever I am awake and not preoccupied by other matters. That's bad enough while driving on the highway or while trying to read or watch something complex, but it's particularly unsettling in the middle of the night when sleep is elusive...
Ed, sincere thanks, and solidarity.
I don't believe I've ever had COVID, but 2:30 - 3:00 has for long been the cutoff for me getting to sleep.
I lost my Partner of 44 years almost two years ago. (You met her in San Diego a couple of times. She and I read China Airborne because of that) And when I lost her, my sleep patterns were awful. So bad I went to the ER at 4 A.M. thinking I was having a heart attack. MAJOR anxiety.
And then read an NYT article about sleep. And the VA has an app to help veterans sleep better. PTSD and such. Load you sleep times into it, and it gives you recommendations. And it works.
Government at work. Thank you.
Ongoing condolences on this grievous loss. And thank you for generously sharing this info.
And by the way, the name of the app is "Insomnia Coach". Built by the VA's National Center for PTSD.
Government at work. For the people.
For my frequent middle-of-the-night wakefulness, I find that putting a basketball talk podcast on quietly—familiar, friendly voices chatting and joking inconsequentially—usually sends me back to sleep in about 10 minutes. I think Adam Gopnik uses this trick also. Good luck!
PS: British news chats—FT, Guardian, News Agents—also work. Like sports, matters of mild interest, nothing urgent or stressful, amiable conversation—far from more upsetting US matters!
Thank you! Will add to the list.
With you Jim and Deb. Thank you so much for opening a new field for thinking. Feel like I have some things in common ~ flying (my father, not me, but learned a lot from flying with him), Erie PA (my husband’s family), China (my husband is visiting professor).
Solidarity, and thanks.
More, please. You are good at this.
That is very gracious of you. My thanks.
JIM, If I have trouble sleeping, I take a lick of a melatonin pill. (Very small dose.) That does it for me. But sleeping has never been a major problem for me.
Book Rec--which might just help you sleep better. WHY WE SLEEP: Unlocking the power of sleep and dreams, by Matthew Walker, PhD (2017). He's head of the Human Sleep Science Laboratory at UC Berkeley, and you'll learn a lot of fascinating info, including that good sleep is necessary to absorb new information into your permanent memory. (I must have slept exceptionally well as a small child, because I have lots of memories from my earliest years.)
Vitamin D is involved with regulating sleep. I honestly don't know how important it is for proper sleep, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's at least somewhat important. It's also VERY important for proper functioning of the immune system, as the latter has hundreds of vitamin D receptors, and studies have clearly shown that people get well more quickly whether the problem is COVID, colds, or other infectious disease. My one case of COVID was a nothing and along with the D, I've kept up with my vaccinations, and since I started taking D in 2004, I can count my colds on one hand.
In Wash. DC, you can't get any from this sun this time of year, so you need to take it. I'd recommend AT LEAST 2000 IU/day, and at your age and size, you'd probably do better with 3000 IU (21,000/week). I take 5000 IU five days a week (25,000 a week) and I'm smaller and slightly younger than you.
Sex is also a good way to help a person get to sleep. Just sayin'!
Thanks on all fronts!
You're welcome!
One word, Jim: quetiapine. 25 mg.
Will learn more, thanks.
At 91 I am old enough to have been a dog person, a cat person, and now a dog person again. I was a night person, then, by necessity a night and early morning person. After four compound fractures of my lower back and a few other Jiffy Lube physical problems, I write when the topic triggers a riff and my energy is up to it. Seldom does this last more than 20-30 minutes, and not infrequently it occurs when I read a Fallows or Richardson post or when the NYT prompts a prompt riposte.
What hasn’t changed is my commitment to the Constitution and the core principles of the United States for which I voluntarily was a ‘sucker’ and almost a ‘loser.’
I was brought up to believe in the checks and balances of the Constitution. During Watergate, as 1 of 500 members on the Nixon White House Enemies List, this caused me inconvenience with the CEO of the corporation who spent 30 minutes praising Nixon in my two hour job interview.
This was a personal inconvenience, but I never.was frightened. While Nixon, KIssinger, and the Plumbers Unit went against Nixon’s ‘enemies,’ Judge Sirica, the Erwin Senate Committee, Elliot Richardson as Attorney General (two of his predecessors went to jail,) and, ultimately, the Supreme Court assured that I needn’t be frightened by a rogue president.
Now, with my wife, our dog Bruno, four children, and five grandchildren, I AM FRIGHTENED.
While I physically am no longer able to fight 24/7 for the democratic America that I wish my grandchildren to inherit, I continue to fight to the best of my ability for the principles of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, FDR, LBJ, and Joe Biden, who have nobly placed country over self
Once again our country is at a crossroads. Jim Fallows expresses this more eloquently than can I. But, at 91, I am committing my remaining years to restoring the checks and balances upon which our country was constitutionally founded.
The clearest distinction between democracy and authoritarianism is JUSTICE. What I observe in Trump’s appointees is the trashing of core American justice.
The Senate has a constitutional responsibility to ‘advise and consent’ on presidential nominees. If they fail to exercise their constitutional right, then my country is on the slippery slope of potentially irreversible authoritarianism.
The fight is to preserve the soul of America.
THIS IS MY FIGHT AND YOURS!
Keith, belated thank — for your example and message. We all must fight on. I am deeply appreciative.
And mine too. Thanks.
It certainly is all of our fight! Thanks Keith, for your wisdom! Oh, and, what kind of a dog is Bruno? My Natalie is a border collie, who used to work on a farm. Now she runs with me almost every day.
David Bruno, our 14 year old dachshund, brings us great joy. Total love and snuggling during these perilous times.
Given the thousands of years during which H. sapiens coevolved with dogs, I just take it for granted that we're far better off with them than without them. It probably doesn't matter much the breed--they're all good for love and joy! My sister, and my cousin and her daughter have dachshunds, and they get plenty of love and joy!
I agree that there has to have been symbiotic evolution between human beings and dogs. (And I grew up with a sequence of them.)
I am more similar in personality to a cat, which is which I've leaned that way (when our kids were little and we had pets).
Jim Dogs have to be taken out during the day. Also, in dog walking I encounter a number of interesting people (whether it’s me or my dachshund that fascinates them I leave to your imagination).
My grand kids are split between cats and dogs. None have gold fish or turtles.
I'm in favor of most animals. (As a kid I had dogs, cats, a barnyard assortment in the next door lot, pigeons, hamsters, and chickens. In favor of them all.) In our frequent-travel mode, it hasn't made sense for us to have a pet in recent years. But a highlight for Deb when she was until recently visiting her late mother, on Manasota Key in FL, was watching the sea turtles come ashore to lay their eggs — and the lucky ones among the hatchlings making their way back into the water.
Thank you, Jim, for being so open. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy helped me learn to greet unpleasant thoughts and then say good-bye to them, knowing they will return and I'll repeat the drill. At my age, 79 this month, I notice how all the forgetting mercifully includes some of the things I used to worry about. Your life is busier than mine, do when I awake, I often have time to read the Times on my phone in bed and then top off, occasionally until most people's lunchtimes, followed by enough energy to enjoy the day. Sometimes I hold my breath to fall asleep. One time I realized I was starting to dream and was still holding my breath. I try to stop worrying about getting enough sleep--that helps. <3 to you and Deb
Susan — thank you, I appreciate it! We can talk this over in the neighborhood.