Why You Keep Waking at 3am

If you find yourself waking up at three in the morning,

Suddenly alert with racing thoughts or body activation,

You're not alone.

My husband and I experience it.

My clients experience it all the time.

And this is an incredibly common experience in perimenopause or menopause,

Or just during times of high stress or nervous system overload.

I want you to know there isn't anything wrong with you and there's not something that you have to fix.

So let's talk about why this happens.

The hormonal shifts that come from menopause can affect our cortisol rhythms,

Our body temperature regulations,

And a lot of other pieces that lead us to be more lightly activated at night.

Our protective parts can become more active in that silence at nighttime.

You find yourself rolling through those thoughts,

There's fewer distractions,

And so that internal material tends to kind of rise up.

So just know that your body isn't malfunctioning.

It's just more sensitized and more receptive and responsive right now.

A part of us often tries to make meaning out of that 3 a.

M.

Wake up.

So recognizing that problem-solving part that wants to really figure this out,

Or the anxious protector that shows up at three in the morning trying to figure out what's wrong,

Or even the inner critic that shows up at that hour telling us,

Why can't you just sleep like a normal person?

What's wrong with you?

So these are protective responses and not the truth in big,

Bold letters.

So just remembering that nothing needs to be solved at 3 a.

M.

Even though those parts of us.

Really would like to do that.

Those parts would really love us to not wake up again at three in the morning.

So let's talk about what to do and maybe what not to do.

So when you wake up in the middle of the night,

Don't overcheck your phone to see what time it is.

Make that mental calculation of how many hours you've got left.

Don't try to force sleep.

Don't try to start mentally planning around your life problems.

And definitely don't judge yourself for being awake.

And so efforting will wake the system up more.

If you're really struggling in bed,

One of the things that you can do is honestly just get up out of bed,

Go do something gentle with yourself,

And so really trying to practice that kindness.

Other things that you can do are focus on just breath work and really trying to focus on that and really taking good care of yourself in those moments.

A hand on your chest or belly.

Focusing on slow exhales through the mouth,

And maybe even just a gentle internal phrase like,

Nothing is required of me right now.

This is just a wave in my system.

And just allow the wakefulness to be present without identifying it as a problem that has to be solved.

And so you can acknowledge the part of you that's awake without needing to fix it.

So remember.

Sleep isn't linear.

Wake-ups are not a personal failure.

And the goal of our nervous system is safety,

Not control.

And over time,

The system will learn again.

So if you find yourself awake at 3 a.

M.

,

You're not doing anything wrong.

You're having a very normal human system experience.

And I happen to have a meditation for this exact experience called A Soft Reset for Sleepless Nights over on my page.

And I hope you'll check it out.

I also have a course on sleep using cognitive behavioral for insomnia that can really help if this is something that's happening over and over again for you.

So either of those are fantastic options.

Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope I'll see you at one of my live events focused on menopause and neurodivergence or just in the community of comments on my courses and practices that I offer here on Insight Timer.

Take care.