{"id":285511,"date":"2025-11-27T04:01:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-27T04:01:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/285511\/"},"modified":"2025-11-27T04:01:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-27T04:01:11","slug":"the-best-thing-to-do-if-you-wake-up-at-3am","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/285511\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Thing To Do If You Wake Up At 3AM"},"content":{"rendered":"

We\u2019ve written before at HuffPost UK about what sleep experts do<\/a> when they find themselves awake in the middle of the night, unable to return to the land of nod. <\/p>\n

Both agreed that<\/a> getting out of bed after about 20 minutes of sleeplessness, trying your hardest not to stress about the morning, and avoiding your screen can help. <\/p>\n

But Dr Allie Hare<\/a>, consultant in sleep medicine <\/a>and co-founder of Grace Sleep, said, \u201cIf I wake at 3am and it doesn\u2019t feel like I am about to return to sleep, I try cognitive distraction strategies first\u201d. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how Dr Hare uses the method to nod back off, as well as what she turns to if that doesn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

How can you distract yourself when you wake up at 3am?<\/p>\n

You might have heard of \u201ccognitive shuffling<\/a>,\u201d which involves associating words which share a letter in order to stop yourself from overthinking. <\/p>\n

This is meant to calm a racing mind and prevent the stress about being awake, which can, paradoxically, prevent you from falling<\/a> asleep.<\/p>\n

For Dr Hare, that involves \u201ccounting backwards from 1000 in sevens\u201d. <\/p>\n

I sometimes imagine myself cooking my last meal in enormous detail: my editor says she pictures as many nooks and crannies of her childhood home as possible. <\/p>\n

The point is to distract your mind from worry or obsessing over returning to your slumber. <\/p>\n

After all, independent sleep expert and author of books like A Sleep Divorce: How to Sleep Apart, Not Fall Apart<\/a>, Dr Neil Stanley<\/a>, previously told HuffPost UK<\/a> that stress and \u201cfrustration\u201d are the natural enemies of a great night\u2019s sleep.<\/p>\n

What else can I do if distractions don\u2019t work?<\/p>\n

Dr Hare said \u201ccognitive distractions\u201d aren\u2019t her only method, though they are the first technique she turns to.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf that doesn\u2019t work, I will always get out of bed, as trying to get back to sleep never works and can condition your body and brain to associate the bed with tossing, turning and frustration,\u201d she told HuffPost UK.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll do something else, like reading or listening to music for 20-30 minutes before going back to bed.\u201d<\/p>\n

And, like sleep experts before her, Dr Hare doesn\u2019t think it\u2019s a good idea to let a bad night\u2019s sleep disrupt your usual cycle.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I\u2019ve had a bad night, I will still focus on getting up at the same time I usually would in the morning and focus on getting early bright, outside light to minimise fatigue.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI will then go to bed at my usual time the following night, and this usually resets things!\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We\u2019ve written before at HuffPost UK about what sleep experts do when they find themselves awake in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":285512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[21517,59,102,370,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-285511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-experts","tag-gb","tag-health","tag-sleep","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/285512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}