Morning Exhaustion & Pain

[shadowson]

Hi all

why do I wake up absolutely exhausted and battered? Pain levels high and completely wiped out.

Morning’s are the worst.

conditioning? Probably. But how on earth do I unlearn that conditioning?

The longer I sleep, the worse I feel. Generally I sleep about 6-7 hours but I feel much less pain and fatigue if I sleep less.

I’ve read a lot about sleep cycles and REM. And I do wonder if it’s from waking up during a deep sleep cycle.

Anyone help with this? Every morning I just feel so depressed. Some days are better than others.

weekends are the worst because I have an extra hour in bed. Weekdays I’m slightly better because I have to get up earlier and drag myself to work…

no idea how to deal with this and I’ve had it about 5 years now. Pain in my sides, glute pain, shoulder weakness and pain plus now extreme fatigue.

Any help please?

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

conditioning? Probably. But how on earth do I unlearn that conditioning?

Do you know the night before how long you are going to sleep for? It sounds like it, but I just wanted to make sure. I.e. Do you set an alarm each morning even on the weekends? Because if so, then there's an element of anticipation to it which can fuel the conditioning. E.g. if on Friday night as you go to sleep you know that you're going to sleep for longer, the fear and dread has already started (and that fuels conditioning).

 

[shadowson]

Do you know the night before how long you are going to sleep for? It sounds like it, but I just wanted to make sure. I.e. Do you set an alarm each morning even on the weekends? Because if so, then there's an element of anticipation to it which can fuel the conditioning. E.g. if on Friday night as you go to sleep you know that you're going to sleep for longer, the fear and dread has already started (and that fuels conditioning).

I pretty much sleep the same amount of time each night. From about midnight to 7am. Or from 11pm until 6:30. I don’t think about the length of time I’m going to sleep consciously. Probably subconsciously. Generally my pain and fatigue is worse on weekends because I sleep longer. No idea how to break this conditioning because it’s sleep that’s causing my symptom cycle.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

Generally my pain and fatigue is worse on weekends because I sleep longer. No idea how to break this conditioning because it’s sleep that’s causing my symptom cycle.

Maybe, maybe not (in terms of the last sentence). I understand that it seems that way, but it could be something else. People often have more pain on the weekends because there's a let down effect from the work week (the pain is less during the week, because the mindbody knows that it doesn't have to time for that and gets wired for stress, then it catches up with you on the weekend).

Here's a post from the president of the Association for the Treatment of Neuroplastic Symptoms (the ATNS), Dr David Clarke, explaining the general idea:

https://www.instagram.com/p/DaWFp_BEcTS/?img_index=1 (Dave Clarke on Instagram: "Here is a pattern almost every chronic pain patient I have treated has experienced, and almost no one has a name for. You hold it together for the entire work week. You make it through the meeting, the deadline, the project, the holiday preparation. The moment you finally sit down on Friday night or Saturday morning, your body falls apart. A migraine arrives. Your gut rebels. Your back seizes up. Fatigue lands like a wave. This is the let-down phenomenon. Researchers have been documenting it for decades. A landmark 2014 study in Neurology found that migraine sufferers had a five-fold increase in attack risk in the 6 to 18 hours after their stress levels dropped. The attacks did not happen during the stress. They happened after the stress was released. The mechanism makes biological sense. When the nervous system is in survival mode, it pours cortisol, adrenaline, and other stress hormones into the system to keep you functional. These chemicals also suppress pain signals. As long as the demand is on, you hold together. The moment the demand ends, the suppression releases. Everything that was being held back rushes through. The body, which had been performing under emergency power, finally registers the cost. The reason this matters clinically is that patients often blame themselves for it. “I should be enjoying my weekend.” “I should be on vacation.” “I should not be sick now.” This is one of the most painful versions of self-criticism I see, because it sets the patient against their own body for doing exactly what it was designed to do. The way out is not to never rest. It is to give the nervous system smaller transitions instead of cliffs. Predictable decompression. Smaller resting plateaus during the week. Time between intense effort and full rest. The vagal system can come back online safely if it is not asked to do it all at once. If you have ever been confused by a body that falls apart the moment it is finally allowed to, this is the explanation. And the pattern can change. Start at symptomatic.me. Source: Lipton RB et al. Reduction in Perceived Stress as a Migraine Trigger: Testing the “Let-Down Headache” Hypothesis. (2014). Neurology.")

I would at least test this by sleeping the same amount of time on the weekend (at least one time - take that extra hour away) compared to the work week and see what happens - if you're still in more pain despite lining up the timing, then that points to it more being associated with the weekend itself (and the potential for what I said above to be correct) vs the sleep time.

 

[Booble]

Hi all

why do I wake up absolutely exhausted and battered? Pain levels high and completely wiped out.

Morning’s are the worst.

conditioning? Probably. But how on earth do I unlearn that conditioning?

The longer I sleep, the worse I feel. Generally I sleep about 6-7 hours but I feel much less pain and fatigue if I sleep less.

I’ve read a lot about sleep cycles and REM. And I do wonder if it’s from waking up during a deep sleep cycle.

Anyone help with this? Every morning I just feel so depressed. Some days are better than others.

weekends are the worst because I have an extra hour in bed. Weekdays I’m slightly better because I have to get up earlier and drag myself to work…

no idea how to deal with this and I’ve had it about 5 years now. Pain in my sides, glute pain, shoulder weakness and pain plus now extreme fatigue.

Any help please?

No answers just can commiserate. In the mornings I feel clogged and heavy. By around bedtime I'm feeling clear and light. As if gravity as lessened.
I've been like this all my life and the best advice I have for you is just to go with it. If you take a morning shower, let yourself semi-sleep through it. Get through your morning without paying attention to how you are feeling. Focus on the tasks at hand. When you do that eventually it just lifts.
Paying attention to it doesn't get you anywhere.

 

[JanAtheCPA]

Agree 100% that obsessing over the amount of time you expect to sleep is pretty much guaranteed to feed your fear mechanism. 7 to 7-1/2 hours is fine, you don't need more on your days off.

If you want to use that extra hour effectively, try exercise, yoga, tai chi, meditation, journaling, listening to a podcast while you drink coffee, catching up on reading... something... ANYTHING, to take you out of yourself instead of worrying and ruminating.

Your fatigue is not connected to your time in bed, sorry.

Rumination is the tool your fear mechanism uses to keep you wound up. Look up "David Hanscom MD, RUTs" for an explanation of rumination (his term is Repetitive Unpleasant Thoughts) and techniques to control it.

My very wise mother taught me, in my early teens, that if you're sleepless, just lying in bed and breathing meditatively (which means clearing your mind of negative thoughts) is just as good as sleeping. I have found that if I mindfully do this, I'm actually asleep again almost immediately. But if allow my brain to go on a rumination rampage, I'm SOL.

If you're not aware of waking up between sleep cycles, that's good, but employing the same thing (breathing mindfully without negative thoughts) before sleep, and replacing rumination with a brief visualizion about having good sleep and waking refreshed, is very effective and doesn't take long - - IF you can clear the negative thinking.

A warm shower before bed is well-known to help relax, IF you can visualize the shower as metaphorically washing away your concerns from the day and entering sleep with a clear mind.

Tried and true is the writing technique of writing down a list of the things that are on your mind, right before going to sleep. Try to end the list with just one positive thing from your day, no matter how small or insignificant. Mine is usually food- or pet-related. If you can add just one thing that made you appreciate yourself, that's even better.

Hanging on to negativity and anxiety are completely antithetical to peace and relief from pain. We are wired to be negative and anxious, so we must constantly remind ourselves and force ourselves to aim for constructive alternatives that allow us to move forward.

 

[Booble]

My very wise mother taught me, in my early teens, that if you're sleepless, just lying in bed and breathing meditatively (which means clearing your mind of negative thoughts) is just as good as sleeping. I have found that if I mindfully do this, I'm actually asleep again almost immediately.

Wise mother indeed!
I have found the same. Once I stopped trying to fall back asleep and simply decided that laying there was close enough to sleep I ended up getting more sleep.
At other times I'll do something to further tire out my brain such as try and review all the characters in a book I'm reading or TV show. I usually nod off after a bit of that.

@JanAtheCPA, I love that your positive thing is food or pet related.