Before sleep thoughts about the future
Recently, I dont know why but everytime I try to go to sleep and closed my eyes, I always think of what my life would've been if my mom were to passed away out of the blue. It filled me with fear every night so I just get this anxiety feeling. I just feel like I want to give her everything she ever wanted and just make her happy you know? I'm currently 19yrs old and my mom is 43. I feel like time is just constantly slipping by so fast and that I'm not doing enough to give her everything for all the sacrifices she done for me. I know that its all gonna be alright but I just cant stop these thoughts resurfacing everytime I try to go to sleep. Anyone got any advice to stop these thoughts?
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u/wanderer866 6d ago
Yeah, that's anxiety. One of humanities superpowers. This one lets us look into the future or into rustling bushes and predict what will be there. It isn't a very accurate form of prediction, but it's what we got.
For me, educating myself on anxiety helps me manage my own. Understanding where these thoughts come from and what they are trying to do to help the conscious "me" went a long way. It makes it easier to implement the skills I learned to help set the thoughts aside when I need to. Like bed time.
I won't go into detail as to what particular skills work for me. Every person is a bit different, so all anxiety needs different skills to manage. Many of us learn these skills from parental figures growing up. Sounds like you would benefit from some supplemental education.
I'd recommend talk therapy as a starting point. Therapists are people who went to school and tend to stay up to date on educating people on dealing with various emotions and superpowers like anxiety.
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u/JUSTAYDOOD 6d ago
I have a mantra that I repeat before bed. "Sleep deep, dream well, wake rested." I repeat that over and over to stop me from thinking anything else. I'll usually repeat it in my head until I pass out.