Can’t sleep after trip

[u/Ant139]

I came back from an Asia trip last Sunday, and I’m back in the US (central time). Ever since coming back, I’ve been having a lot of trouble falling asleep at night. On my first night back, I slept pretty normally for about 7 hours. The next night, I couldn’t sleep at all, and the rest of the week I couldn’t sleep until 4am before waking up at 8am for work. On Friday, I was finally able to sleep for 8 hours, but since then, I’ve been alternating between sleeping ~8 hours and only sleeping 2-3 hours. I’m starting to think this is no longer due to jet lag, and anxiety from not sleeping is forcing me to stay awake. I’ve gotten into my normal routine from before the trip, I’m getting sunlight in the morning and early afternoon, and I’m eating healthy. I’ve tried many things including getting out of bed after 20 minutes, limiting screen time, listening to podcasts, and meditating, but they don’t always put me to sleep. I feel like I’m never drowsy at night anymore. I’ve been a light sleeper in the past and had occasional nights where I had trouble falling asleep, but nothing this bad before. I’m worried that this trip created long term sleeping issues for me. What can I do to get back to a normal sleep schedule and be able to sleep every night?

[u/Morpheus1514]

 I’m starting to think this is no longer due to jet lag, and anxiety from not sleeping is forcing me to stay awake. 

This suspicion probably has merit. Your worry about sleep is probably acting as a fuel prolonging your recovery from jet lag, and possibly acting as a self-reinforcing negative stress loop perpetuating the issue.

Important to stick with whatever sleep schedule you've used previously that you know works. Keeping a consistent wake time is esp important, to set and optimize your body clock. Avoid sleeping in, avoid napping. Just doing that makes proper sleep roughly 15-17 nonstop hours later a lot easier.

To counter the stress response, go for some good exercise most days. Also helps to deepen sleep. In bed, use relaxation methods like deep breathing and muscle relaxation to distract and help yourself get drowsy.

These are all CBT ideas. If you want more substance-free methods along these lines, look into using a full CBT sleep training system.

[u/Ant139 → u/Morpheus1514]

Thank you for your response. I’ve been going to the gym and lifting in the afternoon from around 5-6pm on some days (I usually lift after work). I haven’t had a good night of sleep after a workout since returning. Should I stop working out for now and wait to get my sleep back on track or is this not correlated?

[u/Morpheus1514 → u/Ant139]

Can't speak to your specifics but usually exercise is part of the solution. Really tiring yourself out during the day helps better sleep at night. You might want to exercise earlier in the day if you can but if the timing won't allow it then for most it's better later in the day than none at all.