the lights go off and your brain turns on: 8 ways to manage stress and anxiety before bed

One of the biggest reasons I see individuals struggle with their sleep is due to stress and anxiety.

It’s when the lights go off, and the silence sets in, that the thoughts, worries, and anxieties gets louder.

This is because all day long we are inundated by distraction and stimulation; from the second we wake up to the moment we lay down. Responsibilities, relationships, technology, and more — we are constantly pulled in every direction. How often do we have true moments of stillness, silence, moments to be alone with our thoughts? Not often. That is, until we get to sleep.

Consider the following strategies to get to bed more soundly

— Set a technology curfew (2+ hours before bed)

If you are prone to stress and anxiety before bed, work emails, news outlets, social media, and more will not help your circumstances! Be willing to create solid boundaries are your technology use — for the sake of stress and blue light exposure, which can be ultra disrupting to your sleep! Instead, create a wind down routine to prime your body for rest. So many of us are laying in bed, reading and responding to emails, scrolling news outlets and social media, sending texts, and more —which drives up our stress response and activates cortisol, the stress hormone. By setting a technology curfew, and sticking to it, you are giving the body the much needed disconnect from you and your responsibilities — an opportunity to decompress and get better quality sleep as a result.

— Avoid reaching for your phone if you wake up in the middle of the night

It’s 1am, you wake up and can’t fall back to sleep. How often do you reach for your phone to pass the time? Let’s try and avoid this temptation. By reaching for your phone, your eyes are receiving blue light which signals to the pineal gland to release cortisol — as it interprets the blue light as daytime! This can further promote difficulty getting to sleep and impact your circadian rhythm as a result. At all costs, avoid reaching for your phone and consider the strategies listed below instead.

— Have a worry journal next to your bed

A ‘worry journal’ is a journal meant for your worries! This allows you to symbolically remove any worrisome thoughts you may have, whether before bed or waking up in the middle of the night, out of your brain and onto paper to be dealt with the next day. Realistically, spending time investing worry into your stressors, your to do list, and more is very unproductive — afterall, worrying won’t get things done! Instead, try utilizing a worry journal in order to prioritize better, less worry-filled sleep.

— Do a brain dump

Brain dump is essentially what it sounds like; giving yourself time to journal before bed and write out anything on your mind. This coincides with the ‘worry journal,’ as it allows you to acknowledge your worries, your stressors, and more, and make the executive decision to relinquish them until the next day. Check out this article by Headspace on brain dumping!

— Breath work or meditation

Supporting the nervous system before bed is one of the best tools to getting restorative sleep. Activating the parasympathetic nervous system, or the relaxation response, signals to the brain that we are safe, promoting more calm in mind and body. The part of the autonomic nervous system, the sympathetic nervous system, is the ‘stress response,’ meant to keep us safe and activated for survival. Unfortunately, the way of the modern world impacts the stress response which inhibits quality rest — after all, if the body interprets that it is in danger, it would instinctually inhibit rest. Breath work, meditation, and practicing mindfulness are ways for the body to manually activate the ‘rest and digest’ part of the nervous system, promoting restfulness and an appropriate state in order to sleep.

— Try herbal remedies or calming tonics to relax

While I don’t believe in putting ‘band aids’ on a symptom, I do believe that herbal remedies and adding in supplements to your nighttime routine can help promote mental calm and reduce stress as a result. Adding in herbs such as lemon balm, passionflower, lavender, chamomile, and Valerian root have been found to promote calm. The more that we can generate calm physiologically within the body, the more the mind will tap into a calmer state as well — this is the mind body connection at play. Furthermore, supplements like magnesium glycinate and magnesium l-threonate, or l-theanine, have been found to promote calm. Magnesium is the ‘anti-stress mineral,’ and both magnesium and l-theanine are considered anxiolytic, or anti-anxiety. Always work with your healthcare provider before adding anything new supplementally into your routine.

— Get out of bed instead of tossing and turning!

Research shows our beds should be reserved for only a few different activities: sleep and romance. That said, if you are tossing and turning at night, get up, relocate, and read a few pages in your book, journal, or do some breathing OUTSIDE of your bed. This will help to prevent association with your bed with restlessness or difficulty sleeping. Only once you feel drowsy and are ready to get back to sleep, should you return to your bed.

— Don’t worry about your worry!

One of the biggest issues with stress and anxiety around sleep, and around anything for that matter, is how we begin to stress and worry about the stress and worry! You may wake up and think: I’ll never get back to sleep, what about my big presentation tomorrow? I’ll be tired all day, why is this happening? Or, we head to bed with anticipation and worry around: “will I sleep tonight?” We have begun to worry before we have anything to worry about. I used to share this quote all the time as a therapist: "judgment is fuel to the emotional fire.” By placing judgment or more worry on our worry, we are simply fueling the worry and anxiety fire.

This promotes anxious thoughts, worry, and impacts our physiology, perpetuating the difficulty you will have to get back to sleep. Instead, don’t judge yourself — take a few deep breaths to recenter and consider implementing one of the strategies above until you resume your sleep.

If you have any questions regarding sleep hygiene, sleep routines, the importance of sleep, or need support in the realm of sleep, please feel free to schedule a free consult below!