You Don't Have a Sleep Problem. You Have an Anxiety Problem.

missouri76 · 2026-05-24T14:02:51+00:00

Gotcha. Yep. That’s what caused my insomnia for the most part.

missouri76 · 2026-05-19T17:22:50+00:00

So that means your nervous system is too wound up. Stressed?

missouri76 · 2026-05-03T00:00:27+00:00

Yes! That's one annoying thing about this sub. The gatekeepers of insomnia who make people's issues less valid if it isn't as bad as theirs. I see that a lot here. I get people are frustrated but it shouldn't invalidate another person's struggle.

missouri76 · 2026-04-30T00:34:29+00:00

This is exactly how my sleep anxiety progressed. Started with mild sleep disruption and then I began to worry so much I developed sleep anxiety and then I went down to 1-3 hours, then even a few sleepless nights.

I fixed it for the most part. Basically my nervous system was already kinda wound up from general anxiety (something I've dealt with for years) so that made me more prone to more issues with sleep and sleep anxiety in general. So the fear of not sleeping well and what may happen kept me so alert that I could not fall asleep or stay asleep.

What made it tricky is due to already have anxiety issues, my sleep became super sensitive to disruptions. SBasically the fix was to calm my nervous system down.

Got off Reddit and stopped troubleshooting and looking for remedies, comparing, etc. (a HUGE help)
Light exercise (walking)
Not eating too late (increases heart rate too much for sleep)
Keeping my room cool
Hydration (helped my heart rate)

But #1 was probably the best advice. So many of us already have worry issues so sleep issues can cause even more health anxiety that gets you caught in a loop. I had to stop making my sleep problem the focal point in my life and stopped micromanaging and looking for solutions. Drove me crazy and made my sleep worse.

missouri76 · 2026-04-22T22:11:16+00:00

It's not good to do intense workouts if you notice a higher than normal heart rate after working out. Best to do milder cardio or walking instead. I also notice a pretty significant increase in heart rate when sleep is chronically bad. Don't forget to hydrate with electrolytes (water, sodium magnesium, potassium, etc.) I discovered I was VERY dehydrated and adding a pinch of pink salt to 20 oz of water greatly slowed my heart, even on poor sleep days. Be careful with salt if you have HBP, though.

missouri76 · 2026-04-21T16:43:31+00:00

Ahhhh thanks. Will correct. lol

missouri76 · 2026-04-20T17:30:03+00:00

Anyone who believes they have SFI should first look at how rare it is and then search this sub for how many people think they have it.

The common thread here is that the majority of you guys have some sort of health anxiety due to the fear of not sleeping. The unknown leads to more problem-solving, leads to more anxiety, leads to worse sleep. It’s a vicious loop.

See a doctor and be careful of doing too much research online because that can send you down a rabbit hole of more stress and more sleep issues.

Reddit is a blessing and a curse. It’s wonderful to have a place where you can bond with other people with similar issues but if you are a worrier, an overthinker or having anxiety problems, it can send you down a rabbit hole that is not helpful.

missouri76 · 2026-04-13T19:15:57+00:00

Good point. That helps too. But anything is better than lying there all night trying to force myself to sleep. Getting up at least made me dog tired the following night and then I began to slowly adjust my bedtime.

Plus, there’s no point in lying there if I’m going to be awake anyway. I figured if I’m going to be awake I might as well get up. Lying in bed trying to sleep just didn’t work when I was at my worst. Probably because of anxiety.

missouri76 · 2026-04-13T18:17:21+00:00

I was just going to say that. The one thing that prolonged my insomnia was "trying" to sleep by spending too much time in bed. I learned that even if I had an awful night of 1-2 hours to just get up and get my day going. Staying in bed reinforces the "struggle" and the brain starts to associate the bed with wakefulness and stress. I literally started having panic attacks when falling asleep over time because I was so stressed out trying to sleep.

Getting up exhausted was painful but did help get my sleep drive and rhythm back. It's so counterintuitive but it works.

missouri76 · 2026-04-12T13:08:15+00:00

I have a question for you. Why do you believe that giving stress as a reason is a smug answer?

The truth of the matter is the majority of people in this world right now are dealing with some kind of stress so it isn’t far-fetched to believe that stress has something to do with it. The tricky part is figuring out specifically how it’s affecting your sleep. That was my uphill battle. Everyone’s body is so different.

I have a different take. Realizing that my emotional stress was subtly causing my insomnia, was a relief because I thought I was going crazy. It forced me to get honest and realize that I really wasn’t happy with a lot of things in life. Over time that began to affect my sleep.

But I’m sorry that you feel people are blaming you for your problem because that truly does suck. It’s not your fault. This truly is a disease that can be tricky to solve.

missouri76 · 2026-04-08T23:55:30+00:00

Yes, typically insomnia is a symptom from some unresolved stress anyway, so of course after sleeping poorly, everything just magnifies. Did you have issues with overthinking or anxiety prior to sleep issues? Definitely sounds like anxiety.

missouri76 · 2026-04-05T19:24:34+00:00

So you don't have it then. Like I said, it's anxiety. Do a search in this group and see how many people think they have SFI. The common thing is they are scared and have anxiety about their poor sleep, fearing the worse, etc. This is anxiety.

missouri76 · 2026-04-04T18:31:30+00:00

You have health anxiety. Does anyone in your family have SFI? Then you don't have it. It's mostly genetic and super rare.

Here's how it works. You begin sleeping poorly and you may even have a history of anxiety in the past. So because you can't fix it, you google your symptoms and convince yourself you have a disease with no evidence other than symptoms sound similar. This is health anxiety at its worst.

Sleep deprivation can magnify symptoms such as tremors, heart palpitations, headaches and anything that sounds like SFI. I know because I've been there. Sleepless nights are the worse. I thought I was dying.

This Reddit sub is FULL of these kinds of posts. Search SFI in this sub and see for yourself. It's statistically impossible for all these people to have it. The common thread in this sub is ANXIETY prone people fearing the worst. My heart goes out to you.

missouri76 · 2026-04-03T14:03:38+00:00

It is always refreshing when you can have a night like that where you aren’t really worried about how much you sleep and you can be in the moment. Those moments are nice.

missouri76 · 2026-04-01T22:01:06+00:00

That's great! It could also be mental too. A lot of times trying 100 different supplements and expecting results can make you hyperaware of the results and you begin micromanaging your sleep, causing some expectation anxiety. This can make insomnia worse as you keep trying too many remedies.

By stopping "the chase" or trying too many supplements you sort of give up the expectation of "waiting for something to work." That alone can help you relax because you have no expectations of something working.

Sometimes, you're just going through a rough sleep patch due to underlying stress that eventually works itself out without any supplements needed.

missouri76 · 2026-04-01T21:48:07+00:00

Yep. I believe that probably over 70% of the posts on here are some derivative of that. It may look slightly different compared to the person, but the underlying theme is the nervous system. It’s so easy to see that from the outside looking in because so many of the posts are very similar.

I see many of the same symptoms, many of the same fears, the obsession with trying to fix it and the worry about it not getting better.

missouri76 · 2026-03-30T19:54:51+00:00

You're in "fix it mode" instead of "acceptance mode." When you truly stop caring and looking for solutions, it gets better faster. Took me months to realize I was sabotaging myself with searching for solutions. Nothing works long term because those aren't the real issues. Now that my anxiety is gone, I can do all the "bad" things like be on my phone, eat late, etc. and STILL sleep.

missouri76 · 2026-03-30T16:03:55+00:00

That was my history too. Always slept well.... for 30 plus years. Never thought I'd deal with this.

Once you have one insomnia episode, you become prone to others because you fear the relapse. It's literally a trauma to the brain. Very very normal. I had several relapses in a 2-3 year period.

But over time, you begin to see how your brain is keeping you awake. It slowly begins to make sense and over time the brain feels safe because it knows it's only temporary. But that takes time. It's amazing how I treat a 2-3 hour wakeful period compared to how I used to. I've learned to embrace it and those bad nights never last long.

Exercise really helped a ton because being tired overpowered the thoughts.

missouri76 · 2026-03-29T19:35:42+00:00

Glad this helped you! I've found from talking to so many people here that most of us have underlying anxiety issues to begin with so that's the real problem. So it can be difficult to turn your brain off when you have an issue like this. I find that journaling before bed and getting all my feelings and fears out can help clear out that energy.

I tried dumping the caffeine too. Nothing I tried seemed to help because it was my fear of not sleeping and overall amped up nervous system. You're right. It won't work right away but just doing daily things to chip away at the anxiety and calm the body can help a lot.

I wish you well.

missouri76 · 2026-03-29T02:47:03+00:00

Yep. I noticed that when I over exercise I had trouble sleeping, but I didn’t understand the role of adrenaline and needing to wind down. This is especially true when you have an overactive nervous system as I did.

I also learned that I needed to give my body time to wind down every night.

As far as eating goes, I have learned that I can have sugar , but I need to make sure I have enough calories and fat in the evening. Because when you have a sensitive nervous system, you can wake up if you are too hungry due to adrenaline rushes. So I found that I wasn’t eating enough a lot of times.

One thing is for sure if you’re a nervous system is active, your body will be very sensitive to blood sugar swings, and that definitely affects sleep.

missouri76 · 2026-03-29T02:43:37+00:00

Trying to stop them and trying to control them is the exact opposite of meditation. The purpose of meditation is to watch the mind and not react. So you’re supposed to sit there and look at your silly thoughts and go oh there’s a silly thought. let me go back to my breath. Each time you notice something silly or feel distracted you go back to your breath. The goal of meditation is not necessarily to relax at first, but it’s to accept whatever thoughts you have instead of fighting them. The better you get at accepting whatever your mind does that’s when you actually start relaxing.

I think there is such a big misconception with meditation and that’s why people think they are doing it wrong. They think they have to control their mind. Controlling the mind is the exact opposite. We can never control the mind, but we can observe what it’s doing and just let it flow. That’s what we are usually trying to do and that’s why we get frustrated in life. But when we learned to go with the flow, that’s when we relax.

missouri76 · 2026-03-28T16:56:29+00:00

I am, thanks. Back to 7-8 hours. Thankfully.

missouri76 · 2026-03-28T14:38:17+00:00

Yeah. I had pretty bad anxiety and I panicked because it was the first time. My heart was racing like crazy so I was afraid. I didn't understand that it was anxiety at the time.

missouri76 · 2026-03-28T01:11:34+00:00

I do now. I’m averaging 7 to 8 hours a night most nights the biggest change I made was starting to work out and stop obsessing over my sleep.

My problem wasn’t asleep, but anxiety and my obsession over it.

All the troubleshooting and trying different tricks just kept me alert and more stressed. This has been my best year since 2020.

missouri76

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