Hi! I’m new here, can I have tips how to sleep better; having a panic attack every night?

[SerenaSolsikke]

Same question as title said, but also how can I deal with panic attacks in general? (I deal with it everyday in many times of the day) do think I deal with C-PTSD though I yet have to be properly diagnosed first; please do not ask me about my triggers but just reply how I can cope better.

 

[Ice_Fire]

Hey, welcome.

I have night time triggers, some nights I just don’t sleep because I can’t relax, so you have my sympathy.

Some things I’ve found useful are the usual stuff: have a routine, even if it’s not a specific time, I do the same things every night. I’ll do the necessary washing and teeth etc but then I’ll have a hot drink before I go to sleep (or at least attempt it), a hot water bottle, unless it’s really warm out because I like having something warm to snuggle with.

One that I found strangely helpful was making sure the door was fully closed so nobody could sneak in, even though I live alone. And the door has a clothes peg rail thing on it that makes a noise when I open it, which at least made me think I’d wake up if I heard it. Silly but is comforting to me.

I also used to use white noise, but now I’ve found a cool little playlist on Apple Music called Bedtime Beats that I listen to. I set a timer for an hour and have my phone shut it off when the times up. Usually I’m asleep before the hour is up. If not, I’ll reset it. I’ll have it at a really low volume so the sudden quiet doesn’t then wake me. I began having it at 20 minutes but if I was still awake it would go quiet and I’d panic that I still wasn’t asleep yet!

I try not to have the time showing. My phone is on my nightstand but I have to tap it to see the time. Having a clock with a lume that was always visible made me clock watch and I’d become more and more anxious.

As for panic attacks in general, honestly I’m not much help, sorry. Grounding techniques are useful. If I’m sat I’ll stand up, if I’m stood up I’ll sit down. Just a change of position to try and break out of it. Try to name 5 things of a certain colour near me, just to bring me back to the here and now. But mainly I just have to have my panic and it subsides on it’s own eventually.

 

[SerenaSolsikke]

Hey, welcome.

I have night time triggers, some nights I just don’t sleep because I can’t relax, so you have my sympathy.

Some things I’ve found useful are the usual stuff: have a routine, even if it’s not a specific time, I do the same things every night. I’ll do the necessary washing and teeth etc but then I’ll have a hot drink before I go to sleep (or at least attempt it), a hot water bottle, unless it’s really warm out because I like having something warm to snuggle with.

One that I found strangely helpful was making sure the door was fully closed so nobody could sneak in, even though I live alone. And the door has a clothes peg rail thing on it that makes a noise when I open it, which at least made me think I’d wake up if I heard it. Silly but is comforting to me.

I also used to use white noise, but now I’ve found a cool little playlist on Apple Music called Bedtime Beats that I listen to. I set a timer for an hour and have my phone shut it off when the times up. Usually I’m asleep before the hour is up. If not, I’ll reset it. I’ll have it at a really low volume so the sudden quiet doesn’t then wake me. I began having it at 20 minutes but if I was still awake it would go quiet and I’d panic that I still wasn’t asleep yet!

I try not to have the time showing. My phone is on my nightstand but I have to tap it to see the time. Having a clock with a lume that was always visible made me clock watch and I’d become more and more anxious.

As for panic attacks in general, honestly I’m not much help, sorry. Grounding techniques are useful. If I’m sat I’ll stand up, if I’m stood up I’ll sit down. Just a change of position to try and break out of it. Try to name 5 things of a certain colour near me, just to bring me back to the here and now. But mainly I just have to have my panic and it subsides on it’s own eventually.

thank you!! do you know any other coping methods?

 

[arfie]

hello serena. welcome to the forum. sorry for what brings you here, but glad you are here.

alas, i haven't found any quick, easy or sustainable cures for my ptsd symptoms and what works for some doesn't always work for me. the best solutions/coping tools i've found have been acquired through tedious trial and error. i've been on my recovery road for long enough that i have amassed more psych tools than i care to type. i have grown to be a huge believer in learning my tools one at a time. when i experiment with too many at once i only confuse myself further.

while pro support has been valuable, peer support has been priceless in the search for what works for me. sharing experience with a broad base of people who actually use the tools gives me insights i can't gain from folks who have only studied those tools from a safe social distance. virtual peer support groups such as this one help mightily. real time support groups help even more.

for what it's worth
i breathe my way through panic attacks for immediate coping. deep cleansing breaths. once the attack has passed, i get busy plying my deeper tools. peer support, journaling, meditation, channeling, etc.

bedtime anxiety is tougher in my own case. a vigorous work-out and journaling before bed are my two go-to tools.

 

[Friday]

The way I was taught to manage/eliminate panic attacks is (come to find) known as “fast & dirty”. Because it only works about half the time, and the other half of the time it carves the trigger in stone and sends you to the looney bin.

What that looked like was you, triggering yourself/being triggered, and a small group of other people to tackle you to the floor and hold you until you calmed down. And then do it again. And again. And again. Hundreds of times over the course of 3-4 days.

Seeeeeeeriously NOT recommended.

But this is what I learned :

- Recognize what’s happening.

- No need to be afraid of it, or angry about it, or feel anything about it at all. It’s just a biological/instinctual response. In the wrong time&place. So it’s time to retrain it, is all.

- Divorce my emotions from my body. (Different from above.) Just because my BODY is freaking out? Doesn’t mean I have to be. Once that’s sorted?

- Clear my mind, & ready to act. Next?

- Act. On purpose. Pretty much anything. It’s wresting conscious control away from instinctual control. Whatever the instinct is? Fight, run, drop, freeze, whatever? Don’t do that. Do what you’ve decided to do. <<< This is where most lessons “start” with panic attacks, teaching people how to breathe, on purpose. That’s one very useful skill, to be sure. I just prefer to start farther back, and to have more actions in my back pocket, is all.

- Work on calming my body down, now that I’m back in the drivers seat. Slow my breathing, my heart rate, all of it. Like after sprinting until you collapse and your heart is beating out of your chest, and limbs shaking, and breath ragged? Stop that. Catch your breath, slow everything down, stop shaking, stand up, walk it off. Vision, hearing, all clearing as all systems go back to normal.

- Remerge / undivorce my body & emotions

- Recover faster. (The hangover that follows? Isn’t required. It’s just a natural byproduct of the clusterf*ck. Once the clusterf*ck is in hand? The recovery from it gets faster & faster, too.)

When I haven’t had a panic attack in years? It can take me 3 days to unf*ck myself. When I’m having multiple panic attacks a day? Tick. Tick. BOOM. That’s called “practice” and I can usually shorten the entire experience to a few minutes, and then to a few seconds in very short order.

Now… I haven’t don’t the fast & dirty method of dealing with triggers & stressors in over 20 years.

(There is a sloooooow and very sane, but crazy effective method of eliminating triggers & stressors that does not require any of the risk fast&dirty comes along with. It’s called exposure therapy, and it means you spend apx 92% of your time bored off your ass, & 7.9% of your time debating about what else you could be doing with that time, and 0.1% of your time just flickering/flirting up near the edge of a reaction. Hit anxiety in your belly, ice in your veins, much less a full fledged panic attack? You’ve gone waaaaay too far, too fast. Bored. Bored as f*ck. Is where all the action is.)

You don’t need to do fast & dirty to be able to recognize what’s happening, and stop it in its tracks. But it DOES take practice. And an understanding that not only is this temporary, but super duper malleable. Somehing you can play with. Something you can learn to control. They’ll still happen, but your response to it happening? Will get faster & faster, more & more effective.

 

[Freddyt]

8 times out of 10 when I have a panic attack my PTSD is lying to me. It's saying you need to panic when I don't.

One of the things we do is bring fears from the past into the present, they are still there and still real to us. Unless I am overloaded or overwhelmed, convincing myself that I am here in the present, and that I am safe is a big part of dealing with it, it's called grounding.

Learning to deal with rumination - that tornado of thought imagining worst case scenarios and creating fear and panic is a huge part in this too. To be able to recognize and stop that keeps me from getting wound up enough to get to panic. There's tons of threads on rumination on the site that can help you with that.