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General Feeling stressed at night, waking up vigilant

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Never_falter2

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Hi,

I just wonder if you are familiar with this. My guy wakes up in the night and feels mega protective, hypervigilant and stressed... then he sometimes sneaks around the house and checks if everything is okay, sometimes talks to me, sometimes just lies awake and feels hypervigilant... and he is often hypervigilant about things that make no sense like one of our children running in front of a car...
Sometimes he wakes up hypervigilant in the morning and for like ten minutes he does no act like himself. One can see he is under pressure.
Then he has a cup of coffee or a snack and then he is okay and in cheerful mood, sometimes even a bit enthusiastic because he realizes the stress has no real life basis. I am not arguing pro coffee here because caffeine is not good for him and juice or whatever has the same effect or even better effect but if he is feeling hypervigilant he chooses coffee and I think that’s a bit like a ritual and after that he is okay.

Does that happen to your guy? What helps?
 
Mine gets up at night and does perimeter checks... sometimes multiple times a night.

I just let my vet do his thing. He's always on guard though. There's nothing that's going to help him with that except years of therapy... it's hard to convince yourself something isn't based on reality if it saved your life in combat. He's still in Iraq in his head.
 
Thanks for sharing @Sweetpea76. I think I did not explain this very well. Unlike your vet mine is not very happy about this or thinks it is functional. So he wakes up in the middle of the night, feels he has to check things. Then he maybe sneaks around the house, looks if everything is in the place or if there maybe something that could hurt the kids if they wake in the middle of the night and start playing... like for example a knife or a plastic bag... well there never is one... and they never wake up in the night without calling for us. Sometimes he feels like he should check out for news he needs to know about and sometimes he is afraid that they are local news he needs to know about and switches in the radio.
He actually knows it is only in his head but cannot snatch out of it because it is nearly physical for him, like he is awake and maybe he had a nightmare and then he is awake and feels mega stressed and does not feel better until he checks if everything is okay... he needs to find something that help him snatch out of it and de-stress.
 
Never_falter said:
Hi,

I just wonder if you are familiar with this. My guy wakes up in the night and feels mega prot...
Click to expand...
@Never_falter First of all, good for you for being so supportive. You're awesome. I have the same issue with sleep and hypervigilance. My psychiatrist likened it to a combat veteran with PTSD not being able to sleep because when they were in war, sleeping could kill them. I often can't sleep because I'm afraid of what will happen if I do. I don't really know what to do to help, other than tell myself, "Fear is a feeling, not a fact. Feelings are fluid and it will pass. The FACT is that I am safe. Concentrate on the facts, not the feelings."
 
@Never_falter for a minute there I thought you were talking about me.

Also after doing my checks and recheck, I'll sit in the dark and listen for anything out of place. Then when I finally get to bed, I'll usually lay there for an hour or so listening while occasionally looking out the window.

I was ambushed at night so I think this ritual resulted from that.
 
Sign me up for the wandering crowd also.... For years I would find myself standing in the middle of the room looking for "something". I never knew what it was but I had to check the whole house until I found it. Then I would lay in bed and listen.
Right about the time I finally agreed to get help I woke up in the kitchen armed with a knife and I had no idea why. Who was I going after? It was only hubby and me in the house. It scared me to death to think I may have harmed him if he had come looking for me and had gotten too close before I realized who he was.

EMDR seems to be helping...but it's a tough road.
 
How scary? You said you „woke up“, were you not aware of what you were doing? Was this like sleep walking.
He knows what he does, he is awake.
 
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