INFJ's and Sleep.

I have strange sleeping habits. I battle with insomnia a lot, and have all these tricks that I use to deal with it.

I fall asleep quickly and easily, but wake up for hours in the middle of the night. Then I fall back asleep and wake up a few hours later, usually for a few hours. Sometimes this can go on and on and on. It totally sucks. It'll be interesting to see what other people say.

 

sleep is odd for me. Ideally I need 10+ hours of sleep to feel totally recharged. I also always feel like I never get enough sleep. I HATE waking up regardless of what is going on. I also tend to go to bed very late (after 2am), and like to wake up late (after noon). I also get a very strange physical feeling when I am falling asleep, but I believe this to be caused by something else and will go away in a week or so. It takes a while for me to fall alseep if I am stressed because I fail horribly at turning off my mind. It is near impossible for me to do.

 

Yep, go to bed very late, obsessing over things, even when i'm sleepy, and then going to sleep with the tv on. Can't go to bed with complete silence. My mind is so preoccupied with things that it's hard to fully rest. I think not having a full schedule doesn't help either. Too much time to think. Sometimes, it's best to be doing something, work, school, etc. if it's not too stressful than having very little to do.

 

All of my life I've slept with ease. It was wonderful. I would lie down, and within 2-3 minutes be asleep. I guess I've been very lucky.
But my sleeping habits have been consistently irregular during the last 10 years, and it seems I've reached a point now at which I'm seriously being affected by it. I actually have a really hard time practicing good sleep habits and I avoid going to bed because I feel anxious about going to bed unless I am quite literally passing out. I get really stressed out that I won't be able to sleep, so I avoid it altogether by wearing myself out. I'm going to have to face this anxiety though, because the toll on me is very costly.

As for restlessness and thinking when I am going to bed, I avoid it now because I'm just so tired that my body gives out. But when I wasn't, I would use breathing and imagery if I noticed my thoughts were active. Or I would literally realize what I was doing, and along the lines of "Okay, that's enough, it's time to sleep", somehow stop or slow them down. It worked.

As for my dreams, I don't remember my dreams as often as I'd like, but oftentimes they are very bizarre. They tend to leave me with heavy and vivid emotion that sometimes hangs around me all day.

 

My sleep habits...Oh jeez, this is kinda interesting to think about. When I was an adolescent, I had trouble falling asleep because I always felt that I couldn't sleep and when I attempted to force myself to fall asleep, I would just think about things I needed to do and imagine how it should play out. I was used to only getting four to seven hours of sleep every night and I felt fine though. At least, as fine as I could with me combating depression. Another thing i remember about this point in time is that I never remembered any of my dreams (Everyone HAS them) I would remember my dream once in a rare occasion and they usually involve me being scared of something or having an absurd amount of a particular feeling, but that's another topic

Now though, my sleep habits are somewhat normalized. I have more dreams that I actually remember and I also, on average, get more sleep. However, I do suffer from insomnia now. For some reason, I always wake up four to five hours into my sleep and then have to go through the process of falling asleep again (Which isn't all that hard at this point.) The major differences between now and then is that I've learned some meditative techniques to calm my mind, and I often sleep without my T.V. on (I did that a lot but now I typically lie in bed with my labtop which isn't better)

 

I'm good at sleeping at times where I'm not planning to sleep. Such as while watching a film, meditating, etc. But in a routine, sleeping in the evening to wake up in the morning, I never seem to sleep at all. In the past, I would sleep for a few hours just right after closing my eyes but then I'd be wide awake throughout the rest of the night and fall asleep again when the sun rises.

I'm the opposite and I can't have the slight sound of water dripping even if the bathroom is far away, or clocks ticking. I allso unplug the electronics in the house.


Just till a few days ago, I could remember all my dreams. They had only recently become more vivid to the point where I wake up because I feel it happens in real life. But this week I just have very faint memories when I wake up

I try to meditate to go back to sleep but it hasn't worked these few days. My mind just gets very excited and full of energy. I'm thinking if it happens tonight, I will get out of bed and walk around. In the past I would have a snack with some protein and berries before sleeping because I heard it keeps your blood sugar level throughout the night (which is what keeps you awake).

 

-I'm a teen, so this is probably bad but I get about 4-5 hours of sleep each night. But I just CANT fall asleep.
-I have many dreams--I even have dreams if I take a short nap and I don't really know how thats possible because I don't know how I could go into a deep sleep within an hour. Almost all of these are nightmares.
-But some days I do get a good sleep--these are the nights when my cat sits on me when I am lying down and purrs so I have to stay in that spot.

 

sleep for me is always different and it depends alot if im sleeping alone or together with someone. if im sleeping together with someone i often fall asleep instantly, like a baby. otherwise it's a battle. i rarely (almost never) remember my dreams. i need 10h of sleep to feel rested. i often feel completely alone with my dreadful head and without any means to get rid of it to become calm and fall asleep. it's a waiting game most of the time. and it's random: i can be halfway to sleep just to suddenly start thinking about someone or something and be halfway awake.

in short: i hate the night and i hate trying to sleep.

during the day i can sleep anytime and anywhere...

 

First of all, I do really enjoy sleeping. For me, it is the perfect way to just escape and let all of my problems become nothing if only for a little while. However, I also need to say that unless I'm totally exhausted and under-slept, It is incredibly hard for me to fall asleep. There's just so much going on in my mind and in my emotions, that it is very distracting I guess you could say, from quickly and easily descending into slumber...it usually takes quite a while if I ever fall asleep at all.

Ask my family about my own sleeping habits, and they'll tell you that I'm extremely prone to being nocturnal. I'd actually say that I vacillate between being nocturnal and not though more of the time I'm not. I do enjoy staying up all through the night sometimes because there are some very cool benefits but ultimately, maybe it isn't so healthy to stay awake when everyone else is sleep.

When I do fall asleep though, my dreams are usually extremely vivid. I can wake up and write all about them. Sometimes they're telling me things, I think so yes. They're extremely vivid.

 

The vast majority of my life, I've definitely been at a point where I end up staring at my ceiling in bed just thinking for a good couple of hours before I can finally fall asleep. Lots of great thought during those periods, but it definitely left me less than rested when I'd still have to get up a few hours later for classes. And here I was always being called completely lazy for sleeping close to noon on the weekends by my parents, haha.

Recently though, and it may have much to do with extreme stress levels (and has also been probably the least dangerous sign of high stress I've had at that), I've developed a case of hypersomnia. I'm not entirely sure, outside of trying to relax, of what to do with it. There have been times that I've been sitting there working on homework, and come to a few hours later on the floor wondering why my shoulder is killing me and very confused about what day and time it is. It's kinda been a bit of a hinderance in getting things done at that. I've had some nasty bruising from falling out of chairs or off my bed at an odd angle too.

 

my INFJ love falls asleep quickly, easily, and deeply. We'll go to bed and within minutes he's gone. Making weird noises and shuddering and "running" in his sleep like an adorable puppy. I'm likely to be up all night though.

 

I dont dream a lot but it is in color. I was told that having dreams in color is not typical. I have a very strong Ni. I fall asleep fast and sleep like a rock. That is just me.

 

Outside noises bother me, I have to drown them out with a loud air filter blower with it just mere inches from my head, and even then still sleep with ear plugs, then a bandanna tied around my eyes.

Every window in my house has black 4 mil plastic taped over it, sorta dual purpose... shuts out light, affords me privacy , plus saves on my power bill so I don't lose heat in the winter and cool in the summer.

It irritates me hearing thumpity thump in someones vehicle driving by, when I'm trying to sleep. The bassing "boom-chica-boom-boom" concert speakers that the younger generation loves so much.

I had a hard time sleeping when I was younger, sometimes 2 hours to get to sleep. I have stayed up 24 hours before many times.

I think of that movie a lot with Tom Hanks...Castaway , where he was on the island , imagining how peaceful that would be, sleeping in a cave, listening to the roaring of the ocean, the wind blowing, the rain falling.

The more exhausted I am before sleep usually will determine if dreaming will happen, if I am really tired and sleepy I know dreams will occur almost 99%.

 

I need about 10 hours of sleep to be fully enough. but every night I find myself staying up late for no reason. definitely need to change that habit.

 

It's of the topic, but maybe you are anemic. I used to be always sleepy, than I found it's sirious anemia. Maybe you should control that.