Sometimes I Can't Sleep

And I want to understand why.

Observations

In line with my more scientific way of thinking, I'll be stating what I can notice about the behavior. I think that listing the various factors of today may help with recognizing a pattern.

I'll keep updating this as I have more cases. I'm just adding all of the potential factors until I notice a pattern of what works and what doesn't.

Case 2023-07-14

Woke up at: ~9:30 am

Caffeine at: ~3:00 pm

Food: Had 2 think bars, a burger and a few chips, 1 scoop of ice cream for the day (1 meal at 6:00 pm)

Short exercise at: ~4:30 pm

Sleeping Temperature: ~71F (Feels hotter)

Music when trying to sleep: Majority of the night didn't listen to anything

Melatonin: None

Other Medications: None

Fan: Tower Fan, on max, stationary(oscillating off)

Sleeping Posture: Tried multiple positions, couldn't seem to get comfortable

Went to bed at: 12:57 am (Didn't fall asleep)

Stayed in bed for: ~ 2:30 hours

Last known time awake: 4:21am

Events before bed: Before I went to bed I played a tense Rocket League Tournament with a friend. Then I watched videos for about an hour before trying to fall asleep. No sleep routine, just hopped into bed.

Recent Stressful Events: Went through my budget today, also went through my finances for the past 3 years. Had a conversation with my dad about what happens if he were to die, what I should do. Work was less productive than I would have liked. I didn't get as far as I would have liked on my personal projects. Had some stressful games of Rocket League. Spent 98% of the day alone. Spent nearly half an hour reading about strikes in the US and the new potential strikes. I've also been left nearly in charge of the house, and practically forgot some of the responsibilities.

Final Notes: I can't really tell if there was any 1 thing that prevented me from falling sleep earlier. It could be any number of things. I was also idling pondering as I was going to bed. Wasn't thinking or focusing on anything specific.

Case 2023-07-17

Woke up at: ~7:30 am

No Caffeine.

Food: 3 think bars, a burger, some cookies. Technically I haven't been eating enough the past few days, but I don't get hungry so I don't consider it a problem. I doubt that hunger is causing me to loose sleep, but it couldn't help to test for it.

Light exercise, some walking outside.

Sleeping Temperature: ~73F

Music while sleeping: Light, slightly upbeat. (I could think louder than the music)

Melatonin: None

Fan: Tower Fan, on max, stationary(oscillating off)

Went to bed at: 10:35pm

Stayed in bed for: 30 minutes

Notes: Tonight I noticed a few things that stuck out. The temperature may have a role in my ability to sleep. Or at least a larger role than I had imagined. I didn't really notice that my bed was too warm, it was just uncomfortable to be under my blanket. I tried putting a bowl of ice cubes in front of my fan to see if that would help at all.

Believe it or not, I think that by closing my garage door, I'll be able to sleep better. For whatever reason it seems that the garage door was left open during today, and it got up to 105F outside today. My room is directly above the garage. (The door opening and closing shakes my plants) So the heat, from the garage being open, could be raising up and causing my room to be slightly warmer than I'm used to. Just a hunch, but I thought I would close the garage door anyway, considering I have no idea why it was left open in the first place.

It seems that the air conditioning isn't working well enough for what I need. I set it to 68F about an hour ago, and it's still on 74F.

The other observation that I had made was that I was getting stuck in a lot of thinking. Even with music to listen to and try and distract my thinking brain, I still found myself thinking over the songs. I think that this subtle factor is probably playing a bigger role in why I can't fall asleep. But how can I test for it? And what can I do to prevent it?

I bet I could prove this by seeing how difficult it is to fall asleep while doing math equations. It just seems like I can't fall asleep while my brain is active, I need some way to shut itself off. I've tried some breathing techniques and meditations before, but nothing really worked.

Hypotheses:

Based on my observations, here is what I think may be causing my inability to sleep:

Hypothesis 1: Playing games within an hour of trying to fall asleep will make it more difficult to fall asleep. (I won't expect this affect to last longer than a specific amount of time, say 1-2 hours.)

Hypothesis 2: Lack of a consistent sleep schedule makes it difficult to fall asleep.

Hypothesis 2b: Sleeping in later, makes it more difficult to fall asleep earlier, and vice versa.

Hypothesis 3: A warmer room temperature makes it more difficult to fall asleep.

Hypothesis 4: Thinking makes it more difficult to fall asleep.

Experiments:

It's going to be a little bit difficult to control for so many variables to determine what specifically causes this poor sleep. I want to pay attention to 2 things: The things negatively affecting my sleep, and the things positively affecting my sleep.

I think that I will conduct my experiments in such a way that I can cross reference them to make observations. For example, when I get into a consistent sleep schedule, then I can try playing a stressful game before bed and see if the response is the same. If I don't have that bad of a response to it, then I may be able to eliminate one of the hypotheses.

Bias

One of the things that is difficult with running experiments on myself is that I have an inherent bias. I can't exactly counteract this easily without modifying the validity of the experiment. This isn't any fancy experiment either, I just want to fall asleep within a reasonable time. And figure out what is causing me to loose so much sleep.

Running experiments on my sleep will also subtly affect my quality of sleep. In my head, I'll be trying to pay attention to whether or not I'm asleep. I'll become stressed if I don't fall asleep fast enough or at all. And I don't know how I can overcome this type of bias when the experiment has to be done on me, because I'm the one that I want to observe the behavior of. If I were to run this experiment on others, I may be able to come up with general patterns. But what I'm focused on is figuring out what's affecting my sleep. Which is different for everyone.

Experiment: Sleep Schedule

Objective: Test the hypothesis that lack of a consistent sleep schedule makes it difficult to fall asleep.

Procedure:

Baseline: Spend 1 week with inconsistent sleep schedule. Going to bed at least 2 hours different from one day to then next.

Experiment: Spend 1 week with a very consistent sleep schedule. Going to bed within 30 minutes of the night before.

Analysis:...

Going To Bed Procedure:

Turn Off Devices. No devices for at least 30 minutes before bed. [1]
Prepare Space: Turn on fans, get everything ready for bed. Ideal temp is between 68 - 72 degrees Fahrenheit.
Prepare For Tomorrow: Set alarm for the next day.
Brush Teeth.
Reflect On Today: Gratitude Journal.
Sleep Timer: Start a sleep time playlist that you know stops after ~25 minutes.