Battling Pre-Big Day Jitters: Strategies For Better Sleep

It's the night before a big day and you can't sleep. Whether it's a presentation, exam, competition, job interview, or even a vacation, insomnia before a big event is a common experience. This phenomenon, known as special event insomnia, is often driven by performance anxiety and stress. The harder we try to sleep, the more elusive it becomes, as our worry about losing sleep only adds to our anxiety. So, what can we do to calm our minds and drift off?

Performance anxiety

Identify and Address Subconscious Links

Early life experiences, such as oversleeping and missing an important event, can create strong subconscious links. These links can trigger stress chemicals the night before a similar event, keeping you awake. To address this, reflect on past events and introduce new beliefs or decisions to replace any negative associations. For example, if you once overslept and missed an important exam, you might decide to set multiple alarms the night before an upcoming exam to ease your anxiety.

Schedule Time for Deliberate Worry

This technique, recommended by Nick Wignall, involves scheduling a specific time to address your worries and anxieties. A few days before the event, write down all your concerns without censoring yourself. Then, identify your top three concerns and create an action plan to address them. This can help reduce anxiety and make it less likely that worries will interrupt your sleep.

Build Up Your Sleep Drive

Sleep drive builds up over the course of the day. You can increase your sleep drive by exercising more and adjusting your sleep and wake-up times in the days leading up to the event. This will make you sleepier and more likely to sleep soundly the night before.

Let Go of Expectations

Sometimes, the fear of not sleeping is what causes insomnia. Try to let go of any expectations around sleep the night before a big event. If you don't sleep well, accept that you're tired, and remember that one night of missed sleep has a minimal impact on your performance.

Establish a Bedtime Routine

Create a defined nightly ritual before bed to signal to your brain that it's time to relax and prepare for sleep. This might include reading, yoga, or meditation. Avoid activities that involve electronic devices, as the blue light from screens can delay melatonin production and disrupt your sleep.

Stick to a Consistent Sleep Schedule

Maintain a consistent bedtime and wake-up time, especially in the week leading up to the big day. This helps to regulate your body's sleep-wake cycle and improve sleep quality.

Practice Relaxing Activities

If you find yourself unable to sleep, try relaxing activities such as meditation, deep breathing, or progressive muscle relaxation. These practices can help quiet your mind and body, making it easier to transition into sleep.

Avoid Stimulants and Heavy Meals

Caffeine and heavy meals too late in the day can disrupt your sleep. Avoid caffeine after noon and opt for a light, easily digestible snack if you're hungry before bed.

Remember, it's normal to struggle with sleep before a big event, and you're not alone. These strategies can help you manage performance anxiety and improve your sleep, so you can wake up feeling rested and ready to take on the day.

Stress and insomnia

Stress and anxiety are often the cause of insomnia and sleep problems. Insomnia symptoms may begin to disappear once the stressful situation has ended or the stress has subsided. However, some people fall into a cyclical pattern of sleep loss and daytime anxiety that can contribute to stress. As stress and sleep problems are so interconnected, addressing one can often lead to improvements in the other.

Insomnia is a common sleep disorder defined as persistent difficulty with sleep onset, maintenance, consolidation, or overall quality. It occurs despite adequate time and a comfortable place to sleep. People with insomnia experience excessive daytime sleepiness, fatigue, irritability, and other impairments when they are awake.

Stress can influence the structural organisation of sleep, including the duration of each sleep stage. People experiencing chronic stress may experience a decrease in the amount of time spent in deep sleep and disruptions during REM sleep.

Chronic insomnia can be diagnosed if symptoms occur at least three times a week for at least three months. Persistent stressors can heavily contribute to chronic insomnia, and those with anxiety disorders are at higher risk of experiencing insomnia symptoms.

The "Internalisation Hypothesis" Model proposes that patients with chronic insomnia are in a state of constant emotional arousal, which results in a physiological activation such as increased heart rate, peripheral vasoconstriction, elevated rectal temperature, and increased body movements before sleep. At bedtime, they are characteristically tense, anxious, and ruminative about issues associated with health, work, personal affairs, or death. As emotional arousal causes physiological arousal, they face difficulties in sleep initiation or returning to sleep after awakenings during the night. They may develop a 'fear of sleeplessness', which intensifies their emotional arousal and perpetuates their insomnia.

The "Hyperarousal" Model suggests that insomnia is a condition of hyperarousal rather than sleep loss. Insomniacs compared to normal sleepers have significantly increased rectal temperature, heart rate, vasoconstriction, and increased skeletal muscle movements before and during sleep. Insomniacs' frequent complaints of daytime fatigue have been verified in studies that measured fatigue using scales such as the Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS) and the Fatigue Scale of the Profile of Mood States (POMS).

Simple stress relief techniques can help you sleep better and feel calmer. Progressive muscle relaxation and gentle breathing exercises are recommended to reduce stress. Yoga, tai chi, and meditation are also helpful stress relief techniques.

Sleep hygiene

Set Your Sleep Schedule

• Have a fixed wake-up time: Try to wake up at the same time every day, including weekends. A fluctuating schedule disrupts your body's sleep rhythm.
• Prioritise sleep: Avoid skipping sleep to work, study, socialise, or exercise. Calculate your target bedtime based on your wake-up time and prepare for bed around that time each night.
• Make gradual adjustments: If you need to change your sleep times, do it gradually. Adjust your sleep schedule by one or two hours at a time to allow your body to adjust.
• Don't overdo it with naps: While naps can boost your energy during the day, they can interfere with your nighttime sleep. Keep naps short and in the early afternoon.

Follow a Nightly Routine

• Keep your routine consistent: Follow the same steps each night, such as putting on pyjamas and brushing your teeth, to signal to your mind that it's bedtime.
• Budget time for winding down: Engage in calming activities like soft music, light stretching, reading, or relaxation exercises for 30 minutes before bed.
• Dim the lights: Bright lights can hinder melatonin production, which facilitates sleep. Try to dim the lights starting two hours before bedtime.
• Unplug from electronics: Take a break from electronic devices like phones, tablets, and laptops 30 to 60 minutes before bed. These devices stimulate your mind and emit blue light, disrupting sleep.
• Try relaxation techniques: Instead of forcing yourself to sleep, focus on relaxation. Meditation, mindfulness, and paced breathing can help prepare your mind and body for sleep.
• Get up if you can't sleep: If you can't fall asleep within 20 minutes, get up and stretch, read, or do something calming in low light before trying again.

Cultivate Healthy Daily Habits

• Get daylight exposure: Sunlight is a key driver of circadian rhythms that promote quality sleep. Get some natural sunlight during the day.
• Be physically active: Regular exercise improves sleep quality and offers other health benefits.
• Don't smoke: Nicotine stimulates the body and disrupts sleep.
• Reduce alcohol consumption: While alcohol may make you drowsy, it can disrupt your sleep later in the night. Avoid drinking close to bedtime.
• Cut down on caffeine: Caffeine is a stimulant that can keep you wired when you want to rest. Avoid consuming it in the afternoon and evening.
• Avoid late dinners: Eating a large, heavy, or spicy meal late in the evening can disrupt your sleep as your body is still digesting. Keep any pre-bed snacks light.
• Restrict in-bed activity: To associate your bed with sleep, only use it for sleeping (and sex).

Optimise Your Bedroom

• Comfortable mattress and pillow: Choose a sleeping surface that provides comfort and supports pain-free sleep.
• Excellent bedding: Ensure your sheets and blankets match your needs and preferences.
• Set a cool temperature: A cooler bedroom temperature, around 65 degrees Fahrenheit, is ideal for sleep.
• Block out light: Use heavy curtains or an eye mask to prevent light from interrupting your sleep.
• Drown out noise: Use earplugs, a white noise machine, or a fan to block out noise disturbances.
• Try calming scents: Light scents like lavender may induce a calmer state of mind and create a positive sleep space.

Managing expectations

It is important to remember that a "good night's sleep" is not as important as we think. Most of us can function after not sleeping well for a night or even two. So, if you don't get much sleep before a big day, it's not the end of the world.

The more you try to force yourself to sleep, the more difficult it becomes. Sleep is something the body knows how to do on its own. Trying too hard to sleep sends a message to the brain that there is a problem, which activates the brain's problem-solving mode and winds you up instead of relaxing you.

Instead, try to let go of any expectations around sleep the night before a big event. This is the ultimate solution for insomnia. Insomnia is caused largely by the fear of not sleeping. If you don't get much sleep, don't pay any attention to it the next day. Don't give it any power. Just accept that you're tired and that's okay. Remember, one night of missed sleep has a very minimal impact on our performance.

If you find yourself unable to sleep, try moving to a different part of your home that's dark and cool and sit there for a bit. You can also try a brain dump—writing down all your thoughts into a journal or onto a pad of paper. Don't worry about sentence structure or forming cohesive thoughts, just keep writing down every random thought racing through your mind.

Relaxation techniques

Sleep is essential, but sometimes our minds and bodies won't allow us to rest. This is especially true when we have a big day ahead of us. Luckily, there are several relaxation techniques that can help you calm down, relieve stress, and unwind.

Diaphragmatic Breathing

Diaphragmatic breathing, also known as belly breathing, engages the large muscle at the base of the lungs. This exercise can help to reduce stress and increase relaxation, as well as strengthen the diaphragm and improve breathing efficiency. To try diaphragmatic breathing, follow these steps:

• Lie down and place one hand on your upper chest and the other on your belly, just below your rib cage.
• Breathe in through your nose so that your belly pushes against your hand. Keep your chest as still as possible.
• While keeping your chest still, tighten your stomach muscles and exhale.
• Repeat this process.

4-7-8 Breathing

This breathing technique helps to control the speed of your breath. It involves inhaling for four seconds, holding your breath for seven seconds, and then exhaling slowly for eight seconds. Repeat this pattern as many times as you need. This exercise increases oxygen levels in the body and imitates your natural breathing pattern when falling asleep, helping your body to enter a state of rest.

Yoga Nidra

Yoga nidra, or yogic sleep, is a form of meditative yoga that helps the body relax while the mind stays awake and alert. The goal is to achieve a state between wakefulness and sleep. To practice yoga nidra, find a comfortable place to lie down and use a guided meditation activity, which can be found online or through apps. Set an intention, such as stress relief, and focus on your body, noticing any tension or sensations. Follow the guided meditation instructions and allow your brain to transition between states of brain wave activity.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation

This technique involves tensing and relaxing different muscle groups, one by one, to promote physical and emotional relaxation. It is based on the idea that it is hard to feel tense when your muscles are relaxed. To try progressive muscle relaxation, lie down and focus on your toes and feet. Curl your toes and arch your feet, then relax your muscles and let your feet sink into the bed. Move your attention slowly up your body, tensing and relaxing each area as you go.

Non-Sleep Deep Rest (NSDR)

NSDR is a practice that focuses the conscious mind into a state of calm without entering the first stage of sleep. It is similar to self-hypnosis and can be done independently or with a recorded guide. To try NSDR, get comfortable, close your eyes, and focus on your body and relaxing your muscles. Inhale through your nose and exhale slowly through your mouth. Imagine sinking deeper into the surface you are lying on and maintain your focus, avoiding any other thoughts.

Guided Imagery

Guided imagery uses your imagination to engage your senses, reduce stress, and promote sleep. Imagine tasting a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie and how it affects your senses. Connect your conscious and unconscious mind to help direct your body and brain towards a desired goal, such as relieving stress and encouraging sleep.

Additional Tips for a Good Night's Sleep

• Avoid caffeine in the afternoon and evening, and limit your screen time before bed.
• Exercise during the day to relieve stress and build up your sleep drive.
• Avoid alcohol in the evening, as it can disrupt your sleep quality.
• Stick to your usual bedtime routine and sleep schedule.
• Accept that it is normal to struggle with sleep before a big event.
• Remind yourself that one night of poor sleep will not ruin your big day.

Frequently asked questions