Broken sleep started with recent HA flare-up. Advice?

[jbrokeri]

My most recent HA flare-up started about a month ago following a short period of high stress.  Since that time I have begun to wake up at 1 am and 4:45 am +/- 10 minutes, with a long period of being half-awake prior to getting out of bed.  This occurs EVERY night, except for one night when I took some cold medicine, which resulted in my sleeping too much that night.  This has clearly become a pattern for my body, but I'm not sure how to get out of it now.  I don't drink caffeine, no chocolate, I exercise 5-6 days per week, and I don't eat too close to bedtime.  I've tried the usual relaxation stuff (baths, quiet time before bed, no TV  or reading in bed, etc.) with no effect on the sleeping pattern.  I do fall back asleep, but this has really caught up with me over the last few days.  Being tired has always triggered my HA, and I'm concerned about falling into a pattern with that again, too.  Not to mention that one of my past HA concerns has been fatal insomnia  .  Prior to this I had a very regular sleep schedule (8-8.5 hrs. a night), and hadn't had any prolonged insomnia issues in almost a year.  I'm just looking for some suggestions that you guys might have from experience to try to get my brain out of this rut!

Thanks,
Jessica

[Warbirdwf]

Is your body waking you up because you need to go to the bathroom? I know a lot of folks w/out anxiety who wake up around the same times you do to urinate. If this is the case, cut back on your fluids before bed.

If it's not the case, don't worry about it. You'll eventually go back to your normal sleep patterns. Since my high anxiety started months ago, I've had all kinds of weird sleep patterns that lasted a day or two to weeks. Now, I'm sleeping normally again.
Your body does weird things all on it's own. What your experiencing is not too big a deal. Relax, stop worrying about it and you'll be fine.

[tigerpaw]

Insomnia was one of my worse symptoms, not enough sleep was making my HA get worse and worse. Visit your Dr. and ask for a nightime med.  This could just be a short period and go away as fast as it came.