Before my serious decline, I certainly felt worse from over-sleeping, but that was a long time ago. These days, just sleeping is tough enough and when I wake I am always desperate, really desperate to get back to sleep, but after a time it just doesn't happen. Then there's an hour or so of feeling like death, before I start to become functional (or at least, as functional as I get). Oddly, once I reach that functional stage, it doesn't really seem to matter that much whether I had a "long" sleep (which for me might be 5-6 hours, 7 if I am really lucky) or little/no sleep (2-3 cumulative hours in a series of 30-45 minute periods of unconsciousness is not uncommon) - I feel about the same either way.
Feeling worse from oversleeping—poll
- Thread starter Jaybee00
- Start date
It seems to me 2 different things are being discussed:
- People sleeping less than they would like to, i.e. "shorter sleep".
- Waking up after sleeping and going to sleep again afterwards, but feeling worse after the second wake up then the first, i.e. something more akin to "interrupted" sleep rather than "shortened sleep".
I'm not sure which way to vote. As with others, sleeping outside the normal times does make me feel worse. However, normally I can't fall asleep outside the normal times, so if I can fall asleep during the day, it's because I'm seriously ill, so that confounds the response.
An oddity I recently became aware of: I usually avoid going to bed too early because I expected it to result in waking earlier, but the opposite seems to happen; going to bed an hour or two earlier might result in waking up an hour or two later than normal. That's for a non-repeated change, so going to bed early every night might result in just shifting my usual 7-hr sleep. The extra hour I got recently did no result in feeling worse, but not noticeably better either.
An oddity I recently became aware of: I usually avoid going to bed too early because I expected it to result in waking earlier, but the opposite seems to happen; going to bed an hour or two earlier might result in waking up an hour or two later than normal. That's for a non-repeated change, so going to bed early every night might result in just shifting my usual 7-hr sleep. The extra hour I got recently did no result in feeling worse, but not noticeably better either.
AliceLily
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
I can't recall oversleeping since I had ME. I've lost so many hours of sleep these 30 years that whenever I manage a extra hour here or there it is a thankful bonus.
One thing that I did find extremely unpleasant in my severest years was having fallen asleep in the afternoon for a few hours and waking up feeling like my blood pressure had dropped very low. I wouldn't let myself to fall asleep in the afternoons after that experience even though I was desperate for sleep because of the severe night time insomnia.
PEM always induces insomnia for me.
One thing that I did find extremely unpleasant in my severest years was having fallen asleep in the afternoon for a few hours and waking up feeling like my blood pressure had dropped very low. I wouldn't let myself to fall asleep in the afternoons after that experience even though I was desperate for sleep because of the severe night time insomnia.
PEM always induces insomnia for me.
ScoutB
Established Member (Voting Rights)
Yes I have this. I agree with others that it seems analogous to a similar pattern in healthy people, though back when I was healthy this second period of morning sleep would just leave me a bit more groggy. Now that I have ME/CFS the extra sleep seems to induce the waking-up-feeling-hit-by-a-truck experience that others have talked about taking a couple hours of rest in the morning to recover from.
Experiencing this (waking up at, say, 6am feeling relatively ok, going back to sleep, and then waking up again later on in that post-sleep extra bad state) made me wonder two things
- Could whatever's going wrong with our sleep be happening towards the end of the sleep period?
- Is whatever happens biologically to healthy people here to make them feel more groggy in this situation somehow exaggerated or hitting on something that's dysfunctional in ME/CFS?
Kitty
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Often wondered the same, though it feels as if there's nothing normal about any stage of my sleep.
Because I occasionally experience normal sleep, I don't think it does for me. I've slept long enough to feel a bit groggy, but it doesn't last as long and isn't nearly as unpleasant. It's more a sluggish feeling that will pass with a bit of fresh air or movement, and there are no 'flu-like symptoms. What passes for sleep in ME/CFS produces a fogged-up brain that won't connect, heavy fatigue, additional OI, sore throat, swollen glands, and feeling generally rubbish.
ETA: crazy as it sounds, I often feel as if sleep triggers PEM.
Yes, this is what I was referring to initially.
How about this?— the sleep that you get from morning re-sleeping is less likely to be NREM sleep, so there is sleep but little or no clearance of junk (glymphatic clearance) which leads you to feel crappy—see here for example.
The problem with such an argument is that they tend to not be sufficient if lack of junk clearance is supposed to be the cause of symptoms. What was originally proposed was, is that you feel worse after extra sleep following waking not equally bad. So you have to somehow argue that there is an accumulation of junk, rather than just less clearance and I don't see the paper mentioned showing that.
But I wouldn't be opposed to the general idea that some "overwrite while sleeping for recovery"-process is broken.
NelliePledge
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
I voted never. When I wake up I don’t feel ok ish I feel rough. I have trouble with getting to sleep so everything is shifted to morning sleeping. If I wake up early it is equivalent to someone with a normal sleeping pattern waking up in the middle of the night. Currently due to post Christmas PEM I am in nocturnal mode I went to sleep at 6am when I woke at 11am I needed to go back to sleep. I didn’t get up until 3 pm.
I never plan naps between getting up and going to bed. If I have had broken sleep or as sometimes happens I don’t sleep at all or I have had to force myself to get up early for appointments I then allow my body to take sleep when it can. I take sleeping a lot on any day as my body needing to catch up on a deficit. I agree with what @Yann04 said about oversleeping being a negative bias term. Also worth mentioning If I do sleep longer I make sure to drink water on waking as I feel that I’m more likely to be dehydrated which obviously is something that can make you feel rough but easily addressed.
I never plan naps between getting up and going to bed. If I have had broken sleep or as sometimes happens I don’t sleep at all or I have had to force myself to get up early for appointments I then allow my body to take sleep when it can. I take sleeping a lot on any day as my body needing to catch up on a deficit. I agree with what @Yann04 said about oversleeping being a negative bias term. Also worth mentioning If I do sleep longer I make sure to drink water on waking as I feel that I’m more likely to be dehydrated which obviously is something that can make you feel rough but easily addressed.
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Peter T
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
I found this difficult to answer as in the thirty years of my ME I have probably experienced every possible variation in sleep patterns. I eventually decided on ‘occasionally’.
I have had periods of hypersomnia, sleeping sixteen or more hours in a twenty four hour period. This has only occurred for periods of several months three or four times, first during my initial EBV infection and the start of the ME it triggered, again during and following the seasonal flue that triggered my first major relapse and possibly once or twice since. When this happened I would wake up still tired and wanting more sleep. I guess it could be said I was oversleeping every day.
Sustained hyposomnia is probably much less common than I feel it is. When I have kept a diary no matter how disrupted my sleep patterns may be, I was surprised how often when averaged over several days I was actually sleeping six to eight hours per twenty four hour period. Occasionally I have woken from what felt like a good eight or more hours sleep feeling rested, but in general it is much more common to wake feeling unwell and feeling I need several hours rest to recover from having been asleep. PEM can trigger short term insomnia, tired but wired.
My more frequent experience is disrupted sleep patterns, frequent waking or shifting body clock (ie getting to sleep a bit latter each day and similarly waking later, even at times reaching complete day/night reversal of sleeping patterns). Then I can wake with my body insisting it is the middle of the night, no matter what time of day it is.
Given this variety of experience it is hard be clear about specific patterns, but at times sleeping longer than my current sleeping times can result in me feeling better, or feeling worse or not having any obvious impact.
I have had periods of hypersomnia, sleeping sixteen or more hours in a twenty four hour period. This has only occurred for periods of several months three or four times, first during my initial EBV infection and the start of the ME it triggered, again during and following the seasonal flue that triggered my first major relapse and possibly once or twice since. When this happened I would wake up still tired and wanting more sleep. I guess it could be said I was oversleeping every day.
Sustained hyposomnia is probably much less common than I feel it is. When I have kept a diary no matter how disrupted my sleep patterns may be, I was surprised how often when averaged over several days I was actually sleeping six to eight hours per twenty four hour period. Occasionally I have woken from what felt like a good eight or more hours sleep feeling rested, but in general it is much more common to wake feeling unwell and feeling I need several hours rest to recover from having been asleep. PEM can trigger short term insomnia, tired but wired.
My more frequent experience is disrupted sleep patterns, frequent waking or shifting body clock (ie getting to sleep a bit latter each day and similarly waking later, even at times reaching complete day/night reversal of sleeping patterns). Then I can wake with my body insisting it is the middle of the night, no matter what time of day it is.
Given this variety of experience it is hard be clear about specific patterns, but at times sleeping longer than my current sleeping times can result in me feeling better, or feeling worse or not having any obvious impact.