Applied Psychology

A tip from a YouTube video

Research suggests that not just sleep position, but sleep itself, can play a role in musculoskeletal pain, including neck and shoulder pain. In one study, researchers compared musculoskeletal pain in 4,140 healthy men and women with and without sleeping problems. Sleeping problems included difficulty falling asleep, trouble staying asleep, waking early in the mornings, and non-restorative sleep. They found that people who reported moderate to severe problems in at least three of these four categories were significantly more likely to develop chronic musculoskeletal pain after one year than those who reported little or no problem with sleep. One possible explanation is that sleep disturbances disrupt the muscle relaxation and healing that normally occur during sleep. Additionally, it is well established that pain can disrupt sleep, contributing to a vicious cycle of pain disrupting sleep, and sleep problems contributing to pain.

Quite difficult to describe how to do it in text, so watch the vid

it uses this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_following_response , i tried reading that article and it was too complex for me

"Psychologists now say that this is a dangerous myth. Some people use this theory as a license to hurt others. Research has found that "letting it rip" with anger actually escalates anger and aggression and does nothing to help you (or the person you're angry with) resolve the situation."

Most conventional approaches don't work, like one word answers, turning away, making small motions toward doors, mindlessly agreeing with them.

The best approach is too not respond in any kind of significant way, including head nods

One is to let it play out a bit, because often times there's some useful thought in there that if you completely ignore will actually cause more anxiety.

Once you're ready to stop the rumination simply note it. Some of my go to notes for rumination are "anxiety" "social anxiety" "guilt" "doubt" "fear" "obsession" "not useful". (I use "not useful" the most, as it seems to have a non-judgmental quality to it).

So the strategy is to either sit down or stand and note the rumination as it pops up or continue what you're doing but take note when it pops up. Sometimes I do both. It works very well.

pilot study from 2015 was one of the first to look at the effects of meditation on IBS symptoms. The researchers found that after just nine weeks of meditating, IBS sufferers had drastic reductions in their symptoms—and this continued for three weeks after the meditation program ended.

You could try that meditation eating, but imo meditation eating is very hard

Lying down meditation is still like impossible for me

A friend sent me:

It's less mental tricks and more fundamental trust. I care about only one opinion of me, and it's not mine - it's God's. That opinion is, in short, "you suck but it's ok, we're working on it". So I aim to do better than yesterday.

It is also worth noting that the only person whose behaviour you can control is yourself, so don't worry about what others choose, instead choose, consciously, to laugh it off, and over time it becomes real.

This is likely contempt - feeling superior

My spouse is talking to me less than usual today vs my spouse is ignoring me

This also sounds like a variation of saying i statements instead of you statements

My criticism: they didnt address that some activities, in their example, browsing Reddit, might come easier than others like trying to exercise every day. Basically they emphasized individual responsibility, the same way as most similar vids. Reddit has had a lot of engineering put into trying to make it more enticing that healthier activities, so it'll be easier to get into those unhealthy activities since you're basically more predisposed.

I'm gonna try to keep track of how many lemmy posts i click. To try to eventually reduce how much time i spend online. I found an app on f-droid called 'counter'. Not sure how to link to f-droid apps.

The first thing i learnt in like budgeting 101 was to keep track of expenses and i figure this would be the same process for reducing my online time.

Immediate-release melatonin has a short elimination half-life of about 20 to 50 minutes. Meaning if you wake up too early or halfway through sleep, you might as well take it then.

Higher doses do not appear to result in a stronger effect but instead appear to cause drowsiness for a longer period of time.

It's safe to take melatonin everyday for 12 months. Might not be studied sufficiently to know beyond that.

It's generally makes people fall asleep 6 minutes faster, but doesn't change overall sleeping time.

It's useful for a bunch of other health problems, read the article to see if it applies to you.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melatonin_(supplement/medication)

Before doing anything too crazy

Follow up to https://mander.xyz/post/198078?scrollToComments=true

Haven't looked into it at all, but intuitively it's probably less harmful than purely like Lemmy/text/pictures socializing

Wikipedia summary:

If you can't sleep, that sucks but not the end of the world. Not even thattt harmful.

Paradoxical Intention is a treatment method which involves telling the patient to do the exact opposite of what they have been doing in bed: They should stay awake and avoid falling asleep.[3] The goal of this method is to decrease performance anxiety which may inhibit sleep onset.[3][4] Paradoxal Intention has been shown to be an effective treatment for sleep initiation insomnia but might not be effective for sleep maintenance or mixed insomnia

Article talks about sleep hygiene

More effective than pills (ex zopiclone). Chronic sleeping pill usage can cause tolerance.

You can also try https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acceptance_and_commitment_therapy instead of cbti

Biofeedback has been shown to be an effective treatment for insomnia

Computer based therapy is as effective as seeing a human therapist

• if not asleep in 20 minutes get up and do something else

• Don't exercise too late in the day.

• Bright lights in the day could help.

• don't be hungry or stuffed

• wake up and go to bed at a similar time each day

• not a bad idea to meditate. (Bonus: all the health benefits of meditation). Can do progressive muscle relaxation or guided imagery or body scan

• challenge and change negative thoughts to make them positive (bonus: can use wake time to write these out or making a positive entry journal/tally count

http://healthysleep.med.harvard.edu/healthy/getting/overcoming/tips source for above

According to Wikipedia's sleep hygiene page:

the effectiveness of sleep hygiene is "limited and inconclusive" for the general population[1].

Don't do other activities besides sex and sleeping.

Naps can be harmful to sleeping at night. Children naps are less harmful to trying to sleep at night.

Trying to plan things before bed reduces sleep quality.

Cbti is more effective than sleep hygiene.

Avoiding nicotine, caffeine (including coffee, energy drinks, soft drinks, tea, chocolate, and some pain relievers) is good.

Alcohol might be good for falling asleep, but is more likely to fragment sleep.

eliminating a visible bedroom clock, to prevent focusing on time passing when trying to fall asleep.

Light exposure when sleeping has been shown to cause ocular fatigue.

An excellent lecture about the psychology of procrastination and some tips about how to break the habit.