As you maybe have read in my post How to deal with sleep problems, I wanted to improve my horrible sleeping. My skin is still pretty good thanks to Ciclosporin, so this was the only thing that was still problematic at this point. I can safely say my sleeping has been A LOT better since I started using some of the tips provided by my psychologist. I fall asleep quite easily now and barely wake up at night anymore. I’m still tired when I wake up and at certain times during the day, but it’s not worse than when I was sleeping until 2 or 3 p.m. I feel the fatigue is slowly decreasing though! My sleep rhythm isn’t “changed” yet, but that will take more than a few weeks. I will know I’ve reached the finish line when I start waking up a few minutes before my alarm clock.
So what do I do? I set my alarm clock for 9 a.m. everyday. I usually don’t get up right away, but give myself some time to wake up. Important is that I try not to fall asleep again (my snooze goes off every 10 minutes, but sometimes that’s enough), which can be hard. It would be better if I got up right away, but I haven’t noticed a negative impact on my sleeping so it’s probably not much of a big deal. The hour of going to bed varies between about 11 and 12 p.m. I try to explicitly wait until I’m getting (really) tired, which was also adviced by my psychologist. It gives me so much peace of mind knowing that the amount of sleep isn’t as important as we all think! I also try to avoid naps during the day and the use of television, computer or phone at least 15 minutes before going to bed. I don’t know if this is enough, but again, I don’t feel it impacts my sleep negatively. Last but not least I’m trying to “exercise” a bit. I do small things like dancing while doing the dishes (I always put music on when I do this, it’s just a lot more fun that way!), driving my bike or walking instead of taking the car, … . Not sure if I can call all this “exercising”, but for someone who dislikes most sports, it’s already something haha. Only have to watch out for sweating, because that’s still causing itch attacks and irritated skin!
My sleep isn’t the only thing that has improved by the way: my skin tends to be a bit clearer after waking up. Maybe “beauty sleep” is actually a thing! It makes sense as one of the functions of deep sleep is cell repair.
My Poisoned Skin 