Do you always sleep through the night without problems? Or, are you like much of the population and find yourself waking up at 3 am, unable to fall back asleep? If you’re part of the second group, it’s important to figure out what may be causing you to wake up and, most importantly, how to prevent it from continuing. This is what your sleepless nights mean and how to finally get the rest you need.

Why You Keep Waking Up At 3 am

Waking up in the middle of the night is often a very frustrating experience. You lie there as the minutes tick by, and all you can think about is how tired you will feel at work the next day. There are many reasons why you are waking up at 3 am. Figure out what your reason is, and you will be well on your way to solving the problem.

First, it’s important to note that waking up at night is normal. In fact, most of us do it a handful of times throughout the night, but we fall asleep so quickly we don’t even notice. This is because we sleep in cycles. In one sleep cycle, we transition from wakefulness to sleep, light sleep, deep sleep, and REM sleep. REM stands for rapid eye movement and is the part of the sleep cycle where we will have the most dreams. Typically we have longer deep sleep cycles earlier in the night and longer REM cycles the closer we get to morning. (1)

When you wake up at 3 am, however, and can’t get back to sleep, this is problematic. Though it can be challenging to identify why you might be waking up, it’s important to try so that you can bring an end to this nighttime wakefulness. These are the reasons why you might be waking up, unable to sleep, in the middle of the night