Alarmy app didn’t work, rewarding myself didn’t work, going to bed early didn’t work, taking my adderall 3 hours before actually getting up didn’t work. Nothing worked. It’s gotten so bad recently that im getting later and later to work.
Recently I had asked my boyfriend to spray me with water if I didn’t get up to my first alarm. No snoozing allowed. I’m now on my 8th day of immediately getting up. This has always been a life long struggle of mine and something about not wanting to inconvenience him to do this and also not wanting to be sprayed with water, has solved my problem 😭
In the past before I lived with him, I’d have different friends call me and I told them to stay on the phone for a few minutes and just talk. This helped my brain turn on and it also held me accountable because someone took time out of their morning to help me get up. I didn’t do it all the time because I didn’t want to bother my friends all the time.
But something about being held accountable has really clicked with me and I haven’t seen anyone with a solution like this so I thought I’d share!!
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I can wake up and be out of bed in seconds without a problem, I have the opposite problem, I can't get off the damn internet and get to sleep. I don't even have a problem falling asleep, I just have an intense problem going from not sleeping to deciding to sleep lol.
I have this problem too. I just found out that I can put myself to sleep but I don't wanna sleep. I'm not ready to sleep.
I used to have this problem. A few things helped me.
-Routine. Same time (give or take) 7 days a week. I may allow myself to sleep in an hour on weekends, but otherwise get up the same time. I also start winding down early- power ambient lighting, read a book for a half hour in bed etc. Just try to find something that works and is repeatable.
-Breathing to reset my mind and my body. I read a book called oxygen advantage and started doing "breathe deep" every night for 10 min in the dark. It's hard. But because it is, you need to focus. It helps break my mind from the churn that is keeping me up. The days I really don't want to, are the days I need it most. But it really does work to quiet the chatter and also has the physical release at the end from the c02 buildup.
God luck, hopefully some of that helps.
Big advocate for zone 2 cardio, I couldn’t do any cardio for the life of me until I tried this.
I have the same problem. But there are groups for excessive use of the internet. I've attended a few times and I found them very helpful.
https://internetaddictsanonymous.org/
Isn’t there a timer for shutting down the phone?
Yes, but it is easy to turn off.
And once my phone is on the charger in my bedroom I'll just need to "make a quick note" and end up sucked in for hours.
Now, when I really, really need to get up the phone actually gets locked up in the living room.
Something that's helped me somewhat lately is an app called Freedom. I think I had to pay a subscription for it, though it could've been a lifetime thing (I should probably know/check). I went with it because it could be used on all my devices instead of just one, so I saw that as an added benefit.
Basically, it's an app blocker. I have schedules where it blocks access to apps each night in the hopes of forcing me to go to bed.
It works for the most part, but I still feel like I haven't found an "app blocker" that is perfect for me.
I think that would be YOU that is the best app blocker. In other words, you need to look at what is driving you to your phone or other device. What are you hoping to get there and why?
There are support groups such as this one that you could attend. Plenty of help there.
https://internetaddictsanonymous.org/
You post quite a bit about support groups (and try to hide your profile), so I do not trust you.
What's not to trust about support groups? The ones I post are mostly free, so neither I nor anyone is profiting. And, like anything else on Reddit, they are just suggestions.
A lot of people mention that they're suffering, from depression, anxiety, compulsive behavior, whatever, and they may not have insurance to get therapy. And therapy isn't always effective, I have found. I get more help from the support groups. So I want to share the information as much as possible.
Isolation is so common now, partially because people are using their phones so much. So they can use it for connecting with others.
But it's okay if you don't trust me. I'm a stranger - you don't have to. I get lots of praise already. 👍😁
I set up parent controls and had a friend keep the password from me so that apps would shut off after a certain amount of times and there was NOTHING I could do about it. It worked so well but I had her shut it off a few months later before I took a big trip (different time zones and I didn’t want to get messed up) I might try it again haha
let me just check in that other game so I don't lose my daily streak. It will only be 30 seconds. 2h later...
I have always struggled with this. Here's what I have been doing:
My alarm app connects to Spotify. That has helped me a lot! I find it much more pleasant to wake up to songs I like than a blaring alarm sound. Plus since I can set each alarm to a different station it helps me organize the morning a bit. 80s New Wave? Time to get up. Motown? I know I need to get in the shower. Eazy-E radio? Time to leave for work.
That paired with a sunrise alarm clock - no sounds, just a gradual light source pointed directly at my face. AND having my coffee set up to start brewing right before my first song alarm has made my mornings much less of a battle.
I used to have a spotify random pop playlist as my alarm and the panic I felt when Niki Minaj's Anaconda went off at 5:30 am was a very unique feeling I'll never forget.
"MY ANACONDA DONT! MY ANACONDA DONT! MY ANACONDA DONT WANT NONE UNLESS YOUVE GOT BUNS HUN"
I wish my alarm app could connect to deezer.
So I've been using an app for over ten years called 'Sleep' (not sure if it's only available on android) but it has an amazing feature I've used for my alarms. You can set an alarm to be only deactivated by using different methods, one is solving a math question but the only one I use is scanning a QR code. My alarm will not be silenced unless I scan the QR code I've registered, this used to be on the back of the bathroom cabinet but since moving has been stuck to the back of the cupboard on the landing so I have to get up & out of bed to switch it off.
WOW! Never heard of this. Genius. Downloaded straight away and looking forward to tomorrow morning already. Will probably hate it and QR codes forever, but this is absolutely one of my achilles heels. Thank you for sharing this.
ooh I like the barcode in the cabinet idea!
I use a similar one called "I Can't Wake Up" (also Android) that has various challenges.
The math-based ones did wake me up but pissed me off even more than having been pulled out of REM lol
I generally use one that makes me shake the phone vigorously for X seconds/minutes, but sometimes even that isn't enough.
My child barfing always gets me from deep sleep to wide awake, out of bed, with a bucket in parts of a second. Set an alarm to that noise and you'll never want to sleep through it.
Or the sound of a cat barfing...
Put an annoying alarm across the room so you have to get up to turn it off.
My alarm is across the room 😂
I can get up and turn it off without waking up.
esto realmente no sirve, yo tengo la alarma en mi telefono con el duermo en mi cama, y tengo otra alarma en el google nest, al otro lado del cuarto, pero esto no sirve para hacerme iniciar mi rutina
Having a cat helped me to wake up almost on time.
This almost works for me. My problem is I take my meds and going back in bed after I've fed the cat.
The admin from my kids' elementary school used to call me in the morning as she was leaving home in the morning. She was really amazing for helping me that way
My family's gonna give me a wake up light/sunrise alarm clock (don’t know the correct english term) for Christmas. I have regularly missed appointments or was forced to re-structure my whole day/week because I didn’t hear my alarm for almost an hour. I can report by new year’s!!
There’s a sleep cycle app that wakes you up when you’re at the peak of one of your sleeping cycles
I calculate my bedtime by this. I want to wake up when a sleep cycle ends, so I can wake up more easily. It works very well. 😅
I calculate my bedtime by this. I want to wake up when a sleep cycle ends, so I can wake up more easily. It works very well. 😅
And the longer you do it succesfully, the more you build the association, so you're basically conditioned to get up the same way normal people can get up with an alarm. If it fits, it sits. Good for you!
have you tried one of those alarms that have challenges, like scanning a qr code or doing a math operation? I found this one called FixSleep and it's quite helpful since i always have to go in my bathroom and scan a skin care product to turn it off
I downloaded the QRAlarm app.
You can scan in any barcode or QR code and associate it with your alarm. When the alarm goes off, it will not shut off until you scan that code again (you can program in some snoozes).
I used the barcode on my toothpaste, so it forces me to get out of bed to turn off the alarm.
The only drawback is if you are travelling and don't have access to your barcode, it's a major pain to turn the alarm off.
Now I have to figure out how to make a contraption that sprays me and hen my alarm goes off lmao
no bc I feel like that would be a great product
When I first started dating my now husband and we started full time corporate jobs, we worked in the same office for a few months and I would have to call him almost everyday to make sure her was up to get there on time. I would wake him up before leaving and then call again when I got to work (I like to be early).
When we were no longer in the same office and I had an hour long commute and left early to beat traffic, I would set a reminder daily for 7 AM to call him if he hadn't texted that he was up yet.
Then I was doing this for 8 AM when he was working in central time and an hour behind me.
Finally he got sleep apnea study done and eventually surgery and the problem went away... So possible it may not be your ADHD.
I’ve been wanting to get a sleep study for a while now. I don’t snore so I’m not sure if that’s the issue, but both of my parents have it. I’ve been getting up but I still find myself very fatigued during the day so I’m definitely gonna look into it.
I only have 1 alarm, no snooze.
I have to physically get out of bed to shut it off.
If I go back to sleep after that I lose my job, income, and house. It's worked pretty well for the past 5 years.
If you're waking up THAT tired, maybe get checked for sleep apnea?
There are vibrating alarms that you put under your pillow.
Getting older worked for me. I lost jobs in the past and used to always be in trouble for oversleeping. Now I'm in my late fifties, I always wake up just before the alarm. It doesn't matter how early the alarm is or how little sleep I've had. I can stay up until 02:30 and if the alarm is set for 06:00, I wake up at 05:58.
I still don't want to get up, but at least I don't oversleep any more.
I’m hoping I’ll get this way too. My goal was that my brain starts to associate the alarm with getting up rather then “I’ll walk across the room, snooze, then go back to bed” I have to retrain my brain
I have a couple of remedies that have worked for me over the years. Back when I was in University, long before I was diagnosed with ADHD and on meds, I would put my alarm all the way on the other side of my bedroom so I had to literally get out of bed to turn it off and then get moving. That was back when I was in my 20s. I was diagnosed ADHD 7 years ago at the age of 52 and finally put on Adderall. That is very effective. I will set 2 alarms and take my Adderall after the first alarm, then go back to sleep and have the second alarm go off 30 minutes later. By then my Adderall has kicked in once the alarm goes off and I’m able to get right up and complete the “3 Ss” right away.
When the alarm goes off, you put your feet on the ground. As soon as you realize the alarm is going off, feet go on the ground. No thoughts. Nothing. Just feet on that cold, hard floor. It will take some time, but it will give you the same trigger/response as the cold water does now.
You are now awake. Get up and start walking. Do not turn the alarm off until you are walking.
I have to walk across the room to shut my alarm off I just have no discipline when I’m half awake, once my brain gets adjusted to hearing the alarm and associating that with being up hopefully I wouldn’t need the threat from another person to do what I need to do lmao
I used to struggle with this till I was medicated and now I only really need one alarm to wake me up (I do still set a million alarms cuz of habit though lol)
Not the good old pet dog treatment working?? Because same.. I have a joke with my woman that I’m like a dog (a Husky honestly with how they prefer to be outside all the time). where I need to have daily walks or I get restless. She knows this and sometimes she’ll just ask me “have you gone for your walk/run yet?” When I’m being too much and she’s trying to chill. 😭I think the phone call idea is great too. I’ve realize I hate waking up to phone calls but it DOES wake me up
Hahaha luckily he hasn’t had to spray me yet but I figured it’d be a great motivator 😂 adhders are just golden retrievers at heart
Yeah I couldn't wake up or would just keep sleeping after turning off the alarm so now I just ise sunrise alarm + push ups alarm that has no snooze and only turns off after I do push ups on camera
this is truly unhinged and i'm here for it
This is self-care, just aggressively 😂💀
This is honestly such a huge problem for, ESSPECIALY, if i have to be somewhere in the morning or early afternoon continually. I set 10-15 alarms every morning, and every other week, if I don't change my alarm sound or time, I just get used to it, and it becomes like a lullaby. My mum and my brother come into my room to chat to me, does nothing, I barely ever remember them being in here. And once I am finally awake, it takes me around an hour and a half to shake myself fully awake and be able to get out of bed.
Tengo una solucion, no se si sea saludable pero apenas suene la alarma hueles sales de amoniaco "Wake The Dead (Sales de Amoniaco)" esto definitivamente activara tu sistema nervioso al instante al menos lo suficiente para entrar a bañarte y quitarte el sueño rapidamente https://suplementosags.com/product/wake-the-dead-sales-de-amoniaco/
el proximo mes las volvere a comprar y compartire mi experiencia
What's funny is my cat is a natural alrm clock for me because she paws at me for breakfast in the morning but I just end up going back to sleep after I stumble up to where her food dish is.(usually she does it around 6:30-7 when I should be ready to leave by 8 AM)
That’s so cute lol My cat does this on weekends when we try to sleep in but fails me during the week. He likes to bite my nose until I get up
Lmao the water spray method is genius but also sounds like training a cat 😂 I've definitely used the friend call thing before and it works so well - there's something about knowing someone else is involved that just flips a switch in the ADHD brain
Exactly! It sounds ridiculous when I say that I’ll physically get up, shut my alarm off, and go back to sleep but I genuinely feel like a zombie. It’s like someone else is controlling my brain. It’s insane that this has been effective and he hasn’t even sprayed me once. I guess it’s a form of body doubling in a way?
I use a smart home platform so that, to turn off the alarm, I have to walk down two flights of stairs into the basement.
Remember that our brains are special, some adapt to change quicker than grandma's when her lifelong supermarket closes down. E.g. eat sugar before bed 3 days in a row and your body will ask for it on the 4th day.
Try this:
Day1 - get out of bed when the alarm rings. Even if you feel like dying, puking, tripping on your own feet zombie-ing to the toilet. Just do it as if you had a plane to catch.
Day2 - same, but you already know that you can do it so it's a bit easier
Day3 - same, but your body already almost adjusted and you won't feel like a puking zombie anymore
...Day x - same, don't break that habit anymore, or you know where it leads.
P.S. I feel that's what actually killed grandma, not Covid, but having to adapt to driving to and shopping in another supermarket.
I would get up two hours before work and take my time, eat a little something, pack my lunch, sit playing on my phone, drive to work and be there 15 minutes early. This was after 40 years of struggle like you. I hope you find a way that is comfortable for you