If you cannot sleep, stop trying to force it. Turn the clock out of view. If you notice that you are fully awake, frustrated, or struggling, leave the bed when that is safe and practical. Do something quiet in low light, then return when you feel sleepy.
You do not need to wait for an exact number of minutes. Watching the time to enforce a 15- or 20-minute rule can add pressure. Stimulus control, a component of cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I), uses wakefulness and frustration as cues to leave the bed and sleepiness as the cue to return 12.
These steps may make the night less tense, but they cannot guarantee sleep. The strongest evidence for stimulus control is as a treatment used consistently for chronic insomnia, often within CBT-I, not as a one-night cure 1.
What to do right now
1. Remove the deadline
Hide the clock and stop calculating how many hours remain. NHLBI notes that worrying about getting enough sleep and watching the clock can raise insomnia risk or make it worse 3.
You do not have to make yourself sleepy. Let the immediate goal be quiet rest and less struggle. Sleep may follow, but it is not a task you can complete by trying harder.
2. Leave the bed when you are awake and frustrated
If you are clearly awake and the bed has become a place for effort, get up without checking the time. Move to a safe nearby place if one is available. Keep the light low enough to move safely, and return to bed when you notice genuine sleepiness 2.
Choose an activity that is calm and easy to stop, such as:
- reading a familiar or undemanding paper book;
- listening to quiet audio with the screen off;
- doing a simple puzzle, knitting, or another repetitive seated task;
- writing down a thought or next-day task so you do not have to keep rehearsing it.
Avoid work, arguments, upsetting news, vigorous exercise, or anything you are likely to continue long after you become sleepy. If a phone is your only practical option, lower its brightness, avoid messages and scrolling, and use it only for a quiet audio or reading activity.
3. Return when you feel sleepy
Go back to bed when your eyelids feel heavy, your attention drifts, or you start losing your place. If you become alert and frustrated again, repeat the same process. The point is not to perform the steps perfectly. It is to stop pairing the bed with a prolonged struggle to sleep.
If leaving the bed is not safe or practical
Do not risk a fall, worsen severe pain, leave a child or dependent unsupervised, or create another safety problem to follow the standard instruction. If possible, sit up or change position, stop actively trying to sleep, and use quiet audio, a familiar reading passage, or a gentle relaxation exercise in bed. Remove the activity and settle back when sleepiness returns.
This is a practical adaptation, not the standard form of stimulus control. A clinician delivering CBT-I can adapt the method to mobility, pain, caregiving, housing, trauma, or other needs. The VA guidance itself describes leaving the room only when feasible and recommends working with a CBT-I provider on suitable nighttime activities 2.
An optional relaxation exercise
Relaxation can be part of insomnia treatment, but it is not a switch that guarantees sleep. The AASM gives relaxation therapy a conditional recommendation as a treatment component for chronic insomnia, reflecting a smaller or less certain evidence base than the strong recommendation for multicomponent CBT-I 1.
Try this only if it feels comfortable:
- Let your breathing stay easy rather than holding it to a strict count.
- On each comfortable exhale, release a little tension in the jaw, shoulders, hands, and abdomen.
- Move attention slowly from the feet toward the face, noticing sensations without trying to erase them.
- Stop if focusing on breathing or the body increases panic, pain, dizziness, or shortness of breath. Choose neutral audio or another quiet activity instead.
The goal is to lower effort, not to judge whether the exercise made you sleep.
Protect tomorrow without punishing yourself
If it is safe, get up reasonably close to your usual time and preserve a realistic sleep opportunity the following night. Avoid moving the entire day into bed or going to bed extremely early solely to recover every lost hour. At the same time, do not turn chronic-insomnia rules into a test of endurance after one poor night. Formal CBT-I schedules are intended to be used consistently and adapted to the person, often with professional guidance 12.
Safety outranks schedule consistency. If you are struggling to keep your eyes open, do not drive or perform safety-sensitive work. Arrange another driver, public transport, a delayed trip, or a safe place to rest. NHTSA warns that adequate sleep is the only reliable ongoing protection from drowsy driving; caffeine provides only temporary help and may not prevent brief lapses in consciousness 4.
Do not improvise a chemical fix
Do not add alcohol, cannabis, a sedating antihistamine, melatonin or another supplement, leftover or borrowed medication, or an extra dose of prescribed medicine to force sleep. Do not abruptly stop or change a prescribed medicine either. If you already have instructions from your clinician for occasional sleeplessness, follow those instructions rather than this general article.
These options are not interchangeable home remedies. The 2025 VA/DoD guideline concerns chronic insomnia, not one isolated night, and it recommends clinician-guided CBT-I as first-line treatment. It suggests against cannabis, diphenhydramine, melatonin, and several other supplements for chronic insomnia, while prescription treatment requires review of other sleep disorders, daytime sleepiness, breathing or cognitive problems, substance history, and interactions 5.
Alcohol and recreational drugs can also contribute to insomnia, while medicines and substances may affect sleep in different ways. If the timing of the problem matches a new medicine, a dose change, stopping a substance, or increased caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, or drug use, ask a pharmacist or clinician what to do. Do not make a self-directed change based only on one difficult night 36.
One difficult night is not chronic insomnia
A single night of trouble falling asleep or returning to sleep does not establish chronic insomnia. NHLBI defines chronic insomnia as difficulty occurring at least three nights a week for three months or longer. Diagnosis also considers whether the person had enough time and a suitable environment for sleep, daytime effects, health conditions, medicines, substances, and other sleep disorders 6.
If difficulty persists despite adequate sleep opportunity and affects daytime life, read the broader insomnia guide and seek an assessment. For adults with chronic insomnia disorder, both the AASM and 2025 VA/DoD guidelines recommend CBT-I. Sleep-hygiene advice alone is not considered an adequate stand-alone treatment 15.
When sleeplessness may need a different path
| Pattern | What to do next |
|---|---|
| Frequent loud snoring, witnessed breathing pauses, or gasping, especially with daytime sleepiness | Ask for a sleep apnea evaluation. These symptoms can occur with sleep apnea, which may require a sleep study rather than an insomnia strategy 7. |
| An urge to move the legs that starts or worsens at rest, improves temporarily with movement, and is worse in the evening or at night | Ask about restless legs syndrome. Treatment depends on identifying the condition and possible contributors rather than simply trying harder to relax 8. |
| Sleep comes readily on a much earlier or later schedule but not when work, school, or care duties require it | Track sleep timing and ask about a circadian sleep-wake assessment. Diagnosis considers the pattern, duration, environment, light exposure, and substance use 9. |
| Pain, fever, breathing symptoms, reflux, pregnancy or menopause symptoms, or another illness is keeping you awake | Address the symptom or condition with the appropriate clinician. New, severe, or rapidly worsening symptoms should not be treated as a sleep-hygiene problem 6. |
| Trouble began after starting, stopping, or changing a medicine or after a change in caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, cannabis, or another substance | Check the label and contact a pharmacist or clinician. Do not stop, double, combine, or borrow treatment on your own 6. |
| Persistent excessive sleepiness, unplanned dozing, or difficulty staying awake despite enough sleep opportunity | Seek clinical assessment. Until the cause is understood, avoid driving and other safety-sensitive tasks when sleepy 64. |
When to get urgent help
Being exhausted and wanting to sleep is different from needing very little sleep while feeling unusually energized or irritable. Little or no sleep together with racing thoughts, much more activity, fast speech, feeling unusually powerful, or risky behavior can occur in mania and needs urgent mental-health assessment, especially when behavior is escalating or unsafe 10.
Get immediate emergency or crisis help if you are having suicidal thoughts, may harm yourself or someone else, cannot stay safe, become severely confused or difficult to wake, or develop chest pressure, severe trouble breathing, fainting, a new inability to speak, or sudden weakness or vision change. These are not ordinary sleepless-night symptoms 11.
