How to Sleep When Grieving: Gentle Help for Tonight

The house is quiet, the light is off, and that is exactly when it hits. During the day there were calls to make and people around you. Now it is just you, the dark, and the fact that they are gone. If you can’t sleep since someone you love died, you are not doing grief wrong. Broken sleep is one of the most common things grieving people go through, and there are small, gentle things that make tonight easier.

Here is the short version: you do not have to stop thinking about them to rest. Give the thoughts a place before bed, slow your breathing once you lie down, and if you are still awake after about 20 minutes, get up for a little while instead of fighting it. Rest, even without deep sleep, still counts.

Lying awake and missing them? Try the free 5-minute sleep reset →

Why grief keeps you awake

You are not imagining it. A 2020 systematic review in Sleep Medicine Reviews looked at 85 studies with more than 12,000 bereaved people and found sleep problems are common after a loss, and that stronger grief tends to go with more trouble sleeping.

The Sleep Foundation describes the pattern many people know too well: thoughts of the person make it hard to fall asleep, and then you wake in the middle of the night and can’t get back down. A few things are usually going on at once:

• The quiet gives the mind room. All day you were busy. At night there is nothing between you and the memories, the what-ifs, and the last conversation.
• Your body is on alert. Loss is a huge stress. A body under stress has a hard time powering down, even when you feel completely drained.
• Your routine is gone. Maybe they were the one who locked up, or you used to talk before lights out. The cues that told your body “it’s time to sleep” have changed overnight.
• The bed itself feels different. If you lost a partner, the empty side of the bed can be the hardest part of the whole day.

Before bed: give the thoughts somewhere to go

Trying to push them out of your head rarely works. What helps many people is giving the thoughts a set time and place, so they are not all waiting for you on the pillow.

1. Take 10 minutes about an hour before bed. Sit somewhere that is not your bed. Write whatever comes: things you wish you had said, a memory from today, the tasks that are worrying you. Nobody reads it.
2. End with one small thing for tomorrow. “Call Mom’s bank at 10.” Writing it down tells your brain it does not have to hold on to it all night.
3. Close the notebook on purpose. That is the signal: the thinking had its time. If the same thought shows up in bed, you can tell yourself, “It’s on the page. I’ll come back to it tomorrow.”

If your head is full of work, money and to-do lists on top of the loss, this guide on what to do when you can’t sleep because of your thoughts goes deeper into the busy-mind side.

In bed: a 5-minute downshift

You do not need to feel calm to start this. You just need to do it.

1. Lie on your back or your side and let your jaw go loose. Grief often lives in the jaw, the throat and the chest. Notice them, then let them be a little heavier.
2. Breathe out longer than you breathe in. In through the nose for a count of 4, out slowly for a count of 6 to 8. Do this for a few minutes. The NHS breathing exercise for stress uses the same idea of slow, steady breathing to help you relax.
3. Feel three points of contact. Your head on the pillow. Your back on the mattress. Your feet under the blanket. Just notice them, one by one. This brings you back into the room and out of the memory.
4. If tears come, let them. Crying in bed is not a failure of the routine. Many people find they feel heavier and sleepier afterward. Breathe slowly again when it passes.

When you wake at 3am and the loss hits again

The middle-of-the-night wake-up is often the worst part. For a second you forget, and then you remember. Here is what tends to help:

• Leave the clock alone. Doing the math on how many hours are left only adds pressure. This page on falling back asleep without checking the clock explains why it helps.
• Use the same breathing as above. Long, slow breaths out. Your body learns the routine faster when it is the same every time.
• Get up after about 20 minutes. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine advises getting out of bed if you can’t fall asleep after 20 minutes and doing something quiet in low light, away from screens. Sit on the couch with a blanket, look at an old photo if that comforts you, or just sit. Go back to bed when your eyes get heavy.
• If you dreamed about them, give yourself a minute before trying to sleep again. Some dreams feel like a visit. Others are painful. Both are normal. If a bad dream woke you, this page on getting back to sleep after a nightmare has a few steps for that moment.

If you keep waking well before your alarm and lying there until morning, the steps in waking up too early and can’t get back to sleep can help too.

Small daytime habits that make the nights easier

You do not need a full sleep makeover while you are grieving. A few anchors are enough:

• Get up at roughly the same time each day, even after a rough night. A steady wake-up time is one of the habits the AASM’s healthy sleep habits list starts with, and it helps your body find its rhythm again.
• Step outside in the morning, even for five minutes. Fresh air and daylight make the day feel like a day.
• Watch the evening glass of wine. It is a very human way to take the edge off, and many people notice it makes them wake up more in the second half of the night. Here is why alcohol can wake you up at night.
• Keep naps short if you need one, and earlier in the day, so you still feel sleepy at night.
• Let people help. A short walk with a friend, a meal someone drops off, a call in the evening. Not being alone with it during the day often makes the night less heavy.

How long does grief insomnia last?

For most people, sleep slowly gets better. A study that followed 220 recently bereaved people in the journal Sleep Medicine found three main patterns over the following year: about 47% stayed fairly resilient, about 43% had insomnia symptoms that improved over time, and about 10% had insomnia that stayed. So if your nights are hard right now, you are in very large company, and for most people it eases.

There is no set timetable for grief, and you do not need to rush it. But sleep and grief affect each other. In that same study, people whose insomnia stayed were much more likely to still be struggling with intense grief a year later. That is a good reason to take care of your sleep now, not a reason to worry.

When to get more help

Please talk to your doctor if poor sleep goes on for weeks and is making it hard to get through the day, or if you are thinking about sleeping pills or alcohol to get by. A therapy called CBT for insomnia (CBT-I) is a proven, drug-free treatment, and the American Psychiatric Association notes it can help with sleep problems that come with very long, intense grief. Grief counseling and support groups can help too.

If you feel you can’t go on, or you are having thoughts of harming yourself, please reach out right now. In the US you can call or text 988, the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, any time of day or night.

Common questions

Is it normal not to sleep after someone dies?

Yes. Trouble falling asleep and waking in the night are among the most common things people report after a loss. It does not mean something is wrong with you. It means you lost someone who mattered.

Why do I sleep worse on the bad days, like birthdays and anniversaries?

Those days bring the loss right back to the surface, and the night before can be full of memories and dread. Many people find it helps to plan something small and kind for that day and to do the writing step earlier in the evening.

Should I take something to help me sleep?

That is a question for your doctor, who knows your health and any medicines you take. Ask before you start anything, including over-the-counter sleep aids or supplements.

I feel guilty when I do sleep well. Is that normal?

Many grieving people feel that. Resting does not mean you miss them less. You need sleep to carry the grief, to be there for the people around you, and to be yourself during the day.

Tonight, keep it simple

Ten minutes with a notebook before bed. Long, slow breaths out once you lie down. Feel the pillow, the mattress, the blanket. If you are awake after about 20 minutes, get up for a while and come back when you are heavy. That is enough for tonight. And if anxiety on top of the grief is what keeps you up, our guide on how to sleep with anxiety may help.

If you would like a short guided version you can play in bed, the free sleep reset walks you through it in about five minutes.

Want some rest tonight? Get the free 5-minute sleep reset →