Waking up several times throughout the night is a natural occurrence often due to sleep architecture, which are the stages of sleep that one cycles through every night. When people naturally wake up in the night, they are more likely to remember it happening during the second half of the night. That’s when people typically have longer REM stage, light sleep, while the first half of the night has longer stages of deep sleep instead. The most important thing to do when waking up in the middle of the night is to resist looking at the clock, Peters-Mathews said. It’s also important to ensure the awakenings are not happening from something external, such as disturbances from your sleep partner, Peters-Mathews said.

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Persons: Brandon Peters, Mathews, ” Peters, —, ”, Michelle Drerup, Drerup, that’s, ” Drerup, It’s, Peters, Cathy Goldstein, Goldstein, we’re, ” Goldstein, — Goldstein, it’s Organizations: CNN, Virginia Mason Franciscan Health, Sleep, Cleveland Clinic, University of Michigan Health, University of Michigan Sleep Disorders Locations: Virginia, Seattle, Ann Arbor