Getting your sleep back

Sleep is the first thing to go and the last thing men mention. It's also the one that quietly makes everything else worse — the temper, the low mood, the drinking, the sense that you're not coping. Fix the sleep and you often get a chunk of the rest thrown in.

1. Get up at the same time. Every day.

This is the big one, and almost nobody does it. Not the time you go to bed — the time you get up, including weekends, including after a bad night.

Your body clock is set by when light hits your eyes in the morning, not by when you turn the lamp off. A consistent wake time is the single strongest lever you have. Lying in on Sunday to catch up costs you Sunday night, and you start the week already behind.

2. Get outside within an hour of waking

Ten minutes of daylight, even under Yorkshire cloud, is many times brighter than your kitchen. It's what tells your body the day has started, which is what sets the timer for feeling sleepy roughly sixteen hours later. Walk to get the paper. Have your coffee at the door.

3. Stop lying there fighting it

If you've been awake twenty minutes or so, get up. Go to another room, keep the lights low, read something dull. Go back when you're actually sleepy.

This feels utterly counterproductive and it's one of the most effective things you can do. Time spent awake and frustrated in bed teaches your brain that bed is where you lie awake and get frustrated. Break that association and sleep gets easier on its own.

4. Give your head somewhere to put things

A lot of men can't sleep because their brain is holding a list it doesn't trust them to remember. So it rehearses it. All night.

Ten minutes before bed, write the list down — jobs, worries, the thing you have to ring about. Paper, phone notes, whatever. You are not solving any of it. You are telling your head it's safe to let go, because it's written somewhere.

5. Look honestly at the caffeine and the drink

Caffeine has a half-life of about five to six hours, which means the 4pm coffee is still half-present at ten. If you're a "coffee doesn't affect me" man, that's worth testing for a fortnight rather than assuming.

Alcohol helps you drop off and then wrecks the back half of the night — the 3am wake-up with the racing heart is very often last night's drink wearing off. Details in drinking a bit more than you'd like.

6. Cool, dark, and a bit boring

A cooler room helps — your core temperature has to drop for sleep to start. Dark helps. And the bed is for sleep, not for working, scrolling or watching things that make you cross.

What not to bother with

Sleep-tracking rings and watches make a lot of men worse, not better — chasing a score creates a whole new anxiety about sleep, which is the last thing an anxious sleeper needs. If yours is stressing you out, take it off for a month.

If it's been going on for months

Go and see your GP, and ask specifically about CBT-I — cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia. It's the recommended first-line treatment for long-term insomnia in the UK, it works well, and it isn't medication. Many areas offer it online without a wait.

Also worth mentioning to them: loud snoring, gasping or stopping breathing in the night, or falling asleep during the day. That can be sleep apnoea, it's common in men, and it's very treatable once someone actually looks at it.

Persistent sleeplessness alongside low mood is worth taking to a doctor rather than managing alone. If things feel darker than tired — if you're having thoughts of harming yourself — ring Samaritans on 116 123, free, at any hour.

For tonight The 3am checklist What to do when you're already awake Try now Box breathing Four minutes, guided on screen