Dr Gary Danko

If you’re waking up exhausted despite sleeping, it can feel deeply frustrating. You may be doing everything “right”—going to bed on time, getting enough hours, even avoiding screens—yet your mornings still arrive with heaviness instead of relief.

This kind of exhaustion often brings quiet self-doubt. You might wonder why rest doesn’t seem to work for you the way it does for others. But this experience is not a personal failure, and it’s not a lack of discipline.

Waking up exhausted despite sleeping is often a signal rather than a flaw. It points to the difference between resting the body and allowing the nervous system to truly recover. Sleep and restoration are related, but they are not always the same thing.

Read More

You lie down at night, hoping for rest. The room is quiet. Your body feels tired. And then you notice it — your heart pounding. Not racing wildly, not out of control, just thudding hard enough that it’s impossible to ignore. The more you notice it, the louder it seems to become.

For many people, heart pounding at night anxiety is less about pain or panic and more about confusion. You might even feel emotionally calm, yet your heart feels anything but calm. That disconnect can be unsettling, especially when it happens repeatedly.

What’s important to understand is that this experience is usually not a sign that something is wrong. It’s a sign that your nervous system has shifted into a state of heightened awareness — and nighttime makes that awareness much easier to feel.

Read More

Waking up suddenly in the middle of the night, heart pounding, chest tight, pulling in a sharp breath of air, can be one of the most frightening sleep experiences a person can have. Many people describe it as waking up gasping for air, unsure for a moment whether they stopped breathing, whether something is wrong with their body, or whether they’re about to lose control.

If this has happened to you, it’s important to know this first: you are not broken, and your body is not betraying you. In many cases, this experience is not about oxygen or lungs at all. It’s about the nervous system doing what it learned to do to keep you safe — even when the danger is no longer present.

Understanding why you wake up gasping for air at night can transform this experience from something terrifying into something meaningful, manageable, and ultimately changeable.

Read More

You’re lying in bed. The room is quiet. Your body feels tired. And just as you start to drift, your heart suddenly begins to race. It may feel loud, fast, or pounding in your chest. The shift is abrupt enough to pull you fully awake, often accompanied by a surge of alertness or anxiety. If you’ve been searching for answers about heart racing right before falling asleep, you’re far from alone—and this experience is far more understandable than it feels in the moment.

For many people, this sudden heartbeat change is unsettling precisely because it appears out of nowhere. The day may have felt manageable. There may be no obvious worry. Yet the body reacts as if something urgent is happening. Understanding why this occurs can remove much of the fear that keeps the cycle repeating.

Read More

You’re just starting to drift. Your body feels heavy, your thoughts are finally slowing, and then—suddenly—your body jerks awake. Your heart may race. Your muscles may tense. For a moment, it can feel startling or even alarming. If you’ve found yourself wondering why your body jerks awake when falling asleep, you’re not alone, and you’re not broken.

This experience is far more common than most people realize, especially for those who live with stress, sleep anxiety, or a nervous system that stays on alert. Understanding what’s happening can take much of the fear out of the moment—and fear is often what keeps the pattern going.

Read More

You finally lie down. The lights are off. The day is over. And instead of drifting into sleep, your mind suddenly feels louder than it did all day. Thoughts race. Conversations replay. Worries surface. Even neutral ideas start looping without permission. If you’ve ever asked yourself why your mind won’t shut off at bedtime, you’re experiencing something that is far more common—and far more understandable—than most people realize.

This isn’t a failure of willpower. It isn’t because you’re “bad at relaxing.” And it isn’t because something is wrong with your brain. What’s happening at bedtime is a predictable interaction between your nervous system, your subconscious mind, and the way stress is processed after dark.

Read More

If you’ve ever noticed that your anxiety fades into the background during the day but surges as soon as night arrives, you’re not alone. Many people function, cope, and even feel relatively calm while busy—only to feel dread, heaviness, or racing thoughts once the lights go out. It often leads to the same unsettling question: why anxiety feels worse at night, even when nothing specific seems wrong?

This pattern is not random, and it’s not a sign that something is “wrong” with you. Nighttime anxiety is deeply connected to how the nervous system, subconscious mind, and emotional processing work after dark.

Read More

If you’ve ever felt calm enough during the evening—only to have your anxiety suddenly surge the moment you try to fall asleep—you are not imagining it. Many people experience a spike in fear, racing thoughts, body tension, or a sudden sense of danger right before drifting off. This is one of the most confusing and distressing forms of anxiety, and it leads many people to ask the same question: why does sleep anxiety get worse right before falling asleep?

The short answer is that this reaction is driven far more by the nervous system than by conscious thought. Even when your mind feels ready for rest, your body may still be operating in a state of alertness. Understanding why this happens is the first step toward breaking the cycle.

Read More