A few years ago, I was looking to improve my sleep, which was terrible.

One consistent piece of advice was to avoid napping during the day, to help build up sleep pressure so that it’s easier to fall asleep at night.

At the time, I was taking an afternoon nap of between 1-4 hours every day, so I was sceptical, but I gave it a try one day and cut out my usual nap.

I started that morning at Moderate fatigue level. Even though I felt very tired in the early afternoon, I kept myself awake instead of napping. By early evening, my symptoms had rapidly increased to Severe level - I was hardly able to walk or balance, struggled to speak clearly and had high brain fog and confusion. These symptoms persisted through to the next morning after a nights sleep, at which point I dropped the ‘no napping’, which was clearly actively harming me, and went back to napping and resting, taking over a week to get back to the Moderate level I’d been at only the day before.

Experiencing such a rapid onset of symptoms was deeply scary and has convinced me of the necessity of resting when my body is giving me clear signals. So for me, daily napping is essential.

For a healthy person, the advice to cut out napping is likely good, to regain balance with your natural sleep cycle and circadian rhythm. I also know other people with ME/CFS who don’t nap at all, and some who nap more than me.

For someone with a chronic illness, a cautious approach is sensible, aiming to figure out your own needs. Despite my setback, I’d recommend experimenting with limiting your naps because it may help, and even if not, it brings clarity.

There’s also a range of advice around how long to nap for - sometimes it’s less than 20 minutes, sometimes significantly longer. How long should you pick?

My approach is to let my body decide. At lower energy levels I find I need to nap for multiple hours, and as my energy levels increase, I naturally take shorter naps. It’s a good bellwether on how I’m doing, particularly when PEM can disguise our true energy levels. Trusting our body to take as long as it needs also takes the pressure off, and switches the focus to resting. The aim is to find the balance between taking the rest that we need, without getting stuck in bed unnecessarily.

I try to make sure my nap doesn’t end too late in the afternoon, as I find this makes it harder to get to sleep that night. Ideally my nap is finished around 5pm, or 6pm at the latest.

If you’re struggling to nap, I’d recommend keeping yourself warm - extra layers and especially electric blankets to warm the bed (I resisted these for a long time, but they’re wonderful). If the bed is cold, it takes me much longer to sleep and a lot of energy is going on just warming up.

If not falling asleep quickly is causing stress, remember that it’s the act of resting that’s the most important thing, not the sleep itself. I find I can get some of the benefits of napping by just fully stopping and lying down, even if it’s just for 5 minutes. So simply by taking the time to rest in this way, you’ve already achieved your aim.