Interestingly, I had low ferritin levels (6 μg/L), and my doctor prescribed me iron supplements. They have made a world of difference in my life. The unexpected side effect is that, I actually have a more difficult time with sleep now; before the supplements, I was so exhausted from the low ferritin it seems, that I would just fall back asleep if I woke up in the night. Now that things are improving there, and I don't have that daytime exhaustion, I don't fall back asleep as easily. :) Not really relevant, just kind a fun reminder that sometimes problems in life actually help out in other areas and we don't even realize it. (by the way, it's not a complaint, I really do mean this in a lighthearted way; I am incredibly grateful for those iron supplements.)
I know it's not what you want to hear, but I'm afraid your options are basically move to a rural area where nobody is going to drive by or deal with it. I know how annoying it can be to get woken up in the night so having it happen several times every night must be frustrating, to say the least.
Do you have trouble getting back to sleep? If not, the best advice might just be to accept it--most people wake up multiple times in the night and simply don't remember it. In fact, as far as we're aware, staying asleep (or close to it) all night is a relatively modern phenomenon (at least in the West) and people historically tended to sleep in two blocks with a period of wakefulness in the middle of the night. From Wikipedia:
adults typically slept in two distinct phases, bridged by an intervening period of wakefulness of approximately one hour.[12] This time was used to pray[14] and reflect,[15] and to interpret dreams, which were more vivid at that hour than upon waking in the morning. This was also a favourite time for scholars and poets to write uninterrupted, whereas still others visited neighbours, engaged in sexual activity, or committed petty crime.
I also have a lot of issues with sleep and gabapentin is one of the only things that routinely works. 4 hours seems very low, though. What dosage are you on? 300mg a couple of hours before bed does the trick for me 90% of the time.
If you’re finding it far too easy to wake up even with a small amount of noise, have you considered trying to sound-treat your bedroom? I’m no acoustic engineer or podcaster or anything, so I’d seek advice first (maybe you can’t acoustically isolate outside noise and you can only suppress internal echoes? I dunno) but if you can deaden the outside sounds even more, maybe that combined with the white noise etc you have set up might help?
Another option in a similar vein is if your bed rattles/shakes as vehicles pass by, have you tried cushioning a bunch under where your bed frame meets the floor? For example; when I was at uni, I briefly had three mattresses stacked on top of each other to get to normal bed height, but because there was no rigid bed frame to transfer the physical movements, I literally slept through an (admittedly minor) earthquake.
I have had silicone earplugs made to measure and it has literally saved my life. Our apartment is on the first floor facing the street and it fan get very noisy. The worst is the bins being taken out at before 5am in time for the trash truck which passes around 6am. Right under my bedroom window.
Usually these can be made by an audiologist (the kind that make hearing aids). They inject silicone into your ear canal, let it set for a bit, then send the mold to be turned into silicone earplugs. They look like this: https://www.earplugstore.com/custom-sleeping-ear-plugs.html
They are very good at reducing noise, I can't sleep without them anymore.
It won’t help with the noise, but you can get blackout curtains to help with the light. The cars and streetlights are probably polluting the inside of your room.
Good blackout curtains are heavy. They’ll filter out most but not all light in daytime (at least mine do), but at night they’ll make the room pitch black.
Besides those and silicon earplugs, a job with semi-flexible hours also helps with my sleep. Personally I have trouble getting into a rhythm of falling asleep and waking up at the exact same time.
I had a professor back in college who was researching the physiological effects of meditation.
He claimed that doing meditation daily over a long period of time tuned the "alarm centers" of the brain. After a stimulus the brain would calm itself/the body down much more quickly.
Zero cost, but you need to do it daily, you need to build up to about 20 minutes a session, and you might need to do it over a month to notice results.
You might also want to run with your idea of taking formal stress management training. Such classes are pretty holistic. Much more than telling to do relaxation exercises. You aren't anxious, but you might be stressing yourself out without being aware of it. For example, I don't visualize the next day in the evening as I find that gets me too geared up to sleep through the night. Maybe you have similar mental habits that aren't helping.
One thing that I think wasn’t mentioned here: have you tried investigating if you have sleep apneia? I had and had no ideia of it, always thought I was a light sleeper. My Apple Watch warned me my o2 was getting low during the night, so I went to a doctor, had some exams done and that was it, moderate sleep apneia. Got a surgery done and now my sleep quality is much better, finally I have deep sleep episodes during the night.
Interestingly, I had low ferritin levels (6 μg/L), and my doctor prescribed me iron supplements. They have made a world of difference in my life. The unexpected side effect is that, I actually have a more difficult time with sleep now; before the supplements, I was so exhausted from the low ferritin it seems, that I would just fall back asleep if I woke up in the night. Now that things are improving there, and I don't have that daytime exhaustion, I don't fall back asleep as easily. :) Not really relevant, just kind a fun reminder that sometimes problems in life actually help out in other areas and we don't even realize it. (by the way, it's not a complaint, I really do mean this in a lighthearted way; I am incredibly grateful for those iron supplements.)
I know it's not what you want to hear, but I'm afraid your options are basically move to a rural area where nobody is going to drive by or deal with it. I know how annoying it can be to get woken up in the night so having it happen several times every night must be frustrating, to say the least.
Do you have trouble getting back to sleep? If not, the best advice might just be to accept it--most people wake up multiple times in the night and simply don't remember it. In fact, as far as we're aware, staying asleep (or close to it) all night is a relatively modern phenomenon (at least in the West) and people historically tended to sleep in two blocks with a period of wakefulness in the middle of the night. From Wikipedia:
Sounds like that middle time was fun for all.
I also have a lot of issues with sleep and gabapentin is one of the only things that routinely works. 4 hours seems very low, though. What dosage are you on? 300mg a couple of hours before bed does the trick for me 90% of the time.
If you’re finding it far too easy to wake up even with a small amount of noise, have you considered trying to sound-treat your bedroom? I’m no acoustic engineer or podcaster or anything, so I’d seek advice first (maybe you can’t acoustically isolate outside noise and you can only suppress internal echoes? I dunno) but if you can deaden the outside sounds even more, maybe that combined with the white noise etc you have set up might help?
Another option in a similar vein is if your bed rattles/shakes as vehicles pass by, have you tried cushioning a bunch under where your bed frame meets the floor? For example; when I was at uni, I briefly had three mattresses stacked on top of each other to get to normal bed height, but because there was no rigid bed frame to transfer the physical movements, I literally slept through an (admittedly minor) earthquake.
I have had silicone earplugs made to measure and it has literally saved my life. Our apartment is on the first floor facing the street and it fan get very noisy. The worst is the bins being taken out at before 5am in time for the trash truck which passes around 6am. Right under my bedroom window.
Usually these can be made by an audiologist (the kind that make hearing aids). They inject silicone into your ear canal, let it set for a bit, then send the mold to be turned into silicone earplugs. They look like this:
https://www.earplugstore.com/custom-sleeping-ear-plugs.html
They are very good at reducing noise, I can't sleep without them anymore.
Do you get regular, vigorous exercise?
Have you been to a Registered Dietician who can order blood tests to see if anything is too low in your system?
Have you considered herbal medicine? It might be easier on your system than medication over the long term.
Herbs for Stress & Anxiety by Rosemary Gladstar
It won’t help with the noise, but you can get blackout curtains to help with the light. The cars and streetlights are probably polluting the inside of your room.
Good blackout curtains are heavy. They’ll filter out most but not all light in daytime (at least mine do), but at night they’ll make the room pitch black.
Besides those and silicon earplugs, a job with semi-flexible hours also helps with my sleep. Personally I have trouble getting into a rhythm of falling asleep and waking up at the exact same time.
I had a professor back in college who was researching the physiological effects of meditation.
He claimed that doing meditation daily over a long period of time tuned the "alarm centers" of the brain. After a stimulus the brain would calm itself/the body down much more quickly.
He was studying this method at the time.
Zero cost, but you need to do it daily, you need to build up to about 20 minutes a session, and you might need to do it over a month to notice results.
You might also want to run with your idea of taking formal stress management training. Such classes are pretty holistic. Much more than telling to do relaxation exercises. You aren't anxious, but you might be stressing yourself out without being aware of it. For example, I don't visualize the next day in the evening as I find that gets me too geared up to sleep through the night. Maybe you have similar mental habits that aren't helping.
One thing that I think wasn’t mentioned here: have you tried investigating if you have sleep apneia? I had and had no ideia of it, always thought I was a light sleeper. My Apple Watch warned me my o2 was getting low during the night, so I went to a doctor, had some exams done and that was it, moderate sleep apneia. Got a surgery done and now my sleep quality is much better, finally I have deep sleep episodes during the night.