Moody Sleepwalking?

by Lydia
(Pennsylvania)

Apparently I sleepwalk a LOT. My mother and I sleep downstairs (I'm a 16 year old girl) because our dog is very old and needs constant supervision and cannot make it up the stairs to either of our bedrooms. My mom gets up very early, so she's awake when I sleepwalk. I never remember what I do, and she always surprises me because she thinks I'm awake. When I'm tired, normally I don't say much and am lazy, so she just assumes I'm just sleepy. I only find out when I say things like,

"I'm tired today.."
"No wonder, you were up doing stuff at like 3 in the morning!"
"No, I wasn't..?"
"Uh, yeah you were. I saw you."

And I have no idea what she's talking about. For example, last night I apparently got up around 2 or 3 in the morning. I walked out to our kitchen, and my mom asked if I was okay and I said yes. After looking around for something in the kitchen for awhile I came back with nothing and sat down on the couch with my eyes wide open for about a half hour, then got up and went to the bathroom. She asked where I was going, and I just said "bathroom." I stayed up there for 20 minutes, came back downstairs, climbed back into my blankets and fell asleep. I'm very tired today as well. Usually when she tries to talk to me while I'm sleepwalking, I'm very snippy, moody or rude to her saying things that I would never say to her while I'm conscious.

I'm curious as to what I do while I'm in the bathroom since my mom says she hears me doing nothing. Any ideas on how I can maybe...calm this down a little bit? It's really affecting my sleep. I'm not extremely stressed or tired and I haven't majorly changed my sleep schedule in any way.

Thank you!

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Kevin: Hey Lydia, one thing I might recommend is to ask your mom to try to gently guide you back to your bed when she sees you in these states. If she's thinking you're awake it may be hard for her to tell when you're sleepwalking at first, but I bet with a little keener of an eye and some experience with it she can help your sleepwalking self find your way back to bed sooner :-)

Warmly,
Kevin

(Please keep in mind that I am a student of sleep science and not a medical doctor. Please take any thoughts I give with my background in mind.)

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