Having trouble waking to alarm?

I've been trying to wake myself up to WILD about 5-6 hours after I go to sleep. I have a fairly routine sleep schedule (around 11PM - 7:30AM on weekdays), but I don't seem to wake up to the alarm I set. I don't consciously hear it at all, however I think that I am BRIEFLY waking up because whenever I have set my alarm, I have extremely vivid dreams. I'm guessing this is due to waking up briefly.

So, any tips on actually waking up to my alarm? I have it on a somewhat moderate volume because I don't want to wake my entire family at 5AM.

I don't use alarms, because they startle me. If you drink water before bed and every time you get up to the restroom, that should do the trick. You can also try repeating a mantra as you falling alseep "I wake up at [insert time]'. People usually wake up briefly after REM is over, but we don't really realize it, just turn to other side and continue sleeping. Hope this helps:)

Your alarm might be going off when you're in NREM sleep. It can be very hard to wake a person in NREM.

Have you experimented with different timing? Maybe 15 minutes earlier or later? Also, be sure to set your intention to wake from your alarm. When you go to sleep at night, tell yourself you will wake from the alarm. Imagine yourself doing so.

Hi! I've been doing WBTB for a while now, and this was also my problem. Either I can't consciously hear it, or I hear it but something in me just makes me go back to sleep. What I did (and still do) is I set different alarms about 3-5 minutes apart. Even when I don't wake up to the first few ones, I start to become conscious that there will be another alarm, so I end up waking up to the 4th or 5th one. Not sure if it will work for you though, but good luck! :)

Also, I try to avoid setting songs as alarms. I use tones that really annoy me so I am more likely to wake up. When I use song alarms, they just end up being incorporated into my dream and I end up dreaming about being in a concert or something, with my alarm as the song. Lol. :banana: