Appreciate the positive thoughts bro.
I'm not a novice in listening to my body/mind, as am not a novice in using nutrition, nootropics and pharma drugs. The middle of the night awakening, is a circadian cortisol misalignment that is typical to stress and consequently; depression. It's a by-product of a dysfunctional HP axis. You can try 5HT1a agonists, like CBD and Buspirone, or some other adaptogens like rhodiola, ashwagandha, tribulus, etc. Most of them will have a similar MOA in regards to stress, and that is; via HT1a agonism, as most are basically SSRI's and selective serotonin receptor modulators. They have other mechanism too. I have tribulus on the way that I'm looking forward in trying as it's not modulating stress via serotonin, which blunts my cognition to unfunctional proportions.
However, I've recorded my self sleeping, and my breathing is weird af. Lots of moments when I'm gasping for air and those moments corelate with awakenings. I've been a bad sleeper my whole life, and such continuous problems, are usually a sign of a deeper physiological pathology. It's the same with anxiety. So if somebody is struggling, for instance, his whole life with anxiety, it usually points to a physiological problem (if there isn't some underlying psychological issue like ptsd for example). We all have different neurochemistry, somebody might have overactive SERT or may have to much presynaptic HT1a's or might have hypoactive NMDAr's leading to hyper glutamate release, or somebody else might have low PFC dopamine transmission coupled with high striatal and mesolimbic transmission, etc. etc. All of this neurological issues will lead to somebody being much more prone to higher inflammation, ie. stress and subsequently depression, HPA dysregulation, etc. In other words, somebody has a much easier time keeping stress, psychosis, etc. at bay, then somebody else. For some it's a life long struggle, especially if untreated as that leads to morphological changes; brain is far from being static, for instance, changes in NMDAr subunits reflect stress - which subsequently effects cell Ca+2 influx and excitotoxicity. I'm just rambling here, but I hope you get the idea.
It's a comforting idea that you're proposing and I wish it would be that simple, but it's simply not the case and it's factually wrong to think that way, and I can't blame you for it - most neurotypical's think that way, as most are coming from their own perspective and also, they just lack the knowledge. But don't get me wrong; I do get the general sentiment that you're proposing. But sleeping this bad for such a long time, is a huge stressor on it's own and it needs to get resolved in order for remission to occur. And no, just "taking it easy" is not the answer.
I know ya'll are heavily inclined towards psychosis, stress, etc., being the root cause for my sleep maintenance issues (it definitely plays a role, as mentioned above), and thus, I wont bother explaining my situation further. But please, don't take this as me being negative and not welcoming your positive intentions. Cheers.
