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Hi!
My name is Scott. Just want to give an update on my insomnia. I finished the course about 3 months ago. I am doing well. I probably average about 6.5 hours of sleep a night. Sometimes more. It is wonderful! I don’t worry about sleep so much. That actually helps me sleep. If I have a rough night, I just follow the steps I have learned. Consistency is definitely key. Plus, make sure you live your life! That was the first step for me. No matter how I slept the night before, I continue my day as planned. Plus it gets me nice and sleepy at night. Don’t give up hope and I wish everyone success. I know you can do it!!Hi Scott! That’s wonderful news, thanks for sharing your success story! You outlined many of the core steps of cognitive and behavioral theory for insomnia. As you mentioned, it’s vital to consistently implement the techniques and “live” your life after having sleep disruption the previous night. I’m glad to hear you’re experiencing quality sleep now.
Scott
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Thank you so much!! I am definitely in a better place than I was in the beginning of the year. I appreciate it!!
Congratulations.
My personal experience is that over time, sleep only continues to get better. 3 months after starting CBTi, I was sleeping much better and felt like I had my life back though I was not back to being a normal sleeper. I still worried about sleep and had the occasional rough night. But I was sleeping well enough most nights during the week that I was basically able to live my life normally during the day.
After 6 months, I found my sleep and my confidence about sleep was even better. I rarely thought about let alone worried about sleep.
After a year, I was completely and fully recovered. I had no issues traveling to other timezones for multi-day business trips. I even travelled to the other side of the world. Of course, I had jet lag but I used the techniques I learned from CBTi to help me overcome jet lag over the course of my business trip.
So long story short, its great to hear you are doing better. But you ain’t seen nothing yet.
Thank you! I definitely in a better place. I am so glad to find techniques that are natural. Much happier than I was a few months ago.
Thanks again!!!
Kobalap. It is also good to hear your recovery story. I have been on the CBT-I journey, I had some great success while treating with Martin, when I started to sleep through my sleep window of 5.5h for several days in a row, but after I finished, I had a set back and things went down hill to get really bad and I never managed to get it back on track. Maybe its just me not reacting well to a set back and been very afraid of a sleepless night and have to cope with my mentally demanding work the day after.
How has your recovery happened? I guess it wasn’t linear as well? I’ve been on this journey since May this year and I am always trying to find the reason why I am not improving anymore, maybe doing SC the wrong way or something else. Any advice you want to share of what worked for you?Danielstreva,
Sounds like arousal and anxiety are causing you to be awake. I developed a bad anxiety problem over lack of sleep. It was always in the back of my mind. Also, if you have a stressful job, that doesn’t help either. What has helped me greatly is an hour of quiet and relaxation before bed. I listen to music and try and get calm. No tv etc. after about an hour I am sleepy enough for bed. In bed I turn my mind off. This is tough. Some nights, thoughts run rampant. I am getting better at shutting my mind off. When I do that I fall asleep quickly. I still wake up a couple times at night. Which is normal according to Martin. The difference is I can fall back asleep quickly. Before, I would think way too much and I wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep. I hit a rough patch in the beginning of the year. I keep practicing the CBTI. I am living my life, and it is working. I hope you find success. I know you can. Don’t give up and don’t think too much about lack of sleep. Keep practicing the techniques and the sleep window. If I have a bad nights sleep, I usually sleep better the next night, since my sleep drive is stronger. Good luck and I wish you the best.Scott
Yes, my recovery was up and down.
Even though I followed my sleep schedule and other CBTi techniques, I would have setbacks.
One thing that helped me a lot when I had setbacks is just knowing the stats. A guy named Donn Posner was a clinician in the east coast of the US for several decades. According to him, in the years he treated patients using CBTi (thousands of patients), he could remember less than 10 that followed his instructions and didn’t see significant benefit. Dr. Posner treated all kinds of people. People with PTSD, with depression, with chronic pain, with cancer. Regardless, if his patients followed CBTi, their sleep would improve.
The lesson I took fro this was that all I needed to do was follow the CBTi guidelines and I would sleep better. Sure enough, it did. In the first year, I had setbacks. But things did improve.
Does that image represent you after a tough night ? If so, try a more peaceful image of you!
Kobalap, what techniques you think helped you the most? I think the key is sleep restriction to increase sleep drive and stimulus control. Only SR doesnt work for me as I cant be super sleep but as soon as I hit the bed I will go wide awake due to the conditional arousal, so I think at least for me Stimulus Control is key.
If I was to guess, I would say that 90% of people with chronic insomnia would improve their sleep enormously just by following sleep restriction. The first time I had horrible chronic insomnia (15 years ago), that’s pretty much all I did – followed sleep restriction properly (fixed bed times, no laying around during the day, no naps greater than 45 mins, living a regular life during the day) and within 3 months, I was sleeping better. Not as much as I would like but well enough that my life was more than bearable. I followed that routine for quite some time and by around 18 months or 2 years, I was completely recovered.
The second time around (roughly 3 years ago), I came down with a medical condition that made it very difficult for me to sleep. The medical condition is not curable and there is no treatment to reduce the symptoms. So not only was the medical condition affecting my sleep, knowing that my medical condition was not treatable, I was also completely freaked out because I knew I was headed down the road of chronic insomnia. Though I am well versed in CBTi techniques, my sleep spiraled out of control and within 2 weeks, I was a complete mess. In terms of fixing my sleep, I knew that there is nothing out there that is better than CBTi. I got all my notes out, re-watched a bunch of CBTi videos and got to work implementing a proper sleep schedule.
I was suffering from severe anxiety due to the other medical condition. That was compounded by not being able to sleep very much so I felt like crap pretty much always. And as we all know, when we are suffering from anxiety, it makes it doubly difficult to sleep at night.
I followed sleep restriction but to help manage my heightened anxiety, I started working on relaxation techniques. My objective for relaxation techniques was less about reducing my anxiety at the moment but rather to build up skills to help me manage anxiety in the long term. They say that relaxation techniques (PMR, deep breathing, meditation, etc.) take a lot of practice so I never worried about them “not working”. I just felt like I needed something to do to take more control of my situation even if the benefits did not materialize right away.
In my previous bout with chronic insomnia, sleep restriction was enough. The second time around, I did not feel like I was making progress as quickly. There were other tools in the CBTi bag that I wasn’t using – namely, stimulus control. I tried stimulus control for a few nights but I found that it actually made me more alert. I was constantly monitoring. Am I still awake? Has it been 15 minutes? I know what the studies say about stimulus control but something felt counter intuitive for me.
In thinking about it, stimulus control is supposedly meant to break negative associations with your bedroom/bedtime/bed. They tell you that the way to do this is not spend time in bed if you are not asleep. For me, I reasoned out that my objective should never be to fall asleep. My objective for my sleep window is to find relaxation. In most cases, if you have sleep debt and your body clock is aligned, if you find yourself relaxed, you will fall asleep.
So instead of doing stimulus control as prescribed by CBTi, I made a modification – during my sleep window, I go to bed. If I am in bed and relaxed/happy, I stay in bed. Whether I fall asleep or not is not important. If I am in bed and not relaxed or am feeling agitated, then I get up and go to another room for 15-30 minutes. Then I go back to bed again to see if I can lay down and be relaxed. They say that it is incredibly difficult to fall asleep if you are trying too hard to fall asleep. So for me, I don’t go to my bed to fall asleep. I go to bed to relax and think about happy/fun stuff.
So the second time I had chronic insomnia, it felt harder and it seemed to take longer. I had to use more tools to get myself right. But I am happy to report that I have slept well for well over a year now. I have had 1 night in the past 8 months that I did not sleep well. That’s it. For the past year, I have had maybe 3 nights where I did not sleep well.
So to summarize:
– For me, the foundation for fixing sleep is sleep restriction. Following this correctly fixes a lot of what breaks your sleep. It fixes your body clock, it generates sleep debt and it minimizes the amount of time you spend in bed agitated.
– I followed my own version of stimulus control. I am sure the pros would object to my version of stimulus control but this modification worked well.
– When my anxiety was at its worst, I practiced relaxation techniques. It gave me something that I could actively do to help myself feel better. Even though in the beginning the relaxation techniques did not yield any significant relaxation or reduction in anxiety, I looked at it like putting money in the bank. Over time, the more I practiced, the better I would get at it.Kobalap very interesting. I loved reading your post. Very insightful! I, myself had been a decent sleeper, until my episode in the beginning of the year. I really never thought about sleep. Just slept. Of course, as soon as you go through a traumatic insomnia episode that changes. I was putting in too much sleep effort. As Martin says. I had to have this and this and this in order to sleep. That led to even more lack of sleep. Also I had bad anxiety (probably due to lack of sleep). As you said, anxiety can be brutal on a person dealing with insomnia. I totally agree with staying in bed if you are relaxed and feel good. Even if you don’t fall asleep. I do the same thing. Unless I am feeling anxious or agitated. I will then get up and go sit somewhere other than my bed. I have always been one not to fall asleep right away. Sometimes it takes me longer. I usually do though. Getting in and out of bed sometimes can be counterproductive for me. As it keeps me agitated and awake. Sometimes I change my sleep position (facing a different direction completely), and that helps a lot. I did that last night and fell asleep right away. I don’t fear sleep as much anymore and I love it. I also relax about an hour before bed. Read and listen to music. That helps also. Thank you for sharing your experience. It I’ve very helpful.
Scott
Hi @kobalap – what a wonderful story! It sounds like you’ve got a great understanding of these evidence-based techniques and they’ve worked well for you over the years.
Scott
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
What a fantastic and positive discussion this has turned into — thank you, Scott, for kicking it off by sharing your success story and for returning to offer additional guidance and insight. Thank you kobalap for your detailed description of your own journey toward better sleep and the great insights you shared, too!
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
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