[Daf]

For me the sleep window is 6hrs because my average sleep duration is 5.5 hrs. This was measured over the last 5 months when I’ve only had two nil sleep nights. Anymore sleep than say 7 hours means the night after I can expect that sleepiness will not come, so the chance of a nil sleep night is increased.
I think ACT and SRT can and should work together. The only thing I tale issue with on some hardcore SRT folk is the issue of getting out of bed after 15 mins or so if you cannot sleep. It seems far too short to me – and if one uses mindfulness/ ACT one can be at peace in bed just resting, though not actually sleeping. This is what I do when I cannot sleep, only getting up to do something else (I watch TV), if I get fed up with lying there.

[Steve]

Hi Mac. I get what you are saying but I guess we are going to have to agree to disagree. There is a reason the Meadows book tells you to not practice strict SRT with ACT. Also, Dr. Kat from his sleep school told someone on here that SRT isn’t really compatible with ACT because it can cause anxiety in the person. The reason I believe SRT is not compatible with ACT is that ACT doesn’t want you to spend less time in bed. I’m not saying it wants you to spend more time in bed than what you would normally need for sleep, but it doesn’t want you to do a drastic SRT reduction. It wants you to get to know your insomnia and practice the tools when you can’t sleep. Night time is the best time to practice them since that is when the demons affect you the most. In addition, staying in bed allows you to get rest and relaxation, and therefore conserve energy, for the next day. If a person reduced their SW by two hours to practice SRT, then that’s two hours less in bed the person has to practice the tools and get to know their insomnia. It’s also two hours less time the person has to conserve their energy since it means they are up and doing activities in order to make it to their bed time sleep window. As for SRT only taking a week to work, that’s not always true. It took me longer, about two weeks for it to work. And then after working for about three weeks, I started to regress until I was only getting 2 to 3 hours of sleep a night. Even when it did work at it’s best, I was only getting about 5 hours of sleep. Clearly SRT wasn’t working for me. And it obviously wasn’t working for others since if it was, this ACT thread wouldn’t exist. Mostly now, I get anywhere from 6 to 7.5 hours of sleep using ACT (mostly about 6.5) so I am far better off doing ACT than I am combining it with SRT.

[delv-x]

Hello all,

An update since it’s been a few weeks. I had 1-2 days of semi poor sleep about a month ago and since then things have been decent. In bed generally between 11PM-12AM and mostly up at 7AM and maybe 8-8:30 on weekends. A nap here and there for 20-30 minutes when I feel like I need to. Basically relatively normal. Even went on a get away with my wife for a few nights and really no issues worrying about sleep and having refreshing sleep.

Out of nowhere, the night of the 27th, 28th, 29th (last night), I am back to dealing with mostly sleep maintenance. Up around 3 and from 3 till 7, I mostly lay in bed and relax but my body feels tense like I need to stretch a lot and my mind is just wandering like crazy not feeling sleepy. Like Daf mentioned I usually stick it out for awhile but after awhile feels too long and don’t feel like sleep is coming soon then Ill leave the room and lay quietly in another room. Sometimes the next day Ill read or listen to Guy Meadows just to realize my problem isn’t as bad as others and yes the feeling sucks but the more you welcome and just let it in, the less power it has.

Sleep will return and I know I can sleep because I was able to for long stretches many times. I just worry that Ill start going back to logging sleep, thinking about it too much and resorting to meds for that help.

Like always, no idea what caused the relapse.

[Steve]

Sorry to hear of your relapse Delv. I have a question for you. When you say you were in bed between 11pm – 12:00am and up at 7:00am, was that all or mostly sleep? I agree about the less power insomnia has if you let it in. I am at the stage right now where I just don’t care about the insomnia anymore. If I sleep, I sleep. If I don’t, it’s rough but I know I will survive the next day. I try to do what I would normally do such as going to the gym and out with friends although it still has an effect on what I can do. Having said that though, I do still think about my insomnia more than I should. I try to meditate but it’s difficult to not think about it. That’s probably what’s holding me back some. Hope you get back to a normal sleep soon.

Deb – We haven’t heard from you in awhile. How are you doing?

[gsdmom]

I have to agree with Steve that at least for me, sleep restriction would definitely be incompatible with ACT. The greatest benefit of ACT in my case has been reducing my anxiety and resting in bed so I have more energy during the day. I’ve been attempting ACT for almost 3 months now because my energy has increased I’ve been able to start work again, although part-time and I take some continuing education classes. Twice in the last two weeks, I’ve had zero sleep nights and still have gone to work for an 8 hours shift the next day. For the people trying SRT, are you hoping this will speed up the recovery process? From what I’ve read and my personal experience, there is seems to be no quick fix for insomnia, but a process to let the brain change and heal.

Changing the subject – Does anyone still experience long light sleep stages? For me it feels like I’m in the light sleep stage for the first 2 hours of getting to bed, not even sure I’m sleeping.

delv-x – sorry for your unexpected relapse. It seems that once you start sleeping well the relapse is doubly frustrating. Glad you have a positive attitude that you will sleep well again. Since July, twice I’ve had almost perfect sleep for a week then as you said, out of nowhere I go back to poor sleep patterns, but slowly over time things are slowly improving.

[burn]

This may sound like total overthinking, but I would be glad to hear other people’s opinion. I am still not certain whether at times I still apply some sleep effort. Last few nights I allowed my mind to totally relax while in bed. That means that I didn’t try to focus on sensation of bed or focusing on benefits of rest. I allowed myself to just relax and be quiet. In this state it feels like I just fall inside myself, and then just ‘residing’ inside of myself. No disturbing thoughts are coming, no detectable anxiety. My mind does not wander either in this state, it just sits still, quiet. Any attempt to focus on sensation of my bed feels like a mental effort, attempt to crawl from inside of myself to the outside.
Before these last few nights, what I was doing is I was trying to gently mentally focus on sensation of my bed to make sure I don’t apply sleep effort and not trying to sleep. Last few nights, when I allowed such quiet state results are mixed: one night I feel asleep late, another night I feel asleep super fast and last night I got very little sleep.

Do you think I apply sleep effort, since my mind does not wonder?

[burn]

Just to make it more clear. I feel that this state of quiet wakefulness is giving the most rest when not sleeping. It seems that I mentally rest more compared to when I gently focus on sensations. As Deb mentioned, maybe I was working too hard on watching and accepting my wakefulness, that’s why I decided try not to do anything. My concern is that maybe going into this resting ‘inside myself’ state, I am inadvertently forcing sleep. Maybe it is a sign that I am not willing to ‘watch and welcome’ thoughts and sensations.
Any thoughts?

[Steve]

Burn – One question for you. When you are lying there, do you notice that you may be trying to force your eyes to stay closed? That’s one of the things I noticed I was doing and had to stop. I was lying there forcing my eyes to be shut tight. I should have been lying there with my eyelid muscles in the closed position but relaxed. Once I did that, I found it easier to go to sleep because I wasn’t forcing myself into a sleep position.

[burn]

Steve,

I am not sure. I will check it tonight. Thanks for suggestion.

[JTthemillenial]

I am on day four of SRT and didn’t get a wink of sleep last night, after sleeping for 4-5 hours the past week. I was super tired and I have been able to talk myself into “staying awake to rest” until I go under, but last night I decided to go to bed with optimism and I got slammed by my arrivals. I had to continuously use the ACT tools just to keep myself somewhat calm. Sometimes I get to sleep when I do this, but that’s not always the case (and I realize it’s not the purpose). We had winter weather come through yesterday, and now I’m stuck in my apartment teleworking, which does not help me get my mind of things. Ugh. I realize SRT is like this at first, but I’m not entirely convinced it will do much for me if I’m that hyper-aroused after an exhausting week. I’ll be sticking with it for at least a few weeks longer, but ugh.

Burn, I think of sleep effort as actively trying to put yourself to sleep (meditating, counting sheep, listening to hypnotic podcasts, etc). I think of sleep monitoring as maybe more what you’re describing, which involves noticing your state of consciousness. I still do this. If your mind starts to wander, I’d say let it go. If not, I’d say focus on breathing and sensations with the understanding that it may make you more aware of your consciousness, but it may have the benefit of keeping you more relaxed. I keep mentioning this, but when I do let my eyes close and tell myself “I’m just closing my eyes to rest,” I sometimes drop off to sleep quickly, but I don’t know how long my own brain will buy into that distraction.

• This reply was modified 5 years ago by JTthemillenial.

[Steve]

JT, you are committing a very bad error. Going to bed with optimism is actually an unwanted thought. (Dr. Kat from Dr. Meadows sleep school confirmed this with one of the people here who talked to her online.) Continue to go to bed with the idea of accepting whatever happens. That is what acceptance of insomnia is all about. Going to bed thinking you are going to sleep could be very disappointing if it doesn’t happen. When the optimism shows up, just note the thought and then go back to what you were doing, which was probably lying in bed accepting whatever happens. There are so many pitfalls in ACT, I know. But when you don’t have expectations, you won’t be disappointed and you can prepare yourself better for acceptance.

[JTthemillenial]

I thought one of the tenants of treatment was an increase of confidence, but maybe I misinterpreted that in terms of ACT. I can’t imagine a scenario in which I am not disappointed after not sleeping, even if I do practice the tools. Maybe I need more time to work on that. I appreciate the insight.

[Steve]

My interpretation of that with ACT is that you can certainly get confidence in your ability to sleep and that your body certainly hasn’t lost that ability, just don’t start predicting that “this is the night I’m going to sleep”. Accept whatever comes.

By the way, are you in England? You’re getting snow now? Just curious. In order to distract your mind from your insomnia, dress warm and take a walk outside using the Noticing Your Senses tool. Good luck to you.

[burn]

JT,

It is an interesting thought about self-monitoring. Borgesbi mentioned it previously, that subtle self-monitoring was one of here roadblocks.

[JTthemillenial]

That makes sense. It’s just so much harder to accept the possibility of a bad night after a string of consistency. But I know what you’re saying and you’re right.

I’m in Colorado. There has been snow on the ground for days. We barely even had a Fall.

[Author]

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