[Chen Liang]

Thank you deb you have replied my question. I still have a question what is mindfulness what are you doing with mindfullness? Sorry i am really new about all this although i have read the book from guy meadow many i dont inderstand. About welcoming i think i get it where you let worry thought come like a friend and dont fight it but welcome it until they go away on their own. But what about the space you are talking i dont understand at all about this space. What is “space” ? About acceptance i get it but to reach that point of acceptance i cant imagine that my mind keep saying drink the pills to sleep or “oh no not sleeping again” “oh no the sun is up already”. I am jealous about how you can reach that acceptance. Please teach me hahahaha. I am sorry if i have lots of question .

[gsdmom]

Hi Chen – Trying to reduce my insomnia has been a long process, just over a year. Mine was caused by a medication messing up my nervous system and having a double dose of anxiety due to living with a very annoying person. You have good questions and just keep practicing. Healing is a long, slow process but I am seeing progress for about 10-14 days then I’ll have set back for a few days, and the cycle starts again. After recently taking a different medication that gave me insomnia and upset my nervous system, I just have to accept I have a very sensitive nervous system, I don’t know if it is genetics or from environment or both, but I find ACT is a gentle approach to help with sleep.

What especially is helping me is practicing mindfulness during the day – doing the breathing exercises in the Sleep Book or doing mindful walking when I’m out with my dog, clearing my head and listening to all the sounds: the different birds and their distances in relationship to me, my dog’s panting, the crunch of gravel underneath my feet, it all becomes like a symphony. There are apps you can download on your phone like Calm or Insight timer and I like the guided meditations from the Mindful Movement. They talk about “space” too and use an example when you breathe, there is a pause between exhale and inhale and that pause can be like a pause between thoughts or you and your thoughts. Intellectually I understand the “space” right away but actually putting it into practice took a long time.

[Chen Liang]

Hie gsdmom- thank you for replying to me to help me understand more. Here is a thought of mine if you already accept sleeplessness than why we should train mindfulness? isnt the act of training for mindfulness or welcoming actually equal to the act of trying to sleep? because what is the purpose of us training mindfulness or welcoming? isnt it for sleep? if we actually accept sleeplessness, and make it or train our mind to see it, as something normal or not dangerous then we would drop all the routine and training that actually make us try to sleep. I actually met a guy in youtube. He was insomniac and now after 10 years he no longer insomniac and he said he even cant be afraid of sleeplessness anymore. He actually giving up and letting go when no medication no therapy nothing can help him sleep and he said who cares if i sleep or not he drop all the meds all the routine all the props and habit and everything. He is almost masochistic in my point of view and he choose to live without caring he sleep or not. fast forward 10 years from then he said now he even drink caffeine before sleep and he slept 8 hours a day every single day . He even said he try to get scared with sleeplesness but he cant he cant get scared anymore because that is how far he doesnt care anymore he live or die or he sleep or not. well of course its not instant he said its a gradual process not caring about sleep engrave in him slowly the more he doesnt care he slept a bit it take years but he never even read the sleep book by guy meadow he doesnt even know that this forum or talk exist. He just doesnt care anymore. when i ask about fear at night of sleeplessness he said who cares about fear hug and embrace the fear you are not caring or afraid of it anymore. Oh man i envy his personality i want to contact him personally but he doesnt reply anymore.

• This reply was modified 4 years, 6 months ago by Chen Liang.

[Deb]

Chen – if we already are able to accept our sleeplessness and lie peacefully in bed, then we don’t need to do mindfulness. For myself, I didn’t need to do mindfulness because I was able to accept whether or not I slept and lie in bed peacefully. But if aren’t able to do this yet, then mindfulness and welcoming are tools you use to help your mind settle down and relax. I also only needed to do welcoming a few times. Once I knew how to lie in bed relaxed, accepting whether or not I would sleep, then I didn’t need to practice mindfulness or welcoming. So the point is to learn to settle down your mind. If you learn how to do this and just relax in bed, then eventually you will fall asleep.

[Odinsky]

Hey guys I’ve been following this post extremely closely. Many of you are very very similar to me. I’ve been practicing ACT and also a bit of SRT to keep my sleep drive up. ACT alone right now doesn’t cut it though as I’ve relapsed so, so bad. My question is, did you guys stay in bed with your spouses? Or switch to the spare room? I know the sleep book says stay with your spouse. But My wife tosses and turns a lot. Steals blankets etc. i used to be an amazing sleeper and even back then she would wake me up. But, I always could ultimately let it go and fall back asleep. Now, when I’m practicing slight SRT, and I go to bed exhausted, she will roll over and wake me right as I’m drifting off. This happened 3 times last night! All the ACT in the world couldn’t pull me out of the tailspin thinking I’d be asleep if “it weren’t for her.” But if I go to the spare room, I will eventually need to come back to bed sharing. We are young, and separate beds isn’t always possible. Especially on vacations etc. I really don’t want to be in separate beds forever. But I’m so fragile right now in my confidence. Being woken by her is really is tough. What would you guys recommend?

[Chen Liang]

hi deb- i see . I want to ask:
1. if for example you have done acceptance and you didnt sleep at all . In the morning do you wake up everytime the same time like sleep window?
2. Isnt acceptance getting harder when sleeplessness happen everyday like 3 days without sleep. and how can you do acceptance after few days no sleep at all most people will grab the pills already.
3. How long have you train yourself with acceptance to finally it become your personality and bear fruit from it?

Thank you.

[Chen Liang]

Extra question :
4. The longer you stay on the bed not sleeping , isnt your mind going to question the motive of staying on bed? For example me when i lay down at night my mind will wonder eventually why sleep doesnt happen after waiting for 2 hours and it become worried. How do you face this kind of thinking?

[Chen Liang]

Why there is no edit button?! I want to add question:
5. Do you agree that ACTi will not work if you do it for the purpose of trying to sleep? Many here read about CBTi and ACTi after many sleepless night in hope this method might give them sleep. Acceptance is acceptance sleepless become nothing big. If people use ACTi to sleep then it will backfire because they dont trully accept but fake acceptance for the agenda of sleep. What do you think about this?

[Deb]

Hi Odinsky – I would recommend sleeping somewhere else until your sleep improves and you know you will be able to fall back asleep. In Guy Meadows’ book, he talks about the client who couldn’t sleep with his wife until he got better. Then he gradually transitioned into it.

Hi Chen
1) I would sleep in. I didn’t have a strict sleep window.
2) For myself, by the second night I was sleeping a few hours so it gave me hope to keep at it. Over time my sleep gradually improved, so I wasn’t tempted to take any pills.
3) I was sleeping normally by about 2 weeks after I started practicing ACT consistently every night.
4) I lay in bed all night, not worrying, just relaxing. It was a very long night of doing nothing there but laying, but because I had hope in the process, I didn’t let myself worry. When I was exhausted the next day, I took a short nap to help myself get through the day.
5) Well, ultimately we are using ACT to help us to sleep. But when we’re in bed, we accept on a night to night basis that we may not sleep that particular night, which helps calm down our mind and then may lead us to sleep. We give up the worry and then sleep starts coming naturally. The “acceptance of a sleepless night” is a TOOL to help relax our mind so that eventually we will sleep. Please re-read the chapter on Mindfulness which talks about Carlos, who finally learned to completely relax in bed after about two weeks. Then he started sleeping better after that. So the goal is to learn to relax in bed and not worry. Then eventually you will start to sleep better consistently. ACT retrains us to “let go” of all our thoughts when we go to bed like normal sleepers.

[Mac0908]

Hi Deb, I see you asked how I’m doing a few posts back. Sorry for the delay but I’m trying not to linger around here as much right now as I’m doing just wonderful sleep wise. I think I’ve had literally one bad night in the last two weeks. The good times continue. That being said I am STILL working from home as my office informed us that they are not ready to bring us back just yet. As you know full well that will be a whole entirely new ballgame once that 6am alarm anxiousness returns, not to mention everything about what has to happen in the morning again (i.e. showering, shaving, getting ready, etc) as opposed to literally walking 3 steps to my dining room table to start work haha. It will not be pretty, I know this. I’ll probably suffer at least to start a little bit. I probably won’t ever have a run as nice as this once the 6am wakeups return (as opposed to the current 7am-ish ones) But let’s hope that the more and more I sleep well the more confidence I build in my memory and the better things will ultimately be. Times are great right now.

[Deb]

Hi Mac – so glad you’re sleeping great! I am too! I also am staying away from here for the most part unless someone asks me something, like Chen. Let me know how you’re doing once you have to go back to work again. In the meantime, enjoy!

[Chen Liang]

hi deb- i was trying to accept sleeplessness and suddenly the worry comes in and i sweat a lot in bed i have the urge to toss and turn left and right but i didnt do it i just imagine like there is a worry fireball all around my body and make me sweat , but it seems the worry doesnt go down and my body feel like being torched with low heat for a long time. did i do something wrong here? or should i just lay in bed with the worry and sweating until it calm down by itself? my mind is racing like saying what did i do wrong what did i do wrong why im worried why i am sweating like that.

[Deb]

The purpose of imagining the worry as a creature is to help you separate “You” from the worry. It’s only part of you. When I imagined it as a creature like that then I felt sorry for it. Then it went away. But if what you’re doing with it is not helping, then try something else. Don’t just let it dominate you and take over. When my anxiety got really bad and I couldn’t think my way out of it while in bed, I usually got up and did something to calm myself like write in my journal or read a book. Then I went back to bed after I was calm. Your goal is to learn how to stay calm in bed.

[Mac0908]

Chen is your sleep anxiety is that high to the point where you begin sweating in bed then you need CBT-I and fast. Get out of bed and don’t return until you’re calmed down and more sleepy. Keep this up until the anxiety goes down more and more. Could take many months.

[Odinsky]

Did Anyone find SRT makes there problem worse? I was spending 8.5 hours in bed and doing ACT. Sleeping around 5 hours. I’m now doing a 6 hour SRT window and I get so nervous going to bed this much later that I’m sleeping only 3 hours now! I’m sweating profusely as well.

[Author]

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