[Sleepless guy]

Hope I can recover from insomnia and hope I can get a job.

[hiker]

Hi Sleepless guy, I can relate to that—how are you supposed to work when you are hammered from insomnia? I had to let go of part of my law practice, the part that required the most emotional stamina (arguing spouses) and instead did more work which I could do without too many deadlines (less controversial, writing reports).

I don’t know what type of work you were doing. Let’s say it is working for an auto parts store. It might be less demanding to work with inventory in the back, rather than dealing with customers at the counter.

Of course you want to sleep better, and I hope you can stick with this forum. I think you will find a steady stream of comments about how our thoughts can really get us off track. Example:

1. I can’t sleep, which means I can’t work, which means I am going to go broke and be homeless and who knows what will happen living on the streets!

as opposed to:

2. I’m having these terrible thoughts going through my head. I am watching them zip through–thoughts that I will never be able to sleep, that I can’t get any job, that I am going to end up on the street….and that no one cares, etc.

If you have trouble seeing the difference between 1 and 2, it is not that there’s no difference. It’s that your mind is scattered because you are so tired, which is totally understandable. Really hard to think straight, and here I think it comes down to just acknowledging, “OK, the truth is out there, it’s just hard to focus right now,” and give yourself a break for doing the best you can.

I would think all this stuff I have written is so much BS, except for the fact that i lived it for years.

It does get better, even though that can be hard to see. Still true.

[Author]

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