[nrmfrench]

About 2 months ago I had my first ever experience with insomnia (4 totally sleepless nights) I was exhausted and miserable, I called my doctor who prescribed me with some sleeping tablets to ‘reset’ my sleep cycle however this didn’t quite happen. Here we are 2 months later sleeping on average 3-4 hours a night if that! The initial source of my insomnia was going into the office after a long period at home so I was a little anxious, however that now no longer concerns me and the cause of my insomnia now is my fear and worry of not sleeping! I have signed up to the 2 weeks of emails that I hope might help but any advice would be much appreciated!

[Chee2308]

Hello and welcome. I am sorry you are having sleeping problems lately. Please feel free to look through the material here. Some of the success stories have a lot of insights. Insomnia is almost always a problem of too much thinking and too much obsession. If you can start letting go of these, your recovery can truly begin. Other than that, observing a regular sleep schedule (sleep window) is critical. And that’s all you need. Discipline and a willingness to learn and letting go of unhelpful thoughts and behaviors. Good luck!

[nrmfrench]

Thank you! I’ll definitely have a read through, my doctor was very quick to prescribe me with zopiclone which works very well and I find myself taking one after a few restless nights when I’m totally exhausted and it puts me back to square one! I know it can’t be taken long term so am working on a better routine and maybe see if going to bed after about 1am helps. It’s so difficult when all you think about all day is not sleeping/tired and get into bed wide awake and worrying! I will listen to the podcast too as lots of people have found this helpful. As horrible as it is to be suffering it’s nice to know you’re not the only one at times ?

[Chee2308]

Hi and thank you too. Your insomnia is pretty recent which is good because you can nip it in the bud before it develops into years or decades long obsession like in some people.

I wouldn’t recommend taking pills. It’s easy to quit now before the idea that you need external aids like pills to sleep becomes more deeply entrenched. Early in my insomnia, I took ambien but it worked only for two nights. So I knew very early on that pills weren’t the solution for me.

A much better way to “reboot” your sleep system is just to keep to a regular bed time. No sleeping or naps at other times if you can. Keep doing this and your body will respond within a few weeks. The human sleep system works on a clock and on something called sleep drive or sleep debt. You get sleepier the longer you stay awake. You are building sleep debt every minute you are awake. It’s exactly like hunger. Most people will have a healthy sleep drive after at least 16 hours being awake. 18 hours is better so you could start with a 6 hour sleep window and slowly extend this as you improve.

In addition, another common question is waking up during the night or too early. Understand that this is completely normal. Traditional cbti recommends you get out of bed if you can’t sleep within 20 mins. But over time, I found another effective method. Act like you don’t care. Be okay with wakefulness, over time you should fall back asleep pretty quickly.

Try to be cheerful and optimistic about your condition. Fully engage in your daily activities as much as you can, much like before you have insomnia. Behave like a normal person without insomnia. Any truly recovered person is one who sees that sleep just cannot be controlled, and doesn’t live in fear of poor sleep anymore. Best wishes to you.

[nrmfrench]

Thanks so much for your reply it’s really helpful! Without zopiclone I tend to only get 2-3 hours a night if that and it will be early hours of the morning (after about 2am) I find it so hard to keep occupied until this time when there are so many hours to kill after dinner. I think I definitely need to work on my sleep drive as my job is sedentary and a daily walk doesn’t seem to be enough to tire me out, I’ll try to stick to bed after 1am and getting up at 6.30am daily, I have only managed about 1 or 2 nights of 7+ hours in the last 2 months and they were days I spent in London the whole day or if I had been on a night out and got in at about 1-2am anyway. The emails from Martin are very detailed and helpful so I am hopeful that in time this will settle & I’ll start sleeping for longer. Do you use a sleep diary? I have been trying to do that via the Sleepio app (cbt-I app in the UK) but the sessions are only once a week.

[Chee2308]

When I did the course, yes I kept a diary. That was 2 years ago back in 2020. I don’t now. I typically go to bed at 11-12 pm and get out at 7-8 am. My sleep is pretty consistent and I use no aids whatsoever. A sleep diary is pretty useful in recording data and tracking your progress. But for someone who already sleeps normally whom I consider myself as, it’s quite pointless. Nobody wants to keep to a set of sleep rules forever, really. Use cbti as a crutch if you will, but ultimately, you’ll have to grow out of it once its useful purpose has been utilized.

It’s quite impossible for someone who has no sleep problems before to suddenly “lose” it, so to speak, over just a couple of sleepless nights. It doesn’t work like that. Mainly people are overreacting to a harmless condition that happens to everyone. I still get choppy sleep sometimes but I don’t get panicked like before. If I have a bad night then it means just that. It doesn’t mean I’m broken. It’s like I banged my toe or have an upset tummy, it will go away if I don’t start obsessing over it. You must have had many instances of poor sleep before but you weren’t bothered and they eventually went away without much fanfare. You’ll understand what I mean in due course. Good luck.

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