[quadro]

Hi everyone, I don’t really understand what’s happening. I am now 40yrs old and I was always an extremely good sleeper, never had any issues. But a few weeks back I was just lying in bed, eyes wide open with no chance to sleep. After that day it was OK again for a bit, only for the same thing to happen again. Then one day without sleep became two. I would not say I have any stress in my personal life, I have a very easy job, not too much pressure there and I am sure I have slept well under much worse circumstances. Thing is, the longer it goes on the more anxiety plays into it, will I ever sleep again? Am I terminally ill? Sometimes I am dead tired over the day, planning to go to bed early and sleep it out, but when that time arrives, I am once again fully awake. I don’t really know what to do, I guess maybe writing this helps me to sleep as once again I just can’t.

[Martin Reed]

Welcome to the forum, quadro!

We all have difficult nights from time to time, just as we all have difficult days from time to time. That’s natural and normal and all part of being a human being (you are a human being, right?)!

What can happen is that after a difficult night or a stretch of difficult nights our brains start to generate concern (thank goodness — without a brain expressing concern, none of us would be alive). The brain generates concern to look out for us; to protect us and to keep us moving toward the kind of life we want to live and the person we want to be.

Since all this concern often doesn’t feel good (to get our attention our brain will often generate difficult thoughts and feelings like worry and anxiety) we often put all our efforts into getting rid of the thoughts and feelings themselves — and, in the case of insomnia, trying to fight the wakefulness itself.

Unfortunately none of that stuff can be controlled. We can’t control what our mind thinks about, the feelings it generates, and we can’t control sleep, either. The more we try, the more we struggle.

So, what might be a more workable approach could involve acknowledging what cannot be controlled. Acknowledging the thoughts and feelings we experience. Acknowledging wakefulness when it happens. And then committing to actions that keep us moving toward the life we want to live and the person we want to be, even in the presence of all that difficult stuff.

Ultimately, if we continue to do things that matter (even in the presence of difficult stuff that’s out of our control) all that difficult stuff might be less influential and consume less of our attention. And, with sleep, the less of a focus it becomes and the less of an influence we allow it to have, the easier it tends to become.

I hope there’s something useful here!

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