[cheg_1]

Hello everybody,

I have came across the forum and found it very useful to hear experiences and that i am not alone, especially the success stories!
I wanted to write a post to see if anybody has had a similar experience and potentially get some advise on a solution.

Currently I am suffering from poor sleep. I have suffered with lack of/no sleep before (5-6 times in life) due to bouts of anxiety, triggered by external events/perceived danger. This would always pass when the event was resolved and i would be back to normal after a few days. Around 4 months ago however, I returned from a trip to the US and had some bad jet lag. I began to worry I would never sleep again, lose my job, lose my house etc. Extremely irrational thinking!! In hindsight, I would have stopped this thinking in its tracks at the time, but here we are. I took 2 weeks off work to sort myself out, but have not recovered. My current situation is averaging 3-4 hours a night and an occasional night of nil sleep.

Since my 2 weeks off 4 months ago, I have tried to not let this control my life. I have been to work every day, continued playing football, eating properly etc. I have a bed routine of bath, meditation, reading, but i still seem to have bad nights and it’s not getting better.

I am also trying not to worry about sleep, but as most people on here probably know, it’s quite difficult when you are exhausted. I am managing to cope with work (just about), but am becoming disheartened by my decrease in performance, energy, concentration and motivation in work and sport.

Although, I have not been struggling for that long and also have not been triggered by a traumatic event, I am confused why this has happened to me. My heart goes out to anybody who has suffered for a much longer time than me and still suffering.

If anybody has been through something similar, it would be great to hear from you. Would anybody recommend CBT-I for my situation or does it sound too early?

Look forward to hearing from anyone and many thanks.

Charlie

[whitelori]

Hi Charlie, your situation sounds so similar to many others including mine who just one day have a fear or thought they may not sleep and so the vicious cycle beings. Mine started with a reading a an article in a fitness magazine about how important sleep was for good health and then my brain latched onto that and so it all began. It doesn’t always start with trauma unfortunately. I wish I had known about the methods like CBT-I back when I started having issues. I instead went to a psychiatrist, was given sleeping medications, anti anxiety meds, along with therapy for anxiety, but none of that led to a long term solution. I know there are many here who have been cured or have significant improvements with CBT-I and/or ACT. Many have incorporated bits of both and so it probably would be good to start reading up on them. I signed up for Martin’s free email course on how to implement CBT-I which is excellent and a great place to start. Since you are just starting to have issues, I think you can get back on track quickly!

[Martin Reed]

Hello @cheg_1 and welcome to the forum. Nothing in your post sounds unusual — so I have no reason to think that you wouldn’t find cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques to be very helpful.

You have made a lot of progress yourself by not allowing insomnia to control your life, so you have a lot of the cognitive issues “under control”. Adding the behavioral components will almost certainly help you get your sleep back on track and give you back your sleep confidence.

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If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.

The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.

[cheg_1]

Hi @Martin Reed following on from my post. I started some self CBT-I at the end of Feb and got back to normal sleep within 3-4 weeks. This has lasted until now and I had one bad night and seem to have gone back to my previous state and not being able to sleep. I am starting a new project at work and started to feel anxious that it would potentially disrupt my sleep and then my anxiety kicked in and the arousal is there again.

It seems that i get anxious about an upcoming event and whether it will affect my sleep again, which triggers the anxiety again.

I would like to know your thoughts on this. Do you see this as a pure anxiety issue which is not really treatable by CBT-I? Perhaps it was because I did the CBT-I myself and focused on Sleep Restriction and Stimulus Control, but not as much on the cognitive side?

[Martin Reed]

I am so encouraged by your success, @cheg_1! You experienced roughly 90 days of great sleep and 1 night of difficult sleep. So, over the past three months, sleep was difficult 1% of the time and you slept well 99% of the time!

With this in mind, perhaps it might be helpful to focus attention on the 99% of nights that were good rather than the 1% that were bad and to continue implementing the techniques that got you to the point of enjoying good sleep 99% of the time and only experiencing bad nights of sleep 1% of the time?

If you only have a bad night 1% of the time, you are doing great! Everyone has a difficult night of sleep from time to time — even the best sleepers in the world have a hard night every now and then! How long these nights stick around for is often determined by how we react to them. If we don’t react, we give our sleep the best chance possible to get back on track all by itself!

I hope this helps!

—

If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.

The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.

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