[berdibeg]

Was wondering if anyone knew if CBTI is useful for sleep maintenance insomnia?

I do feel sleepy at around the same time every night (10.30 – 11pm). I take about 10 mins to fall asleep. But almost precisely 5h45mins after that, I wake up. I know that’s not enough, because I have fatigue during the day, and when I did not have insomnia, my optimal sleep is ~7h15mins.

After maybe 2-3 days of that cumulative fatigue, I would get maybe 7h15 mins instead of 5h45mins.

It was worse the last week. I was sleeping 4/8/4.5/7.5 hours. Something like that.

When I wake up, I am a little tired, but not tired enough to actually fall asleep (I’m not panicking, but mostly just pessimistic). I lie there for about 15 mins, then get out and go do something. Maybe 3 hours later, I get tired, but I try not to nap (partially cos I think it won’t work).

Any tips? I just want to get back to 7 h 15 mins again, maybe even more, to pay off the debt.

[Martin Reed]

Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques absolutely can be helpful for sleep maintenance insomnia because sleep maintenance insomnia can occur as a result of diminished sleep drive, a disrupted body clock, and heightened arousal — all things that CBT-I helps to tackle.

Your desire to get back to seven hours and 15 minutes might actually be an obstacle to reaching that goal since we have no control over sleep duration (this is something the body takes care of by itself) but as soon as we try, we increase arousal and this disrupts sleep.

So, you might find it helpful to strengthen sleep drive, strengthen the body clock, and lower arousal by allotting an appropriate amount of time for sleep, getting out of bed and starting the day at the same time each day, getting out of bed during your sleep window whenever being in bed doesn’t feel good, not checking the time during the night, and being active during the day.

These are, of course, just general initial suggestions — but they could be a good place to start!

I hope this helps.

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