[Mac0908]

Deb what time did you first go into bed last night? Were you completely sleepy/exhausted when you did so or just “tired” ?

[Deb]

12:00. I was tired all day and very tired when I went to bed.

[Mac0908]

As long as by tired you mean eyelids drooping, can barely stay asleep.

I think part of what happens after a bad night is we begin to worry, even if subconsciously, about the coming night. Anxiety tends to build and that may have been what caused your issues last night. I can’t tell you how many nights I thought to myself, OK, last night was hell, so tonight its like I gotta get away with a good night, and then didn’t. The key IMO is to get better sleep more and more over time and then after the bad nights you don’t feel as disappointed or anxious. This doesn’t work in 2 weeks for most people. 2 months is way more realistic. Do not get discouraged. Keep at it Deb.

[Deb]

Thanks, Mac. Yes I wasn’t at the point of eyelids drooping. But I supposed I would be at that point tonight if I had gotten up when I was supposed to this morning at 6:00, giving me only 2 & 1/2 to 3 hours of sleep. But I just couldn’t bare the thought of being totally exhausted again and wasting the whole day. Somehow I actually had a decent sleep last night even thought it was only 4 & 1/2 hours. I don’t get it. Twice last week I slept 4 & 1/2 hours but woke up tired. But not today. Go figure. I had a very good day with church this morning, a meeting in the afternoon, and going out to listen to live jazz this evening. We’ll see how the night goes however.

[delv-x]

@deb

A thing Ill commend you on is that you are still living your life. The first few weeks I wanted to be a hermit and not commit to anything. What I’ve found is that I would stay at home and have even more struggle staying awake and worrying. The times I am out in the evening enjoying things I may be more tired, loopy and out of it but I still manage to have fun and when I get home, my wind down is shorter and go to bed and generally sleep better. The key is balance, fill up your days with things but make sure to have a bit of a buffer to also de-stress and continue with mindful meditation, tea, bath or whatever helps you relax.

So yes, keep on trucking!

[Mac0908]

Well Deb then perhaps that was the problem. One of the few points Sasha Stephens absolutely drives home in her book that I realized works is that it is absolutely vital that you do not get into bed until you are SLEEPY/exhausted. Not just “tired”. I know it’s hard to fathom getting 3 hours sleep the night before and then not hopping in bed whenever you feel a bit tired the next night, but trust me, it’s important when you’re in this messed up state filled with anxiety over a previous bad night.

Use me as some encouragement. Remember Friday morning when I was posting on here acting like the world was coming to an end because I had back to back bad nights? Well part of the reason I thought that happened was bc I didn’t go into bed completely shot. Friday night I then slept 11-5. Saturday 10:45-6, and last night I slept 10-5. All nights I went into bed during a bad phase of eyelids drooping. Sure there were some Insomnia thoughts in my head, but the point is the sleepiness overrode those.

Mac

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Mac0908.

[Deb]

Went out like a like a light bulb last night and slept all night. Yay! Feel good today. I think maybe I’m starting to get used to the 6 hours of sleep. Yesterday I had a surprising pretty decent day with only 4 1/2 hours sleep. But when it was time for bed I was really, really ready, finding myself reading the same page of my book over and over again as my head was nodding off.

Yes, it helps a lot to vent here and get support – sharing the good, the bad, the discouragement, the hope, the successes, the things that do and don’t work. Sounds like you’re doing good, Mac, with 3 good nights in a row. Hopefully the bad nights will get less and less. Assuming the same thing for me.

Delv – Sasha Stephens also talks about the importance of living our lives and not letting insomnia take over and rule them. So for the most part I’ve kept up all my activities. I did simplify some things though, like Christmas. No one seemed to even notice, which was great. This is probably a good opportunity to remove unnecessary stress from our lives which is always good and will help with the insomnia as well.

[delv-x]

I started reading some of Sasha Stephens. It’s helpful to read.

Glad you had a good sleep. I slept pretty good for a Sunday night. Lights out at midnight and was up around 5:45-6. I tossed and turned and didn’t get up until my 7am. I didn’t bother with SC because I only had an hour left and was hoping to cat nap the extra hour. Anyway, I managed to get a solid block of sleep. Better than waking up 2 hours later and so forth. I find it hard to gauge my sleep because I’ve been fairly strict with not looking at the time. So some nights I may wake up and then get up, read or whatever and go back to sleep or just simply fall back asleep but I usually have no idea what time it is. If I look at the time it could be 2 am or 3 am or 5 am or 6:45 am. But if I do look and it’s only 2am, I freak out.

[Deb]

Mac – I was wondering. Do you feel like since you’ve started SR, you’re getting better overall? Do you keep a sleep log so you can track your overall progress? I’ve been on SR now for 16 days and overall I’m much better than the wreck I was a few weeks ago, with sleeping all over the place (and all over the house) and my anxiety sky high. For myself it helps to look back over the log and see how I’ve improved. Out of the 16 nights of SR, I’ve only had 3 or 4 bad nights. This is a huge improvement over before when basically I was having bad nights most of the time with the occasional reprieve of a couple days. I’m actually writing this for myself as well, to remind myself of my progress when I have a bad night like that a couple days ago.

[Mac0908]

Its great to remind yourself of good progress. Overall yes I feel I’m getting better, at least a little bit. I’m more optimistic than ever before, but still know I am far from the promise land. Just last week I was in a great mood about all of this and then boom, two very bad nights in a row. I’m aware my sleep anxiety is far from gone unfortunately, but I still try and remain as positive as I can since out of the 2 weeks I have only had 4 bad nights. Meanwhile I’ve gone through phases of 2 weeks straight of bad nights many times over the 2+ years.

 

In my 2 years of this hell, there have been many times where I’ve enjoyed good phases only to fall right back into dark holes of Insomnia. The problem and difference then was, I didn’t have discipline or structure like I have now when I came to these boards and began SRT. So I’m hoping with that, in a couple of months max I’ll be back into a good phase that I can once and for all STAY in for the most part.

[Deb]

Its great that you finally found the determination, discipline and structure you need to do this work now. It’s better to learn on a daily basis how to deal with the fear and keep going, than to just keep the fear at bay for the weeks during your good phases. This learning will then stick with you.

[Mac0908]

Nobody will ever know the pain and suffering I went through in these 2 years. The horror some days were. I literally tried everything and thought it COULD be anything that was affecting my sleep, even though it all ironically began after a stressful incident. I tried cutting out coffee, new pillows, new sheets, a white noise machine, covering my blinds up with black curtains, a blackout mask ?, no TV at all before bed, melatonin pills, “sleepy time” tea, discontinuing of eating ANY form of caffeine, got blood work checked, bought a new comforter, moved my bed in different spots in my room to try and change my mind about the fear. Then there was the phase of where I thought my internet ROUTER which is in my bedroom was causing some kind of distress in my brain. There was much more, too. I was a madman for 2 years. Finally late last year I gave up and realized it was 100% anxiety. Be happy and thrilled that you have people like me and others here to remind you that it’s not that bad, and its nothing crazy. You’ll beat this now. I hope I will too.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Mac0908.

[Deb]

Wow! What a journey you’ve been on, and painful one at that. I’m “lucky” because it was only 2 months of trying different things before I read about SC in a library book and finally, like you, realized that fear/anxiety caused the insomnia and was perpetuating it. So I had to do something about the fear/anxiety. No sleeping pill, natural supplement, relaxation CD, or hypnotist was going to help me with that. That’s when I started researching SC online and looking for a therapist to help me implement this.

[Deb]

Last night at 12:00 I couldn’t believe that I wasn’t nodding off like I usually am by that time. I did what you said, Mac, and waited until I was really drowsy, which was around 12:30. I hated to cut into my sleep window of only 6 hours, but at least I fell asleep right away.

I think I made a few mistakes that contributed to my not being ready to sleep. In the evening I laid down with the cat for about 20 minutes and maybe nodded off for a few minutes. Or maybe it was the 6 oz of Pepsi at around 3:00. That hasn’t been a problem before. It’s not that much caffeine. But probably the main culprit was this darn computer that I stayed on until 11:30. Too stimulating. Got to make sure to put it down at least an hour before bedtime. I hate that there is no room for error in these early stages.

[Mac0908]

Some soda at 3pm has absolutely nothing to do with it. As I said in an earlier post, after all my experience I’ve realized there are literally only 3 key crucial things to focus on. One of them is no electronics at the very least an hour before bed. If you can even push it to 2 or 3 hours before bed seeing the fragile state us recovering insomniacs are in, even better.

I did 10:30-5ish last night. Sounds decent I know but I’m not feeling all too rested today. Still waiting for the day to be woken up by my alarm again.

[Author]

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