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Great to hear. You are making good progress but the ultimate progress is no progress in a sense. It becomes something like this,
Slept 7,8 hours + naps = nothing to be happy about,
Slept 3 hours = nothing to be sad about either.Essentially, being indifferent. Becoming immune to insomnia, like you got the insomnia jab 😂. Then the following will happen. Of course, you will get bad nights again. But you are not as worried about them as before. They then become less and less severe and then there comes a time when you don’t even remember or care having them anymore.
You talk about sleep less often. You think about it less. And it keeps sliding down your priority list. Other things begin taking over, like job, family or other commitments. At some point, you might even laugh at yourself for overreacting. Then you realize insomnia has actually been a constant companion throughout your life, but this time, you’ve only taken it way more seriously than before.
Sleeping isn’t a test 😂. It is more like resting, in a quiet place and laying still. Sleeping becomes a byproduct of that resting. Going to bed shouldn’t feel like entering an exam hall 😂. It should be like going on a holiday, where you put behind your worries of the day and that includes your worries about sleeping too. You get comfy snuggling in between the sheets, being thankful that you still have a roof over your head, in your own safe house and in a neighborhood where you should feel safe and protected and not having to hear gunshots or people yelling next door or cars racing down the freeway, these are things to be thankful for. Then you just close your eyes and let your body take over. That’s sleeping. Not, oh can I sleep tonite, I have to do xyz tomorrow and I need to get X amount of sleep, etc etc etc… that’s not sleeping, that’s pressure. And pressure kills sleep drive.
On the other hand, if you are going on a holiday, you don’t care what happens at work tomorrow or next week. You are supposed to feel super relaxed and carefree and no pressure at all. That’s what sleeping should feel like. Best wishes.
Great to hear you love your job! It gives meaning to your life, and I’m sure it gives even more meaning to those people around you, such as your co-workers and the patients you come in contact with. And I think that’s all you need to know, that you’re happy with what you’re doing, even if it means sleeping a bit less than you would like.
There will come a time when that eventual fate beckons, the forever sleep. Everyone will get unlimited sleep, so why miss it so much now? Insomnia is like a teacher, it is trying to teach you something if you really try to listen. To me, it means, don’t spend so much time in bed, because this life has so much more to offer, so go out and make the most out of it. Time is of essence. Then eventually at my death bed, how would I remember my life? How badly I seem to sleep all the time and the endless complaints about them 😆 or how much I have enjoyed living? Of course, it’s going to be latter.
I’m not saying sleep and rest are important, because they are but when you have allowed the space and time and still isn’t happening, then I think you should let it go and spend that time doing something else, ideally things you really enjoy and find meaningful.
The key to happiness in life is to stop gripping it so tightly sometimes. Learn to let go at times and let life unfold on its own terms. Only then are you truly enjoying life as it’s meant to be. Best wishes.
Hello and welcome.
I think you are paying too much attention on sleep, at least for now, but that is likely to change as you progress which it invariably does as you begin sleeping better.
So what I think people here are really curious about and which you almost completely left out is the back to work part. Are you enjoying it so far? Is it worth going back to work, knowing what you know now?
Everyone would be more interested to hear about the work you do. Tons of dramas and sitcoms have been made of people going about their everyday lives, and almost nothing will be about their sleep 😆. Simply because sleep has next to nothing to talk about. It simply is what it is.
Hello and welcome to the forum, some questions to get started:
1. How long have you had the issue?
2. Did you use to sleep late and recently decide to go to bed earlier (2+ hours earlier than your usual bedtime), thinking you needed to catch up on sleep or get up early for whatever reason, like starting a new job, early flight, new work shift etc?
3. Are you mostly a homely person and have a lot of free time? Are you getting enough sunlight exposure during the day?Thanks for sharing. Your insomnia will come to pass as before, like it always has. Maybe talking about it helps you feel better now, try not fall into the trap of obsessing over it.
Overcoming insomnia comes not from picking up a weapon preparing to fight it, but in putting it away and walking away quietly.
The most important question really is not why or what time you are waking up. The one to ask is why are you surprised at waking up and why are you rushing to get back to sleep?
The happy sleeper is the one who is happy to wake up at any time and happy to remain awake in bed, any time, any where.
Hello there
Before your insomnia, what did you do if you couldn’t sleep? Did you lie in bed? Then do exactly that. If you never got out of bed and forced yourself to “like” wakefulness, because everyone here said so, then it is not going to work because it reinforces to your body that you have a problem to fix and you will only end up getting more frustrated.
Bouts of sleeplessness are no stranger because it happens periodically to everyone. The difference this time, you start registering it’s a “problem out of nowhere”, and it needs to be “fixed”. Well, the problem is, there is no effective fix that you are aware of because you haven’t thought there was a problem before and therefore it was always left “unresolved”. You then become confused and frustrated this time, when everything you try seems not to work. More sleep efforts could only mean more frustration.
Sleep never was something you could control. It was something you allowed. Could you explain exactly what is going on, from the process of lying in bed until falling asleep, going through the stages of sleep, and then waking up? If you could not, then why delegate this monumental task to yourself when you have next to no idea how it really works?
You can never argue or frustrate your way out of insomnia. Your body is emotional so it will also not respond to reason. It responds only to routine (such as having a regular bedtime) and also by “observing” how you respond. Having a regular bedtime schedule is usually all that is needed to get sleep back on track. If you are calm, gentle, patient and disciplined with whatever you are faced with, exactly how you responded pre-insomnia, no matter how unpleasant they make you feel now, then your body will see this, start normalizing every unpleasant thought or emotion, you will end up doing pretty well and the whole thing will pass over, like before. Good luck.
Waking up is okay. It’s also normal. Because even normal sleepers wake up before their alarms!
Be okay with waking up. Expect and welcome them even! How you respond shapes your recovery. If you keep reacting explosively and keep thinking that waking up is frightful and needs to be avoided at all costs, then you will continue to struggle. But if you respond gently and continue to be calm, patient and disciplined, there is almost no way you can’t recover.
Do something fun with nighttime wakefulness. Do you lie in and just get comfortable? Or get up and do something else enjoyable? That is entirely up to you, a good baseline is to do what you always did before your insomnia. Just having a regular bedtime schedule is almost always all that’s needed for recovery.
Good luck and I hope you overcome your struggles soon.
Hello and welcome to the forum
If you realize clock watching increases your stress about not sleeping well, so why not stop?
Oh no, please don’t fight it. That is actually quite normal. I sleep well, but I get these too, it is a sign that your sleep system is healthy and your nervous system is desensitized enough to allow natural relaxation to take over. Don’t misinterpret this as sleep deprivation because it isn’t. It could be a sign you are simply too bored and unmotivated. Think being stuck in a boring movie, meeting or lecture. Getting up and engaging in some light physical work often works. Or you could lie down and actually take a nap.
Hi and welcome!
First of all, I am very sorry to hear about your current condition. But a few things to go over here:
1. If you have a medical condition, such as tinnitus, seeking medical attention is the most appropriate way to address it.
2. You may have a mental health condition in addition to your sleep struggles. In that, seeking professional advice is also the most appropriate. Unfortunately, nobody in this forum is able dispense advice regarding a medical issue such as tinnitus or a mental one like psychosis.
3. In regards to your sleeping problems, there is nothing much anyone else can do about it either. You should just follow a regular sleeping schedule and usually, physiologically that is all that is needed. The mental aspect is a bit more different, and harder, but the key is to lower stress and even accepting a bit of stress, which is crucial in making significant progress. Ultimately, you want to be in a position where you are convinced sleeping problems are not even real or physiological in a sense, because your body can sleep, under any circumstances. If your sleep was completely broken, there will be zero sleep all the time (and people will usually be dead within a few months of zero sleep and will not have endured years like you have) and certainly not sleeping 1-2 hours here and there. The stress of thinking you are not getting enough is preventing your body from achieving that normal, peaceful rest.Saying “you surrender” is usually not enough, especially when you don’t really mean it. It actually means you are still struggling.
Admitting “defeat” from a recovery context, actually comes from a position of confidence and conviction (you just know that is the most effective way forward), and not from a position of weakness and fear. There’s the difference.
Good luck to you and I hope you overcome your struggles soon.
“I can just lay there and relax and eventually I go back to sleep.” – So what’s wrong with that response? And why is being woken up even a problem at all?
