Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
The journey of facing insomnia has been one of the most challenging yet. It is not for the faint of heart. For me, insomnia became the big huge monster under the bed. The more I feared it the stronger and more powerful the monster became. Not only did the insomnia monster monopolize my nighttime, but it eventually took over the daytime too. It was ruling over my life. The more power it had, the more I fear it, which gave it more power. It was a vicious cycle. It took me nine years to build up this big scary monster.
This program allowed me to begin facing the monster one moment, one night, and one day at a time.
In my opinion, Sleep Restriction reset my body which was incredibly helpful. But that was the easy part. The biggest hurdle for me was resetting my mind. This is where Stimulus Control (getting out of bed when I was stressed out) and using the other thinking strategies came into play. I had to rethink how I thought about sleep, wakefulness, my bed, etc. I really really struggled with this. My mind wanted to keep fearing the insomnia monster, as it had been doing for nine years. But the strategies were encouraging me to think and do things differently.
My mind was like the scared 4-year-old little girl that did not want to look under the bed at the big scary monster. The strategies were like the loving adult coming to show me one moment at a time that there was actually no scary monster.
I literally learned to be very kind to the scared part of me. I couldn’t wish that part of me away. She was coming with me and I just decided to be kind and loving to that part of me.
There came a point in my journey when the struggle shifted from not sleeping at night to actually staying awake during the day, especially after the sun went down. It felt like torture trying to stay awake. I was so freaking tired, all my body wanted to do was sleep. At that point, I was fighting to stay awake. It was a quiet the paradox. Where I had been trying to sleep before and felt unsuccessful, now I was trying to stay awake. I would doze off if I stopped moving. I felt like a walking zombie.
That particular night when it was time to go to bed, I remember telling myself that I don’t care if I sleep or not, that I just wanted my body to relax and stop working so hard to stay awake. That was the point of total surrender. I gave up fighting it all and I slept. That night, my brain and body learned that it could sleep. That was the night that I realized there was no monster under the bed.
Facing insomnia is no joke, y’all. Keep trudging the road. The only way past is through. It will eventually get easier. Keep listening to the success stories and allow others’ strength and hope to be the beacon of light on those lonely dark nights.
Hi there,
I started seeing results immediately. Sleep Restriction really helped me consolidate my sleep so I was getting better quality rather than spotty quantity. However, I had a rebound effect when I stopped taking Ambien so the insomnia came back with a vengeance. In essence, I took 2 steps forward and then 4 steps back. By the end of the 8th week, I was sleeping 6-7 hours a night.
