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Pretty much all our actions come with pros and cons, right? We might be out with friends and choose to drink more than normal because we are having fun — knowing full well that the next day will be uncomfortable!
Similarly, deciding to stay in bed later in the day is something that comes with pros and cons. We might decide to stay in bed because it feels good — we were having a good dream, it’s the weekend, we are treating ourselves, etc. And this might mean we don’t get sleepy until later in the night the next day and there will be less time in the day to do other things.
What probably matters most here is whether our actions are consistently pulling us away from the life we want to live (there’s a difference between occasionally getting drunk and always getting drunk, right?!) or whether we are accepting some potential “cons” every now and then, in order to live the life we want to live.
Something else to be mindful of here is our intent. To go back to the example of drinking — are we regularly drinking in an attempt to delete anxiety or other difficult thoughts and feelings from our brains? If so, that might not be a workable action. And, are we regularly staying in bed later in an attempt to generate a certain amount or type of sleep? If so, that might not be a workable action.
Is there anything useful here?
—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.
Hello @Zoki! A few questions that might help us explore this a bit better:
1. What does “better sleep” mean to you?
2. If you aren’t struggling when you are awake, how is being awake a problem?
3. If you aren’t struggling with thoughts and feelings that might be present, how are they a problem?
4. If you aren’t trying to control sleep, how is your sleep at the current time a problem?
5. If I had a magic wand and could give you the exact amount and type of sleep you wanted, what would you be doing differently with your life?
6. Is there any possibility that your (understandable!) desire for/attachment to getting a certain amount or type of sleep might be making things more difficult?
@JackHawkins — Thanks for sharing your ongoing commitment (and focus on) workable action. That’s within your control and your actions help determine the level of power and influence sleep, thoughts, feelings (and how much difficulty they might create) have over your life.Remember, too, that it’s natural and normal (and OK!) to experience the full range of human thoughts and feelings — including frustration!
—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.
It’s natural and normal to feel anxious, especially as you get more tired (and perhaps put more pressure on yourself to sleep or more effort into trying to make sleep happen).
And, since the human brain is always active, sleep can still happen even when you feel tired and even when you feel anxious.
What tends to make sleep more difficult is when we try to make it happen. When we go to war with wakefulness and get tangled up in a battle with our thoughts and feelings.
Ongoing struggle often comes from our attempts to control what our experience tells us cannot be controlled.
How are you currently responding to feeling tired and feeling anxious, and how is that response working for you?
—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.
There’s nothing unusual here, Woody — in fact, if you regularly dive into the forums I am sure you’ve seen posts that are quite similar to yours!
Ups and downs are normal. And, the only way you can go backwards is if you abandon what you’ve been practicing and return to actions and habits that you know from experience aren’t helpful and only make things more difficult. Even then, I am not sure you can go backwards because you are already equipped with more knowledge (and experience) compared to how things were in the past.
If you are trying to make yourself feel positive (or any other feeling for that matter) you are likely to get stuck — because human beings do not have such direct (and certainly not permanent!) control over their feelings.
The more we pursue certain feelings, the more we fight or avoid others, the more likely we are to struggle. It’s like trying to hold back a river with our bare hands!
Similarly, the more we try to make a certain amount or type of sleep happen, the more we try to fight or avoid wakefulness, the more likely we are to struggle. It’s like trying to stop it from raining during a thunderstorm or trying to make the sun appear on an overcast day.
Where is all that effort going to get you?
So, what truly matters here is how you respond when things feel difficult. And, you always get to choose your response. How you respond is based on action — and you can always control your actions, no matter how difficult things feel. No matter how difficult things are.
With all this in mind, how are you responding when you are in bed and sleep isn’t happening? How are you responding on days after difficult nights?
—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.
Everyone is different, Matt! What matters is playing around and finding what feels most workable and helpful to you! Acknowledgement is often the most powerful step when it comes to not getting pulled into a battle with our minds
—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.
It’s very early days @MBInsomnia25 — it usually takes longer than a week or two to develop new skills! Committing to consistent, workable action is what matters!
—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.
Thanks for sharing! You are clearly taking action and learning from the changes you are making!
It sounds as though ensuring you go to bed when sleepy helps create better conditions for sleep and not actively checking the time helps reduce any pressure you might put on yourself to make sleep happen.
I am curious to know how logging sleep is proving to be beneficial or helpful for you. Some people do find this helpful (usually in the short-term); I am curious to know if/why it seems to be helpful for you!
It makes complete sense that you are impatient for progress — and yet, progress is out of your control! You can only control your actions. Ongoing, committed, meaningful and workable action is progress because it’s moving you closer to where you want to be!
—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.
If it helps, here’s a study that found the average number of nighttime awakenings in participants without sleep apnea, across all age groups, was 32 awakenings (just under five awakenings per hour of sleep): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2564772/
—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.
Congratulations on your pregnancy!
If you feel as though you are on the right track and moving closer to where you want to be, that’s really all that matters!
Since you asked for my thoughts on the sleep window, I usually suggest basing this on how you’ve been sleeping over the past couple of weeks rather than how you slept in the past or how you want to sleep in the future.
If you currently average around 5 hours of sleep each night, a sleep window of 7.5 hours is almost setting you up for 2.5 hours of wakefulness at night. That might be a problem for you, and it might not. You are the expert on you
—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.
Hello Jolanta and welcome! It sounds as though you are already taking meaningful action that will help you move closer to where you want to be!
I would typically suggest starting with a consistent out of bed time that can act as your morning “anchor”.
As for choosing a specific time, I would suggest going with a time that feels achievable and realistic, and is aligned with the kind of life you want to live.
—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.
That’s a great question and it’s impossible to answer with absolute certainty since so much can influence how we feel.
Perhaps the real insight here is this — how you feel isn’t entirely dependent on how you sleep. You can sleep poorly and then feel pretty good and you can sleep pretty good and then feel pretty crappy.
And, perhaps what matters most is how you respond to how you feel because how you choose to respond can determine how much power and influence those feelings have — and how long they stick around, too.
We’ll be exploring this in a lot more detail as you continue to work through the course!
—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.
Difficult nights from time to time are natural and normal — just as difficult days from time to time are natural and normal. What matters is how you respond to them.
The frustration and worry that’s showing up in response is natural and normal, too. It’s simply a symptom of your brain doing its job and looking out for you.
With all this in mind, how do you plan to move forward?
—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.
I know this is a bit late but, for future reference, I don’t usually suggest making any changes or accommodations based on the beginning or end of daylight savings since doing so can bring more focus and attention on sleep and give it more power and influence over our actions.
Losing (or gaining) an hour of sleep on one night probably has very little effect on the body — we probably experience more prolonged symptoms when we travel and cross multiple time zones.
When the clocks go back (we gain an extra hour), we might want to simply be aware that we might wake a bit earlier in the morning and/or we might not get sleepy until a bit later the next night.
When the clocks go forward (we lose an hour), if you feel sleepy enough for sleep earlier than normal on the night of the clock change then you might allow yourself to go to bed a bit earlier due to the hour of reduced sleep opportunity.
Otherwise, I would simply recommend going to bed as normal and getting out of bed at the same time as usual in the morning to help minimize any influence the clock change can have on subsequent nights.
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.
Welcome to the forum! What makes you think your experience is weird or unusual?
—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.
Welcome to the forum @Jbock77! As you can see from the response from @MBInsomnia25, you aren’t alone!
It’s natural that you think about your current situation — that’s your brain doing its job and looking out for you.
Your experience probably tells you that thoughts are largely out of your control and the more you try to fight or avoid certain thoughts, the more difficult they can become. If that’s the case, what might an alternative way of dealing with them look like, do you think?
On the other hand, reading about this and searching about it are actions — and you can always control your actions.
So, if you feel that ongoing reading and searching isn’t helpful, might be putting more focus on sleep, and might be pulling you away from doing other things that help you live the life you want to live, what might some alternative ways of using that time involve? What might some more workable and productive actions be?
—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.
