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Glad to hear you discovered cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques such as sleep restriction, SIAUS, and that is has been helping you!
Difficult nights from time to time are normal and to be expected. Nobody experiences perfect sleep (or the exact same sleep) from night to night. It will take time to chip away at sleep-related worry/arousal/stress — every better night of sleep builds sleep confidence and reduces stress. Unfortunately, there’s no magic “off-switch” or overnight cure!
So, I would encourage you to keep going — keep looking forward, and keep implementing the techniques that are working for you! If you find yourself awake in bed during the night and it doesn’t feel good to be in bed it can be really helpful to get out of bed and do something relaxing and enjoyable instead. This will prevent you from reinforcing any negative association between your bed and unpleasant wakefulness.
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.
Ultimately, to practice this, all you do is go to bed and stay in bed with the express intention of staying awake. So, when you are in bed you try to keep your eyes open and try to avoid falling asleep for the entire night.
In other words, instead of trying to sleep you are trying not to sleep — this prevents you from putting effort into sleep and/or getting mad/anxious/frustrated with yourself for not falling asleep. When this effort and pressure is removed, sleep can become a lot easier.
—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 am so glad you found the podcast episode with Dr. Jade Wu helpful — she busted a lot of sleep and insomnia myths!
—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.
How are you feeling during the day? If you wake and feel as though you aren’t falling asleep because you don’t feel sleepy anymore, maybe you just don’t need more sleep?
If you feel you do need more sleep then arousal might be making it difficult for you to fall back to sleep when you wake during the night. So, working on reducing arousal can be helpful. There are three types of arousal that typically perpetuate insomnia. These are:
1. Cognitive arousal (the sleep-related thoughts we have)
2. Conditioned arousal (we associate the bed with unpleasant wakefulness rather than sleep or associate waking during the night with remaining awake)
3. Physiological arousal/hyperarousal (this can involve self-monitoring for the effects of poor sleep — and sleep itself — and refers to the physical symptoms associated with arousal such as a racing heart, feeling cold, sweating, etc)If you’re able to recognize any of these, you might find it helpful to work on addressing them! Over time, this might make it easier to fall back to sleep when you wake if your body wants to get more sleep.
—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.
Chronic insomnia hasn’t been shown to cause any health problems whatsoever. In the study you linked to, researchers looked at mice. We cannot conclude that what happens in mice will happen in humans. Furthermore, the mice were intentionally sleep deprived (they didn’t have insomnia). Finally, we have no idea what the loss of neurons in sleep deprived mice means — it might be a protective measure that prevents damage, but it might not. We don’t know. So, ultimately, that study is meaningless for human beings with chronic insomnia.
—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, Iddy! I’d recommend starting by familiarizing yourself with cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques and see if you think they might be helpful or appropriate 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.
Those big ups and downs are often associated with allotting too much time for sleep and/or getting out of bed at a different time each day. With a more consistent (and appropriate) sleep window you might find your sleep becomes a bit more consistent, too!
Here’s a short video related to this: How to stop the sleep roller coaster and make sleep more consistent and more predictable.
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.
What you’ve described sounds like typical, run-of-the-mill insomnia. It seems from your post that you are putting effort into sleep and this is likely contributing to sleep issues because as soon as we put effort into sleep we generate arousal and this makes sleep more difficult.
Trying not to have a bad night, for example, almost guarantees a bad night. Engaging in experiments and behaviors in a bid to generate sleep also perpetuates sleep disruption — doing things like modifying diet, for example, will not improve sleep since diet is not a perpetuating factor behind chronic insomnia (but thinking it might can generate arousal).
Since cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques help address the thoughts and behaviors that perpetuate chronic insomnia (and some of those thoughts and behaviors seem to be present in your post) I think you’ll find it very helpful.
Finally, perhaps I can reassure you that there is no evidence that chronic insomnia causes neurological damage or any other health problem for that matter!
You might find my podcast episode with Dr Jade Wu helpful since we discuss a number of insomnia and sleep myths — beliefs that can perpetuate insomnia.
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.
I’m excited to be working with you, Brian! You aren’t broken and you can get your sleep back on track!
—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.
You transformed your sleep because you remained committed to implementing behaviors that strengthened sleep drive, strengthened your body clock, and reduced arousal. You are enjoying better sleep because of your efforts and because of your natural ability to sleep, Nao!
It was an absolute pleasure to work with you. As you rightly pointed out, there will always be occasional nights when sleep is a bit more difficult — because that’s a part of life!
As long as you resist the temptation to implement behaviors that perpetuate temporary sleep disruption, insomnia can never work its way back into your life!
Thank you so much for sharing your transformation!
—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.
Thank you so much for sharing your transformation, @wsh. I really appreciate the fact that you don’t sugarcoat things — that you emphasize that these techniques can be challenging, especially over the short-term, but that they do end up changing the way you think about sleep and give you a set of behaviors to follow that improve sleep over the long-term.
Furthermore, since CBT-I techniques are, ultimately, a collection of skills, you know exactly what to do should sleep disruption ever return and prove difficult to shake off at any point in the future.
I have no doubt that your experience will be motivational for many people and will encourage others to implement techniques that will improve their sleep for the long-term, just as you did.
—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.
Thank you so much for sharing your transformation! I appreciate you mentioning that you still experience some difficult nights from time to time — because they are a normal part of life and something that everyone experiences every now and then!
As you pointed out, what has changed is how you react to difficult nights. When we can learn to shrug them off and when we have confidence in our own natural ability to sleep, our sleep is able to get right back on track all by itself.
If sleep disruption ever sticks around for longer you now have a collection of skills that you can call upon — and you know that because they worked for you in the past, they will work for you again in the future!
—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 am so encouraged by your success, @cheg_1! You experienced roughly 90 days of great sleep and 1 night of difficult sleep. So, over the past three months, sleep was difficult 1% of the time and you slept well 99% of the time!
With this in mind, perhaps it might be helpful to focus attention on the 99% of nights that were good rather than the 1% that were bad and to continue implementing the techniques that got you to the point of enjoying good sleep 99% of the time and only experiencing bad nights of sleep 1% of the time?
If you only have a bad night 1% of the time, you are doing great! Everyone has a difficult night of sleep from time to time — even the best sleepers in the world have a hard night every now and then! How long these nights stick around for is often determined by how we react to them. If we don’t react, we give our sleep the best chance possible to get back on track all by itself!
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.
There sure are a lot of light sources at night — but the good news is that light is not something that perpetuates long-term sleep disruption so I wouldn’t suggest being too concerned by light as a cause of chronic insomnia.
A sleep mask might help, as might blackout curtains — but, again, I would encourage you to look at the presence of any other issues that might be disrupting your sleep if you are living with chronic insomnia. Usually, these issues are to do with sleep-related thoughts and behaviors that perpetuate sleep disruption.
—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.
Ups and downs can be very frustrating but they are not unusual and are to be expected, Matt! You can sleep without medication and even when you take medication, please be reassured that the sleep you are getting is still sleep that is being generated by you and your own body (because no medication can generate sleep).
Since your sleep got better before, there’s no reason to believe it won’t get better again — especially if you are able to consistently implement evidence-based techniques that help strengthen sleep drive, strengthen the body clock, and lower arousal.
Since anxiety is such a common driver of insomnia, you might find it helpful to listen/watch some of the many stories of transformation from people who were once in the same situation as you over on the Insomnia Coach® Podcast. If they were successful, you can be successful, too!
—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.
