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You shared a huge insight in this post, @speedwalker! The less we do during the day, the more difficult sleep can become! That’s because we have less opportunity to give our mind something to focus on other than sleep, we have less opportunity to feel engaged, positive, and productive, we are often more sedentary, and we might start spending more time in bed or even trying to nap during the day.
All these things can weaken sleep drive, disrupt the body clock, and increase arousal — and this, in turn, perpetuates sleep disruption.
So, if we can recognize that we aren’t doing much during the day, it can be so helpful to do more during the day! The more structure we can add to our days, the more enjoyable activities we can pursue, the less we typically worry about sleep, the more we enjoy our days, and the better we 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.
Welcome to the forum @kkengels! Have you ever returned to bed before feeling sleepy and fallen back to sleep relatively quickly? If so, you might actually be sleepy but your arousal system could be suppressing sleepiness cues — this can happen if we have a lot of worry/anxiety about sleep and being awake during the night.
Since getting out of bed when being in bed doesn’t feel good can help to address that anxiety, I am encouraged that you are implementing this technique! Do let us know how you’re getting on since you posted!
—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, bikash — and thank you, hiker, for the encouragement and support you offered!
It’s not too surprising that you didn’t find medication or yoga worked, bikash — that’s because medication or yoga cannot generate sleep! The only thing that can generate sleep is your own biological sleep drive — and sleep drive is generated through wakefulness.
In other words, when we have been awake for long enough, we will ALWAYS sleep!
You might find it helpful to look into evidence-based cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques since they help address the thoughts and behaviors that often get in the way of sleep. Furthermore, since CBT-I is ultimately a collection of skills, they will be with you for life — so you will always know exactly what to do should sleep become difficult again in the future.
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.
Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques absolutely can be helpful for sleep maintenance insomnia because sleep maintenance insomnia can occur as a result of diminished sleep drive, a disrupted body clock, and heightened arousal — all things that CBT-I helps to tackle.
Your desire to get back to seven hours and 15 minutes might actually be an obstacle to reaching that goal since we have no control over sleep duration (this is something the body takes care of by itself) but as soon as we try, we increase arousal and this disrupts sleep.
So, you might find it helpful to strengthen sleep drive, strengthen the body clock, and lower arousal by allotting an appropriate amount of time for sleep, getting out of bed and starting the day at the same time each day, getting out of bed during your sleep window whenever being in bed doesn’t feel good, not checking the time during the night, and being active during the day.
These are, of course, just general initial suggestions — but they could be a good place to start!
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.
Sorry to hear about your struggles with anxiety, depression, and panic attacks. Let me reassure you that you haven’t forgotten how to sleep! We never lose the ability to sleep — when we have been awake for long enough, we will sleep.
If we have a lot of worry about sleep, are feeling anxious, stressed, etc, we might need to build more sleep pressure to overpower the arousal system and generate sleep — and this is why it can become harder to fall asleep and harder to stay asleep. However, we’ll always get (at the very least) the bare minimum amount of sleep we need.
You might want to ask your doctor if they think you’d be a good candidate for cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I), perhaps alongside separate treatment for the panic attacks.
I hope this helps, and wish you all the best!
—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.
Sorry to hear about your health challenges and difficulties with sleep.
The fact you haven’t found medication helpful isn’t too surprising since medications cannot address the thoughts and behaviors that usually perpetuate sleep disruption.
Have you asked your doctor whether they think you’d be a good candidate for cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I)?
—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 getting started with sleep restriction!
It can often take longer than two weeks to notice significant and consistent improvements in sleep, so I’d encourage you to stick with it!
It might also be helpful to consider that there are many things that influence fatigue other than sleep, so it might not be useful to evaluate sleep based on fatigue alone. Stress, worry, and inactivity, for example, are really big drivers of fatigue.
A good way to help lower fatigue, independently of sleep, is to be active during the day — engaging in activities that you find personally rewarding and enjoyable can be particularly helpful since they can give the mind something to focus on other than sleep, improve the quality of our days, and help us recognize just how much control we can have over how our days go.
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.
Sorry to hear about that setback! It sounds as though you got results implementing CBT-I techniques before, so perhaps you just need to implement them again, or get consistent with them again?
Ups and downs are completely normal — when our sleep confidence is low, a difficult night of sleep can bring back all our old worries and fears and this can lead to changes in the way we think about sleep and even our sleep-related behaviors. This is when it can be really easy to fall back into all the old habits that perpetuate sleep disruption.
Often, the most helpful thing to do in response to a difficult patch of sleep is nothing — because it’s usually our reaction that makes it harder for sleep to happen.
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.
You’re in a great position because you know exactly how to respond to sleep disruption — you can implement all the techniques you are familiar with and know from experience to be helpful!
Sometimes, it can be our desire to “understand” why we are experiencing sleep disruption that heightens arousal and can actually perpetuate sleep disruption (even though you might have answered that yourself with all the uncertainty going on related to COVID-19).
The fact of the matter is, we have no control over sleep. Waking during the night is a normal part of sleep. The body compensates for lost sleep all by itself. The body gives us more deep sleep when more deep sleep is needed. The body always gives us, at least, the minimum amount of sleep we need. We have more control over the quality of our days than the previous night(s) of sleep.
As soon as we become worried about sleep, try to control sleep, or modify our days in response to sleep, we make sleep far more difficult.
So, I would encourage you to implement all the techniques you know from experience to be helpful! You cannot control sleep, but you can control how you react to difficult nights — you can improve the quality of your days by doing things you enjoy and avoiding sedentary behavior. You can improve the quality of your nights by doing things more enjoyable than staying in bed when being in bed doesn’t feel good. You can build sleep drive by allotting an appropriate amount of time for sleep, and you can strengthen the body clock by maintaining a consistent final out of bed time each morning.
It’s our sleep-related thoughts and behaviors that turn what would otherwise be temporary sleep disruption into a longer-term problem. So, if you can avoid the thoughts and behaviors that end up disrupting sleep drive, weakening the body clock, and generating arousal, insomnia can never work its way back into your life for the long term.
I hope this helps — you’ve got this!
—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.
Sorry to hear of your husband’s passing, Janice. Waking during the night is not unusual and is actually a normal part of sleep. Where waking can be a problem is if you find it takes a long time to fall back to sleep after waking — is that an issue you currently face?
If so, it can be helpful to make sure you aren’t allotting too much time for sleep each night, and you can also give yourself a more appealing alternative to unpleasant nighttime wakefulness during the night by getting out of bed whenever being in bed doesn’t feel good and doing something more enjoyable and appealing instead.
You might find this video helpful, too: Waking during the night is normal and isn’t something you should be worried about.
If you regularly wake during the night but fall back to sleep quite quickly, have been told that you snore loudly, you wake with a gasp or choking sound, or you wake in the morning with a dry mouth and headache, you could have sleep apnea. If you recognize any of these symptoms, I’d suggest speaking with your doctor.
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.
You’ve got this, Gabriele!
—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 Karen! It sounds as though you’re doing really well!
Microsleeps are quite common in the first few weeks as you build a really strong sleep drive to help you sleep better at night (isn’t it ironic that your struggle used to be connected to getting sleep and now it’s trying to stay awake?!).
These microsleeps are unlikely to have a massively negative effect on your sleep drive, but they are best avoided when possible. Often, movement is the best way to prevent microsleeps from happening. Some ideas might include some stretching, walking, cleaning, organizing, etc. Anything that removes you from the scenario/situation in which you usually experience microsleeps will likely be helpful.
Here’s a short video on microsleeps you might find helpful: How microsleeps influence sleep drive and what you can do about them when you have chronic insomnia.
Finally, I did see you mention that your goal for the next week is to add 15 minutes to your sleep window. Be careful with goals related to outcome since these can increase arousal and make sleep more difficult since you might put more pressure on yourself to sleep or become distressed if you don’t get the sleep needed for you to extend your sleep window.
Instead, it can be really helpful to give yourself process goals — by continuing to avoid going to bed before the start of your sleep window and always getting out of bed by the end of your sleep window, for example.
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.
Glad to hear you’re countering those negative thoughts with positive thoughts — do you believe the positive thoughts you’re telling yourself, though?
Often, the negative thoughts we have aren’t as accurate as they first seem. So, looking for evidence that supports them and evidence that doesn’t support them can help you come up with more accurate thoughts.
These more accurate thoughts are often more positive because they are more accurate — and with repeated practice, these more accurate thoughts might become the automatic thought rather than the typically less accurate, negative thought.
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.
Feeling really sleepy and then feeling wide awake when you get into bed is a classic symptom of conditioned arousal — because you have found it unpleasant to be in bed time after time after time, your mind has learned to associate the bed with unpleasant wakefulness. So, you feel sleepy when you aren’t in bed, but then when you go to bed your mind tries to protect you from what it sees as the threat of being in bed by making you awake and alert — and, of course, this is not helpful when it comes to sleep!
The good news is that since this association has been learned, it can be unlearned by making sure you’re only in bed when either asleep or when being in bed feels good. If you get out of bed any time being in bed doesn’t feel good, you retrain yourself to see the bed as a more pleasant place to be because you’ll only be in bed when being in bed feels good.
This technique is part of stimulus control and when combined with other techniques that help build sleep drive and lower arousal (such as sleep restriction) you will likely start to experience better sleep.
Here are a couple of videos you might find helpful, too:
What to do when you feel sleepy early in the evening but don’t feel sleepy when it’s time for bed
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.
Welcome to the forum! I think it might be helpful for you to start by challenging your automatic thought that you stopped sleeping from the age of 17 to a more accurate thought that your sleep got worse from the age of 17!
Of course, it’s impossible to stop sleeping and to go for six years with not even one minute of sleep!
It does sound as though you’ve tried a lot of things — but I didn’t see any mention of cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) techniques such as sleep restriction and stimulus control.
Let me reassure you, too, that insomnia has not been shown to cause any health problem or to increase mortality.
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.
