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Glad to hear things are a better than they used to be! If insomnia sticks around when the initial trigger is no longer present (or relevant) that’s often because of a change in how we approach sleep.
So, if we compare our past approach to sleep when it wasn’t an issue or a concern with our current approach when things are feeling more difficult or complicated we might be able to identify some helpful insights 🙂
—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 Kevin — glad to hear you’re finding the course helpful 🙂
It sounds as though you’ve picked up a couple of key insights already (or perhaps these are things you already knew but might be worth emphasizing):
1. You are capable of generating many nights of solid, unmedicated sleep.
2. Difficult nights can still show up and they can come with a lot of difficult thoughts and feelings, too.Difficult nights from time to time are normal — just as difficult days from time to time are normal. They can be really hard to experience, too.
Since we cannot permanently delete difficult nights (or difficult thoughts or difficult feelings) from our lives, it can be helpful to figure out a workable way of responding to them.
We can respond (as I think most of us are hard-wired to do) by going to war with insomnia and our minds, trying to fight wakefulness and what we are thinking and feeling, being really hard on ourselves, and perhaps even withdrawing from life and doing less of what matters.
Or, we can respond by acknowledging what’s going on. Being kind to ourselves in return. And continuing to do things that matter — even when all this difficult stuff is present — so that we continue to move toward the life we want to live.
As you shared, when you are awake at night that might mean you are up for much of the night. And it might mean that you are not up for much of the night. You can’t control that — but you do get decide whether you add struggle (and how much) on top of that wakefulness.
It can be really hard when difficult nights show up — and they’re not your fault, so please try to be kind to yourself and perhaps see them as an opportunity to practice what you are learning.
I hope there’s something 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.
Great! Good on you for getting the practice in!
—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 sounds as though that’s what your experience might be telling 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.
That sounds really difficult — sorry you are going through that.
All of the challenges you shared are things that others here are also dealing with since they are common symptoms of the insomnia struggle. That also means we’ll be exploring all of them in the course, too — and the Week 1 action plan you come up with after working through the first week of the course will get you started on your journey away from the struggle and toward the life you want to live.
I wish you all the best with the course and please feel free to share your thoughts, concerns, and any questions you might have as you work through it.
—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 giving me the opportunity to clarify! I would consider “unusual distress” to involve a level of discomfort or concern that is way beyond expectation or experience — more akin to a potential (or real) mental health concern that might prompt someone to seek medical advice.
I wouldn’t typically consider finding it hard to practice new skills as unusual distress, but you are the expert on you!
Does this help?
—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’d invite you to revisit the lesson in Week 2 “What About Stimulus Control for Insomnia?” — in this course, I don’t encourage people to get out of bed just because they are awake (unless that’s something they want to do).
Since it sounds as though you’d rather not get out of bed to start your day at 3:30 AM, perhaps staying in bed and allowing yourself to rest might be a more workable approach? If you find yourself struggling when you are awake in bed, you might want to practice experiencing wakefulness with less struggle (for example by practicing the AWAKE exercise or by engaging in an alternative activity such as reading).
It might be worth revisiting Week 2 of the course since responding to nighttime wakefulness is explored in a lot of detail there — and none of it involves the requirement to get out of bed 🙂
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.
Thanks for sharing, @teeseey!
When you weren’t challenged with insomnia, did you need magnesium supplements or light therapy lamps to generate sleep? If not, why would you need them now?
—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.
Great question!
If you regularly get out of bed to start your day at 3:30 AM then your brain can learn that 3:30 AM is the time to be awake and starting your day. That’s not permanently set in stone, though — the brain can adapt to new habits and routines.
You might ask yourself what your goal is when you get out of bed at 3:30 AM to start your day.
Are you doing that because starting your day at 3:30 AM is what you want to be doing? Is that an action that helps you live the kind of life you want to live? If so, what’s the problem?
Or, are you getting out of bed to start your day at 3:30 AM in an attempt to fight or avoid being awake in bed and/or the thoughts and feelings that might come with that? If so, how workable is that approach proving 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.
Totally understandable that waking too early is something you’re not happy about — and it’s also something your experience tells you can’t be controlled, right?
Waking is a normal part of sleep. For as long as you are attached to the idea of eliminating that, you might be setting yourself up for a struggle. Perhaps accepting wakefulness is going to show up and practicing responding to it in a way that might create less struggle and help make those awakenings less difficult might be a helpful way 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.
Thanks for the great questions!
You are absolutely correct — the sleep window is nothing more than the period in which you give sleep the opportunity to happen. Since people don’t usually fall asleep the moment they get into bed and stay asleep until the moment they get out out of bed, it will include some wakefulness.
As for feeling sleepy before the sleep window begins and then not sleepy when it does begin, that’s a common symptom associated with your mind firing up to “protect” you from wakefulness.
So, when there’s no concern about the possibility of experiencing insomnia (because it’s not time to go to bed) you feel sleepy. When it’s time to go to bed your brain fires up to protect you from the possibility of experiencing insomnia.
Unfortunately we cannot control the brain to make it switch off or stop trying to protect us (since that’s its main job)!
What we can do is train it that wakefulness isn’t a threat — and we can do that through actions such as practicing experiencing wakefulness with less struggle and putting less effort into sleep and putting less pressure on ourselves to sleep. We’ll explore this in a lot more detail from Week 2 onward.
In the meantime, you have a few options:
1. If your experience tells you that going to bed when your sleep window begins without a strong sense of sleepiness tends to make things difficult, you might want to wait until sleepiness shows up before going to bed.
2. If your experience tells you that going to bed when your sleep window begins without a strong sense of sleepiness doesn’t tend to make things difficult, feel free to go to bed as soon as your sleep window begins.
3. If you are finding it really hard to stay awake and you are within an hour or so of the sleep window starting, you might want to allow yourself to go to bed at that point (you might even want to stop checking the time an hour before your sleep window begins and allow yourself to go to bed whenever you feel ready to go to bed from that point on).
Ultimately, the sleep window is nothing more than a tool that can help us move away from chasing after sleep by doing things like going to bed earlier or staying in bed later. As you know from experience, the more we chase after sleep the more elusive it often becomes!
And yes, every minute of wakefulness build sleep pressure 🙂
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.
That sounds as though it would be a good sleep window to start with, Teresa!
—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 Sophie! I’ve moved your post into the client forum so it might be a bit more visible to others working through the course.
Has sleeping separately from your partner solved all your issues with sleep and moved you closer to the life you want to live? If yes, why change? If not, why continue to sleep separately?
Sometimes when we do things that we’d rather not do in an attempt to fight or avoid things our experience tells us can’t be directly or permanently controlled we can end up making things more difficult because the things we’re trying to avoid will often still turn up anyway.
Then, when they turn up they’re serving no purpose whatsoever compared to when they show up when we do things that matter to us.
As always, you are the expert on you! I know we’ve also communicated privately about this so hopefully others might chime in here, 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.
I’d suggest going with whatever works for you, GenieB! Many people find that setting an alarm is helpful since it is one less thing to have to think or worry about — the alarm is set and you know you’ll be awake when your sleep window ends. Fewer “mental gymnastics” 😉
Does this help?
—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 Howard!
The sleep window should usually start and end at the same time — but that doesn’t mean you will go to bed (or fall asleep) when it starts. The start of your sleep window is simply an “earliest possible” bedtime — it’s perfectly fine (and probably quite normal!) to go to bed after it begins!
What can be helpful is sticking to the end of the sleep window — getting out of bed by the end of your sleep window each day, regardless of when you went to bed or how you slept.
Does this help?
—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.
