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Learning new skills is rarely easy. When this feels hard, it’s because it is hard!
@ktMD — It sounds as though the more you practice sitting with difficult thoughts and emotions, the more you are able to notice them for what they are. Thoughts and emotions. Certainly not facts or even accurate predictions (at least, not always!). They’re bursts of electrical signals that we attach meaning to. Nothing more. Nothing less.And, of course, since your brain’s main job is to keep you safe and alive it’s going to focus on “doom and gloom” stuff and worst-possible outcomes. Happy stuff, positive stuff, good stuff, and safe stuff isn’t a potential threat, risk, or danger — so if you want to identify those things (which can be really helpful!) you have to make the conscious effort to look for them because it’s unlikely your brain will waste time and energy finding them 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.
Hello @ktMD! Waking during the night is a normal part of sleep. If that time awake is something you struggle with as you try to fight or avoid it, practicing the AWAKE exercise might be helpful as a way to build skill in experiencing it with less struggle 🙂
—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!
Returning to your own bed is an action that is more aligned with the life you want to live, and it’s more comfortable!
Thanks to your problem-solving ability you now have a plan in place for what to do when you are awake at night that is more pleasant and workable compared to battling away. You are practicing acceptance and building skill in experiencing wakefulness with less struggle.
It sounds as though you are getting your life back from insomnia, and that’s all down to your own actions!
—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 have a clear awareness that there are many things that influence how you feel. You have also noticed that doing things that matter (independently of sleep, what you are thinking, how you are feeling) is more helpful compared to withdrawing from life and doing less.
You are now using that insight to commit to actions that keep you moving toward the life you want to live. You are taking away the power and influence all those things once had over your life. You are giving yourself the opportunity to recognize that you can experience OK, good, positive, enriching, maybe even fantastic moments — even when difficult thoughts, feelings, and nights are present, too.
What else, if anything, are you noticing (and learning) as you continue to say yes to life?
—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 are falling asleep faster and you are waking after about five hours of sleep and finding it hard to fall back to sleep.
Waking during the night is a normal part of sleep so waking after five hours isn’t unusual. What is it about not falling back to sleep after five hours that makes it a problem? And, if you were given a tool or technique that “worked”, what would be different?
On your final point, it sounds as though your experience tells you that watching TV before bed and reading in bed are actions that do not prevent sleep from happening. If that’s the case, what do you gain from avoiding those actions?
—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 that you’ve been practicing facing your fears and night and accepting the presence of wakefulness and difficult thoughts and feelings when they show up (even though you might wish they weren’t present!).
As you might be aware, acceptance isn’t about eliminating hyperarousal because hyperarousal comes with being a human being and having a human brain that is doing its job of looking out for you!
With that being said, ongoing practice of acceptance can reduce the power and influence hyperarousal might have over you as you become less likely to battle and struggle with it.
Random, racing thoughts are thoughts. They’re no different to having a single, “unrandom” thought. And so, the workable way to approach and respond to them is likely going to be the same — practicing being a kind, curious, and accepting observer rather than a bloodthirsty opponent!
It sounds as though this is exactly what you are doing — you observe them, one after the other (even though they are annoying!). The only other alternative is resistance and battling.
Since you are the expert on yourself, do you feel as though you are dealing with those racing thoughts in a workable way? What, if any, additional guidance are you looking for?
—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.
Your experience seems to be telling you that the more you try to control, fight, or avoid certain thoughts and feelings the more powerful and difficult they become. It also seems to suggest that the more you try to make sleep happen (or the more you crave it and chase after it), the more difficult that can become, too.
If zopiclone is giving you full nights of sleep, what makes sleep an ongoing problem?
—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 @Alwayswinter and welcome to the forum. As suggested by @Chee2308, your experience is not unique or unusual.
You are the expert on yourself and the answers you seek are already inside you. Can you remember a time when sleep wasn’t an issue or a concern? If so, what did you do back then to make sleep happen?
—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 makes total sense that you don’t want to experience anxiety, @sdaven02. Not many of us do!
At the same time, your experience seems to suggest that anxiety is out of your control. It shows up when it chooses and there’s no way to directly and permanently delete it from your brain. No matter what, it always comes back.
If that’s the case, perhaps it’s the (understandable!) attempts to fight or avoid anxiety that might be making things more difficult — rather than the presence of anxiety itself.
What shows up for you when you read that?
—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 @sleep! Your experience has reminded you that you can sleep without medication and that sleep doesn’t require any effort or technique (it happened “accidentally”)!
You are continuing to reduce the power and influence sleep has over your life by committing to actions that matter, independently of sleep. That also helps train your brain that wakefulness isn’t a threat it needs to be alert to “protect” you from.
I don’t know if it’s possible to directly and permanently stop worrying — but you can certainly control how you respond to worry (and that might be what matters most).
—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 can tell you have that problem-solving superpower, @SpeedOfLight! You’ve also been through a lot and that means you’ve also learned a lot.
When it comes to “tackling negative thoughts” by forcing them out or letting them be — what guidance does your experience have to offer as you consider what the most workable way forward might 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.
You are not broken. You are struggling as you try to fix a problem.
Your concerns are understandable, natural, and completely valid. Sleep doesn’t need medication to happen and medication cannot generate sleep (if it could, insomnia wouldn’t exist).
What might be helpful here is evaluating progress based on what you are learning and the actions you are engaging in. For as long as you measure progress based on what is out of your direct control (such as how you feel, what you are thinking, how you are sleeping) you might set yourself up for some ongoing struggle.
Above all, please try to be kind to yourself. This feels hard because it is hard. You are on a journey. There will be ups and downs along the way. For as long as you are committing to workable actions and for as long as you are learning from what you are doing, you are always going to be making progress.
—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.
Your commitment to the action of moving away from sleep aids is proving to be a powerful learning experience!
You are learning that you can generate sleep without medication — and that suggests that any sleep that has happened with medication was sleep your body generated by itself.
You are also reminding yourself that all journeys come with ups and downs (rather than ongoing progress and improvement), which is a wonderful act of self-kindness.
As for implementing a stricter sleep window, that’s definitely an option available to you. A sleep window can’t make a certain amount or type of sleep happen and sleep doesn’t really care about sleep windows.
What it cares about is this: are you giving it the opportunity to take care of itself (in which case, it is more likely to take care of itself) or are you chasing after it and trying to make it happen (in which case, it is more likely to get more difficult and complicated).
I wish you all the best as you continue 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.
Welcome to the forum 🙂
Sleep isn’t happening as you want it to (and as it used to happen in the past!) and that has generated some concern. As you try to fix this problem, you find yourself struggling.
The “good” night that’s happening every few days is evidence that your sleep system isn’t broken — you can still generate good nights of sleep.
So, perhaps something has changed in terms of how you are currently approaching sleep and how you are responding when sleep doesn’t happen as you want it to.
As you reflect on your experience over the past month, what changes — if any — have you made to how you approach sleep and how you respond to being awake at night and what have you learned from that?
—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 Stef and thanks for sharing this update with us all — and for your kind offer to answer any questions 🙂
You’ve been through a lot, no doubt about that! You’ve learned a lot, too. Thank you for sharing how you benefitted from your commitment to workable action.
You committed to actions that mattered to you, independently of sleep (and even in the presence of difficult thought and feelings).
As you did that, you took back all the power and influence insomnia once had over your life. As insomnia lost its power and influence, as your focus was on doing things that mattered to you (rather than endlessly battling away with insomnia and difficult thoughts and feelings), sleep was given the opportunity to take care of itself.
Of course, this doesn’t mean it was all plain sailing — there were ups and downs, challenges, and difficulties. You got through them because you stayed committed to workable action. (You were kind to yourself, too!)
For those interested in your story, I’m also linking to our recently published podcast episode: How Stephanie got her life back from insomnia by letting go of the fight she thought she had to win (#72)
—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.
