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Hello Lovisa and welcome to the course
You are the expert on you and you get to decide whether (and how) to implement a sleep window!
My only goal here is to help you consider how workable your actions are. Whether, through your actions, you might be trying to control what your experience tells you is out of your control (and what the only possible outcome of that might be) and whether your actions reflect who you are and move you closer to the life you want to live (or whether they don’t reflect who you are and, therefore, pull you away from the life you want to live).
Any change that has a workable intention behind it is going to be a worthy change — it doesn’t have to be huge! And, it sounds as though the change you made led to an initial increase in that sensation of sleepiness at night and freed up more time for you to do things that matter.
To answer your question — I don’t think there’s anything wrong with going to bed within an hour or so of your sleep window, if you feel ready for sleep (in other words, you are going to bed because you feel sleepy and ready to go to bed rather than you are going to bed because you are desperate to make sleep happen).
Waking during the night is a normal part of sleep. I’m curious to know why you feel it’s important to know whether it’s night or morning whenever this happens? How does knowing whether it’s night or morning better help you live the life you want to live?
I think the biggest symptom of healing is making a commitment to workable action. That often involves change and change is rarely easy and it comes with ups and downs. You are taking action and making changes. That tells me you are making progress!
As for naps, you can nap whenever you like. I would encourage you to simply be aware that a daytime nap can reduce sleep drive (so you might not get sleepy until later at night and/or you might need — and generate — less sleep that night) and it uses time that might be spent in other ways. You get to decide if this is OK, and how often it’s OK to do this since you are the expert on you!
And, since you are the expert on you, you get to decide how to approach sleep and how to deal with insomnia if it shows up on vacation. You get to choose whether your actions reflect who you are and the life you want to life, or whether they do not.
Your body will always generate, at the very least, the minimum amount of sleep it needs. The key to clearing the way for more than the minimum to happen is to get out of its way — to not get involved in the process by trying to make a certain amount or type of sleep happen. Of course, this is easier said than done!
I hope there’s something useful here and 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.
What you are going through is really difficult, Raju — and it’s not unique or unusual. You are clearly tangled up in the insomnia struggle (through no fault of your own).
You feel stuck not because you are broken but because what you have been doing up to now hasn’t been working. This course will give you new options to explore.
You have not lost the ability to sleep. You are not alone. I wish you all the best with the course.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
Hopefully you found this lesson helpful, Raju!
—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.
Waking at any point during the night is a normal part of sleep.
As for adjusting the sleep window, I usually suggest choosing an out-of-bed time that feels appropriate to you and aligned with the kind of life you live (or want to live).
We probably don’t want to make adjustments in an attempt to make a certain amount or type of sleep happen because that means the sleep window can become a sleep effort — something that is likely to set us up for a struggle since sleep doesn’t usually respond well to effort (and is usually beyond our control).
Really, the sleep window is a tool that can help to move us away from chasing after sleep (since it gives us an earliest bedtime and a final out of bed time in the morning).
I’d also suggest there’s nothing wrong with waking around 5:00 AM and experiencing an hour of comfortable rest until 6:00 AM. What we are looking to do is move away from going to war, battling away, and struggling with wakefulness. Because that makes everything more difficult.
Is there anything useful here?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
The fear of tapering off the sleeping pills is totally understandable and normal — it comes from your brain doing its job of looking out for you!
Moving away from medication can be particularly scary if we have no alternative approach in place. This course will hopefully give you an alternative approach!
As suggested by @StefV, it can be helpful to talk to your doctor to come up with a tapering-off plan when you feel ready to do so.
I wish you all the best with the course
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
What does “withstanding” anxiety mean to you? If I saw you doing that, what would I see you doing?
(By the way, watching TV sure does sound more workable — and pleasant — compared to gritting your teeth all night long!)
I’m also curious to know if you have been getting any practice in with the AWAKE exercise
Thanks for sharing how your superpowers of commitment and resilience helped you get through the extremely difficult process of weaning off the AD. It sounds as though that was an action that really mattered to you and by committing to it, you ensured that your actions kept you moving you toward the life you want to live.
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
It sounds as though you gained some experience of the potential power sleep drive has when it comes to overcoming arousal!
This doesn’t mean sleep is guaranteed to happen, but it certainly can help create better conditions for sleep.
If you regularly fill your sleep window with sleep over a period of a week or so then you can definitely adjust it — we’ll be exploring this a bit more in Week 2
—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 course, Justin!
You have clearly learned a lot from your journey so far — and that’s a reflection of your growth mindset and something you can draw upon as you continue to move forward.
You know from experience, for example, that it’s possible to have a difficult night and then experience an amazing day (even in the presence of difficult and uncomfortable thoughts and feelings).
You also know that you can still live a rich and rewarding life even in the presence of difficulties such as stress (and even insomnia).
You also know that you are capable of generating multiple nights of decent sleep.
To answer your question, sleep is often up and down. We have good nights, better nights, worse nights, difficult nights, awful nights. We also have good days, better days, worse days, difficult days, awful days. That all comes with being a human being!
What matters is how we respond to the difficult nights (and difficult days) because our response determines how much power and influence all the difficult stuff (which is often out of our control) has over our lives.
I think you might find all the exploration that’s to come on the difficult thoughts and feelings often associated with insomnia (such as anxiety) — and how we choose to respond — particularly interesting.
I wish you all the best as you continue on your journey!
—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.
Waking during the night is a normal part of sleep — and, since sleep is out of our direct control, any ongoing attempts to get rid of nighttime awakenings (or make a certain amount or type of sleep happen) tends to lead to only one outcome: more struggle.
What often makes falling back to sleep really difficult is all the effort we put into trying to fall back to sleep, the pressure we might put on ourselves to fall back to sleep, and any battling with our mind during those periods of wakefulness.
We’ll be exploring this in a lot more detail as the course progresses but I hope there’s something useful here in the meantime!
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
If you are going to bed around 9:30 – 10:00 PM and get out of bed to start your day at 5:00 AM, then you are allotting 7-7.5 hours for sleep. If you usually get less than 7-7.5 hours of sleep, you might be setting yourself up for some periods of wakefulness during the night.
If you are comfortable with that, there’s no need to change anything! If you want to reduce the amount of time available for wakefulness, I’d suggest figuring out how much sleep you typically get on an average night, then add about 30 minutes onto that to get an initial sleep window duration.
If you are comfortable with getting out of bed at 5:00 AM, you’d count back the duration of the sleep window from there to get your earliest possible bedtime.
As a reminder, waking during the night is a normal part of sleep and we want to base a sleep window on how we are currently sleeping rather than how we want to be sleeping (because a sleep window isn’t intended to make a certain amount or type of sleep happen — it’s intended to help us move away from chasing after sleep).
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 @PHILOMINAJOSEPH!
What you’ve described can often happen when our brain has learned to associate the bed with a lot of struggle and difficulty — it becomes a bit like a battleground and the brain isn’t about to let you feel sleepy and it doesn’t want you to fall asleep if it thinks you are heading into battle. It wants to make you alert, keep you awake, and protect you!
Of course, this isn’t too helpful for sleep but there’s an insight here. How might we be able to train the brain that the bed isn’t a battleground? That it’s not a place for struggle? That it’s not a danger or a threat?
Now, to answer your question, the sleep window is based on how much sleep you are getting at the current time. So, you’d want to base it on how much sleep you’ve typically averaged over the past week or two — regardless of how long it takes you to fall asleep or how much time you spend awake at night. Once you have the duration, you choose an out of bed time that is aligned with the life you live (or want to live) and count back the duration to get your earliest bedtime.
These lessons might be particularly helpful when it comes to setting a sleep window:
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 Philo! It makes complete sense that you experience frustration and anxiety in connection to not getting any (or much) sleep. That’s totally natural and normal.
You mentioned that you try not to think about it when you go to bed — how is that strategy working for you? Have you found that you are able to “not think” about certain things, through effort, so certain thoughts never show up?
If not, perhaps that approach — although understandable — might be making things more difficult? If that’s the case, what might a different approach look like, do you think?
PS: We’ll be exploring this in a lot more detail as the course continues (especially from Week 2 onward).
—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 David and thanks for the great question!
I’d suggest trying to at least get to within an hour or so of the start of your sleep window before going to bed (or falling asleep).
Often, any form of physical movement can help prevent sleep from happening too early. Do you have any hobbies or other interests that might involve some form of physical movement?
—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 think DARE is a great book — thanks for mentioning it, @StefV!
Anxiety is a natural and normal human feeling. Everyone experiences it. It’s when we try to fight or avoid it that we are more likely to struggle with it — and the more we struggle with it, the more power and influence it can end up having over our actions (and our lives).
Remember that what you are learning in this course isn’t intended to eliminate anxiety. You know from experience that anxiety is going to show up and stick around whenever it wants for as long as it wants. So, fighting it is futile and only makes things more difficult.
For as long as you try to reduce hyperarousal, you might be giving it more power and influence over you. You are likely also consuming a lot of energy as you engage in that struggle and all that endless and exhausting effort of resistance.
The real aim here is to practice building skill in experiencing it with less struggle. Acknowledging it. Making space for it to come and go as it chooses. Being more of an observer of it, rather than an opponent. Giving it the opportunity to be more like water off a duck’s back. Something that comes and goes without derailing you and jerking you around.
As you start to practice this new approach, it can sometimes be like dismantling a dam — as the resistance lowers, more anxiety shows up. That’s natural and normal. And, it’s an opportunity to continue getting in the practice of acknowledgement and making space for it to exist.
Of course, this is easier said than done. And all skills take time (and ongoing practice) to develop. Developing new skills isn’t easy!
—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 back to the course, Molly! I trust you had a rewarding Christmas break!
Let me start by saying this — no form of acceptance can make sleep happen or permanently delete difficult thoughts and feelings like anxiety.
For as long as your intent is to control those things, acceptance (or any other approach) is not going to do anything for you and might even create more struggle and more difficulty.
Acceptance is an ongoing practice of accepting the presence of things that are out of our control. This helps us move away battling away with them (something that only makes them more difficult) and it helps us refocus our attention on actions that will keep us moving toward the life we want to live, even when they are present.
The more skilled we can become in experiencing difficulties that are out of our control and the less power and influence they have over our lives, the less of a problem they become. And, when they are less of a problem, they are less likely to be an ongoing concern or obstacle.
As a bonus, when sleep is given the opportunity to take care of itself, it’s far more likely to do just that (ask anyone and they’ll tell you sleep is “effortless”, right?) — although there’s still no guarantees because sleep cannot be controlled.
Remember, too, that a sleep window cannot make a certain amount or type of sleep happen because sleep cannot be controlled. The true intent of a sleep window is to ensure we aren’t chasing after sleep by going to bed earlier or staying in bed later. It also has the benefits of strengthening our body clock, ensuring sufficient sleep drive builds during the day, and gives us the opportunity to be more engaged in life (rather than spending it all in bed, trying to make sleep happen).
Your brain is always going to focus on the difficult nights, all the things that might imply failure, all the potential obstacles, etc. It is hard wired to focus on the doom and gloom — that’s why we are alive today. It’s a survival mechanism.
What matters is how you respond, because you always have control over your actions.
Is there anything useful here?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
