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Thanks for sharing. Have you had any thoughts on how you might address the Kratom use, if that’s something you want to move away from?
—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 that cuddling with a partner for a bit after the sleep window ends because that feels nice is perfectly acceptable!
The goal of the sleep window is to help us move away from chasing after sleep by staying in bed later in an attempt to make sleep happen.
If you are staying in bed to do something that’s important to you and helps you live the life you want to live (rather than trying to make more sleep happen) then I am not sure how that could be a bad thing!
More problematic would be staying in bed, trying to make sleep happen, and doing less of the things that matter to 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.
Thanks for sharing. It’s good to hear that you are really taking your time with the course and working through it at a pace that feels right to you.
It sounds as though you are being more flexible in relation to sleep, being kinder to yourself when things feel difficult, and practicing moving away from battling with sleep, your thoughts, and your feelings.
As a result, conditions for sleep are improving and sleep is starting to have less power and influence over your life.
I don’t think that shifting to working nights is going to doom you to mess up all your progress! As you have learned from experience, the really difficultly comes when we struggle trying to control what cannot be controlled — and, as you’ve been working through the course and implementing new skills, you have been working on moving away from struggling; moving away from trying to control what cannot be controlled.
It’s natural and normal to experience some sleep disruption as you adjust to working nights again — if that’s what you end up doing. What might be most important of all in considering what to do here is to think about what matters to you and what you have the most control over.
Is your career more important to you and is it something you can control? Or, is sleep more important to you and is it something you can control? Is it worth moving away from the career you want to have (something you can control) in order to try to protect your sleep (something your experience might tell you cannot be controlled)?
Ultimately, as human beings we are constantly faced with difficult decisions — we usually have to make sacrifices to live a rich and meaningful life. What often causes problems is when we end up trying to control things that cannot be controlled, or act in ways that aren’t aligned with our values or the kind of life we want to live.
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.
Great stuff here — and you are right to feel proud of yourself!
You practiced experiencing wakefulness with less struggle. You practiced responding to wakefulness and the anxiety and the difficult feelings associated with it in a more workable way. And, you are being kinder to yourself, too.
It wasn’t easy and you did it. There will be plenty more opportunities for you to continue that practice and continue to build this new skill you are developing. Thank you so much for sharing!
—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 mentioned that sleep restriction sometimes “works” — what do you mean by that?
It sounds as though you might be under the impression that the goal of sleep restriction/creating a sleep window is to make sleep happen or to get rid of wakefulness.
That’s not the goal since sleep cannot be controlled (the more we try to control sleep the more likely we are to struggle with it).
The sleep window is just one tool that can help us move away from chasing after sleep — from trying to make it happen by going to bed earlier or staying in bed later, for example.
Something else that can make this all more difficult is when we try to fight or avoid the difficult thoughts and feelings associated with difficult nights since they are things that we cannot directly or permanently control, either.
When our focus becomes trying to control things that cannot be controlled, we can easily get tangled up in a struggle that makes all this difficult stuff even more difficult and makes it harder for us to live the kind of life we want to live. If our goal, for example, was to stop rainclouds forming, how successful would we be? If our goal was to prevent an earthquake, how successful would we be?
Of course, our problem solving mind often encourages us to keep on trying even if our experience tells us that what we are doing isn’t proving to be helpful or workable. And that’s why it’s so easy to get tangled up in a seemingly endless struggle.
The struggle often continues for as long as we continue to engage in an approach that creates a struggle — for as long as we continue to try the same things over and over again, hoping for a different outcome. It usually takes a change of approach (a change that is rarely easy and often requires ongoing practice) if we want to free ourselves from that 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 the great question!
I would suggest that the first “tool” is to practice experiencing wakefulness with less struggle. To practice acknowledging its presence and allowing it to exist (especially if experience tells you that trying to fight or avoid wakefulness isn’t proving to be a workable strategy).
The AWAKE exercise can help with this. So, if you find yourself starting to struggle with wakefulness you can then practice the AWAKE exercise. And, you can practice the AWAKE exercise for as long as you like and you can repeat it as often as you like. It’s something to play around with and to experiment with.
If you choose to get out of bed because you just cannot seem to be able to practice moving away from struggling with wakefulness while in bed, that would come at the end of the exercise — it’s the “E” in AWAKE (Experience wakefulness with less struggle).
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.
That’s great to hear — thank you for sharing! The “why” each good thing happened can often be a bit harder to consider and is a good opportunity for some reflection!
—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 through Week 1 even though it was difficult and even though your mind was no doubt coming up with countless unhelpful and difficult thoughts, feelings, and stories!
Thanks for sharing that your sleep window has allowed you to experience more sleepiness and to recognize that you are sleeping each night.
Do you feel there’s any possibility that mentally timing 15 minutes of wakefulness might be making it a bit harder for sleep to happen?
To answer your last question, ultimately we get more sleep by completely removing ourselves from the process and allowing our body to “do” sleep by itself! The more we try to make sleep happen, the more we tend to struggle with 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.
Congratulations on being off the medication @lizacollins007!
I think that both physical fatigue and mental fatigue are very difficult to experience. And there are two ways to respond to that fatigue — continue to do some things that matter (no matter how small) or do less of what matters.
Experience is often our most helpful guide in terms of the effectiveness of either option. And, with either option, our problem solving mind will still be there generating all different thoughts and feelings as it does its job of looking out for us!
—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.
Sleep duration for the sleep window is based on average nightly sleep duration for the night — regardless of how interrupted that might be. So, if you tend to sleep for 4 hours, spend time awake, then get another 1 hour of sleep your average nightly sleep duration would be 5 hours.
In terms of adjusting the sleep window, I usually suggest reflecting on this each week or two based on how you “feel” things are going rather than actively tracking sleep. We’ll cover 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.
I think everything is OK in moderation — our actions tend to only become problematic when they aren’t aligned with our values or when they might distract us or make it harder for us to engage in actions that matter and that keep us moving toward the kind of life we want to live.
So, an example here might be that listening to the podcast instead of going out with friends (if that’s important to you) might not be as helpful compared to listening to the podcast instead of doing things that create more difficulty and struggle.
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.
Thanks for the great question! Based on what you’ve shared here it sounds as though you tend to average somewhere between 4 and 6.5 hours of sleep. That’s quite a big range — if you feel you can’t narrow down your average any more than that you might want to start with a sleep window of around 6 hours for a week or so and go from there.
—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.
Many people find it more helpful to get out of bed — but you are the expert on you. If you decide to stay in bed, what would be your reason for that? Does staying in bed when your sleep window ends help you better live the kind of 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.
Welcome to the forum (and the course), Dulce!
What can sometimes be helpful is to reflect on how we approached sleep before the struggle with insomnia began (if it’s possible to remember that far back for some of us!).
If we can identify that our approach has changed, perhaps we can see that it might be that change of approach that is the cause our current (and ongoing) struggle rather than the cause being parasites, mold, heavy metal toxicity, food sensitivities, etc.
Of course, countless things can influence sleep. And yet, if it all feels a bit mysterious and/or if we can recognize that we are engaged in a bit of a struggle trying to make sleep happen, trying to get rid of wakefulness, trying to fight or avoid the difficult thoughts and feelings associated with insomnia, this is more likely to be the explanation for the difficulties we’re experiencing.
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.
Nothing unusual going on here 🙂
You might be feeling sleepy before it’s time for bed because that is a time that’s not associated with much of a struggle and so those sleepiness cues are more noticeable and feel stronger.
Unless you want to start going to bed (and getting out of bed in the morning) quite early, it might be useful to stick to your chosen earliest possible bedtime (or at least get to within an hour or so of it starting) even if you feel sleepy before then.
You mentioned that your issue is related to staying asleep. First, it can be helpful to recognize that waking during the night is a normal part of sleep. What can make these awakenings more difficult is trying to fight or avoid them since that can create a struggle that makes things more difficult.
We’ll be covering this in a lot more detail as the course progresses. At the current time, how do you respond to those awakenings when they 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.
