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There’s some good stuff there, Spindledog — thanks 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.
The unregulated use of supplemental melatonin (a hormone) — especially in children — is of concern to many healthcare professionals.
—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 update @mikearbi18!
How are you implementing stimulus control (a way of responding to nighttime wakefulness that is explored more in Week 2) and why do you feel it’s proving to be so helpful?
Is drinking almond milk something you enjoy or is it something you’re doing in an effort to create sleep?
—If you are ready to stop struggling with insomnia you can enroll in the online insomnia coaching course right now! If you would prefer ongoing phone or video coaching calls as part of a powerful three month program that will help you reclaim your life from insomnia, consider applying for the Insomnia Mastery program.
The content of this post is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.
How can we practice being kinder to ourselves when this difficult stuff shows up — and what might the benefits of that 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.
Marie-C hit the nail on the head!
It’s all about intent — if you’re doing something because you enjoy it, great!
If you’re doing something only because you’re trying to make sleep happen then that might not be too helpful since sleep cannot be controlled.
So, if you enjoy reading in bed — why change that?
If you enjoy watching TV or looking at your phone or other screens before bed — why change that?
If those things were truly a problem, you’d eliminate them and sleep well, right? Has that been your experience? If not, perhaps that suggests that they’re probably not going to influence sleep one way or the other!
—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.
Ditching the clocks at night is one less thing to occupy yourself with at night — and checking the time during the night doesn’t usually come with many benefits!
I don’t think the brain really associates the bed with wakefulness in a way that is a problem for sleep — so many people do all kind of things in bed other than sleep, and sleep well!
As mentioned by Marie-C, the real problem is more likely to come when the brain associates the bed with struggle. If it has learned that the bed is a battleground, it might be less wiling to allow sleep to happen — after all, it’s main job is to protect you and the brain doesn’t know the difference between a real physical threat and an imagined threat.
So, I don’t think there’s any need to respond to wakefulness just because it exists. And, I don’t think there’s any need to get out of bed just because you’re awake.
In short, if you like the idea of lying quietly in bed waiting for sleep, feel free to allow yourself to do just that!
We’ll be exploring this in a lot more detail in Week 2, but I hope this helps 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.
Welcome aboard! As Marie-C mentioned, you are not alone — and what you’ve described is difficult and not unique or unusual.
It sounds as though you have one of those human brains that is doing its job and trying its hardest to look out for you by generating lots of thoughts and feelings, many of which can be quite difficult to experience.
Although we can’t control what the mind chooses to do, we always get to choose how we respond. And if we respond by trying to battle our mind, things can end up getting more difficult since that requires a lot of energy and attention!
An alternative way of responding might involve acknowledging our thoughts and feelings and allowing them to come and go as they choose — that way, we free up the energy and attention that would otherwise be consumed by that battle to do things that matter to us.
Easier said than done, of course, and it’s something that requires ongoing practice. We’ll be exploring all this in a lot more detail as you continue to work through 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.
Thanks for sharing your concerns.
There are probably as many triggers for sleep disruption as there are people in the world — it’s impossible to identify all of them and it’s impossible to eliminate all of them. If we try, we end up consumed by the struggle and it can become really hard to live the kind of life we want to live.
Hormonal changes can definitely create some sleep disruption and there’s not a whole lot we can do about that. We can only control our actions — we can only control how we respond to the sleep disruption.
We can respond in an unworkable way (trying to control what can’t be controlled). That’s probably how most of us are hardwired to respond, which is why it’s so easy to end up getting stuck.
Or, we can practice responding in a more workable way — where we acknowledge what’s going on, try to be kind to ourselves when things feel difficult, move away from trying to control what cannot be controlled, and continue to do things that keep us moving toward the kind of life we want to live even when all this difficult stuff is present.
The thoughts you shared are natural and normal and come from your brain doing its job and looking out for you (thanks, brain)! You get to choose how you respond to those thoughts — what do you feel is the best way to respond to them?
—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. If there was a magic sleep switch I could share with you, I would share it with you. Unfortunately, there is no such switch — and the more we try to find it, the more we can end up struggling.
It can definitely feel scary when our usual or “backup” safety behaviors (for example, medication) no longer seem to “work” — and yet, that’s not unusual since nothing external can actually generate sleep.
Sleep is only ever generated internally by the body and the body doesn’t require any external intervention to make sleep happen (in fact, it’s all our efforts to make sleep happen that are more likely to make it difficult).
Sleep is one of those things that we cannot control. Just as we cannot control the thoughts our mind chooses to generate or the feelings that it chooses to generate. The more we battle, the more likely we are to struggle.
What we can control are our actions — and it’s our actions that determine whether we end up making things even more difficult (by trying to fight or avoid all this difficult stuff and adding struggle on top) or whether we practice responding in a more workable way (for example, by acknowledging all this difficult stuff, being kind to ourselves in return, moving away from trying to fight or avoid the things we can’t control, and continuing to do things that matter).
Sleep drive accumulates with every minute of wakefulness, and yet there’s an important safety mechanism in place to prevent us from falling asleep if a threat is present. If we were being chased by a bear and fell asleep because we’d been awake for too long, we’d be in trouble, right? And, as far as your brain is concerned, wakefulness is like being chased by a bear. And so, it’s trying to suspend sleep drive to keep you safe (although, even then, sleep is still going to happen at some point because sleep drive always wins in the end).
Of course, that’s not too helpful when you’re lying in bed (safe from bears!) and want sleep to happen and so you will probably want to put effort into making sleep happen or start trying to control your mind to fight or avoid certain thoughts and feelings.
Unfortunately, the more you try to fight with your mind the more it will likely push back, because its job is to protect you. It thinks you’re under attack while you might be trying to fight or avoid its warnings. Cue “brain freak out” mode!
What you can do is practice training your brain that, although you wish wakefulness wasn’t present, it’s not a threat or a danger. This might be done by practicing experiencing wakefulness with less struggle and continuing to do things that matter (no matter how small) each day.
So, with all this in mind, I am keen to know how you’ve been responding to that wakefulness during the night and how you’ve been responding to it on subsequent days. Have you been able to practice anything we’ve been exploring in the course up to this point?
—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.
Since all of us spend varying amounts of time awake in bed and many people do all different kinds of things when in bed other than sleep (and still sleep well), perhaps associating the bed with being awake isn’t really a problem — perhaps the problem is associating the bed with 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.
There are so many huge insights here, it’s impossible to pull out just one or two — thank you so much for sharing, Tess!
I think that what you’ve shared here proves that no matter how difficult things are, no matter how hopeless things might feel, no matter how broken we might feel, there is always hope and there is always the opportunity to explore (and practice) a different approach that might help free us from what can feel like a struggle that will never end.
This isn’t an easy process. It takes time. It’s hard. And it can be done. As your husband has proved thanks to his own actions and your support!
Shoutout to Chee, too, for his suggestion to allow the time to be visible again when that felt like a step your husband was ready to take!
PS: I broke your post up into paragraphed sections to make it a bit easier for others to read and added links to the posts you mentioned. Your post is important so I wanted to make sure it doesn’t get missed and that everyone has the best possible opportunity to absorb all the great insights you’ve shared!
—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! Have you considered allowing yourself to stay in bed instead of getting out of bed? When you do get out of bed, what’s your goal? What are you trying to achieve?
—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.
Have you discussed this with your doctor? If so, did they give you any suggestions?
—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! Why do you want to get rid of the sleeping pills and how are you sleeping at the current time? Can you think of any ways you might be able to experience insomnia without it feeling as though you are living in hell?
—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 incredibly difficult and I appreciate you joining the forum to share your experience.
It’s encouraging to hear that you have been able to eliminate your sleep efforts and are trying your best to get on with your day and engage in actions that keep you moving toward the life you want to live, even when all this difficult stuff is present.
I am not sure anyone can successfully ignore difficult thoughts and feelings such as anxiety — perhaps we can temporarily, but it always seems to end up coming back, right?
With that in mind, just as there’s a way to move away from trying to make sleep happen (and that such an approach might be beneficial) perhaps there might also be a way to move away from trying to fight or avoid difficult thoughts and feeling such as anxiety (and that such an approach might be beneficial, too)?
Perhaps all the effort and attention required to engage in a battle with anxiety (and other difficult thoughts and feelings that are out of our control) can make things more difficult, consume more of our energy and attention, and — in turn — also make it harder for us to live the kind of life we want to live?
Having said all this I’d urge you to be kind to yourself because what you’ve described is very difficult. You are a human being and you are finding this difficult stuff difficult. None of this is your fault and you are not alone in your 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.
