Welcome to the Insomnia Coach Podcast. My name is Martin Reed. I believe that by changing how we respond to insomnia and all the difficult thoughts and feelings that come with it, we can move away from struggling with insomnia and toward living the life we want to live.

The content of this podcast 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. The statements and opinions expressed by guests are their own and are not necessarily endorsed by Insomnia Coach LLC. All content is provided “as is” and without warranties, either express or implied.

As a business owner, Anne-Claire began overextending herself and her sleep started to suffer. She reduced her workload and experimented with supplements and medication but her sleep seemed to get even worse.

After deciding that she didn't want to continue using medication, Anne-Claire began to explore whether changing her approach to sleep and her response to insomnia might be helpful. 

Like most people, Anne-Claire had tried to fight or avoid the difficult thoughts and feelings that come with insomnia — and this got her tangled up in more of a struggle with them. In a change of approach, Anne-Claire began making space for them to exist. She would greet and welcome her thoughts (even the difficult ones). She practiced being more of an observer of them, rather than an opponent of them.

As she did that she realized that many of the thoughts her mind generated didn't match her own experience. This helped her realize that there was no need to battle with her mind — that her mind will generate all kinds of thoughts and feelings, some of which might be true, some of which might not be true. Some of which might be helpful and some of which might not be helpful. 

As she started to implement and practice new habits, Anne-Claire also realized that the more effort she put into sleep, the more difficult it became. She found that by maintaining a consistent out of bed time in the morning, regardless of how she slept, she was better able to do things that mattered and she was more likely to experience better sleep on subsequent nights. She also discovered that comparing her sleep to anyone else's or trying to achieve a certain amount or type of sleep was not helpful and was likely to pull her back into a struggle.

Today, Anne-Claire no longer struggles with sleep. Thanks to her willingness to experience insomnia, sleep has — once again — become effortless. 

A full transcript of this podcast and an accompanying video can be found at insomniacoach.com/podcast

Okay. Anne-Claire, thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to come onto the podcast.

My pleasure. My pleasure. Very much.

Can you tell us a little bit more about when your sleep problems first began and what you think might have caused those initial issues with sleep?

I think they began right around 2015, and I think the primary cause was, I'm kind of an overachiever. And I run my own business and I overextended myself and had way too much going on. And so I, in order to be able to meet my standards of what I wanted to do for my clients, I was doing a lot of long nighters, all-nighters, all that kind of stuff. And I'm an analytical type of person, so I was always thinking about what was going on and not really taking a lot of time to give my mind a break. Even when I was trying to rest.

So I think a lot of the time while I was in that sort of overextended time period, I was just almost recalibrating my body clock. And without knowing that I was doing that. And then when it was sort of waning, I just wasn't able to get back onto something normal. And of course life intervenes all the time. So you start thinking about lots of stuff and I was just sort of hyperaroused more than I probably should have been. And so that just carried on for quite some time and then I realized I probably needed to be doing something different.

I've always been a light sleeper, but I could sleep. And so sound would bother me and things like that. But that was easy to take care of. But no matter what was going on, I usually would get enough sleep and I was not one to think, oh, I need 12 hours or 8 hours. It was just, what do I need to feel good? And I'd say that... I mean, I did certainly have some sleep issues probably in 2010, 2011. So when I went through menopause. There was all those kinds of physiological things that were going on, but I could attribute them to that. And then in about 2015, as I mentioned, when I really overextended myself and was just burning the midnight oil all the time and not really resting and keeping my mind going all the time, and then being sort of the one people look to in the family to solve all that as well.

I mean, it was just sort of go, go, go. And I just felt like I needed to be doing all those things and really neglected being on any sort of set schedule other than accomplish, accomplish, accomplish. And so once all that sort of died down a little bit and I could really get back onto more of a regular schedule, I think I had completely recalibrated my body clock. And I didn't understand what all that meant. And so when it was time to sleep and I was still thinking about things or, why can't I sleep? Which would also require me to be thinking more about, well, what do I need to do in order to sleep? Which of course wasn't helpful at all to be doing anything to try to fall asleep. And I did try several things by the time I reached out to you, I believe in 2020.

There's lots of great stuff there. Just to unpack it a little bit. It sounds like you kind of attribute a lot of the initial sleep disruption to that really busy, stressful lifestyle that some of us have. And that also I think some of us are just that high achiever personality. We put a lot of pressure on ourselves to perform all the time. What we would usually expect to see, if we weren't talking about insomnia, we were just talking about life and stress and all that stuff that gets in the way is when we're able to take a step back and maybe a little bit less of burning the candle at both ends, then everything will get back on track again. We can just expect sleep to just kind of take over and go back to the good old days the way it was. But as you were describing, when you were able to take a step back and have less pressure in your life, the sleep kind of didn't seem to get on track. Did I hear you right? Was that what your experience was like?

That's correct. That's correct. And so I felt like I probably needed to go see somebody. Or there's something wrong with me. Or something like that. And so I went to see my primary care physician who also does a lot of homeopathic types of things. And so she said, "Well, let's try some supplements." And things like that. And I can't even tell you. I mean, there was the usuals like melatonin and stuff, and valerian. And there were some other ones that didn't work at all.

But I think in looking back, I was sort of putting all my hope in the particular supplement in sort of being something like magic. As opposed to me making any changes in my behavior. And so that went on for some time, which was very frustrating. And then I ended up getting to the point where I was so sleep deprived, I mean, really sleep deprived. There were many nights I would go with zero hours. And so I said, I really do need to have something that'll help me sleep. And so we moved to sleep medication, which I was not happy about at all. But again, it was really more relying on something external as opposed to me making any behavior changes.

I think it's a well-trodden path that you just described. Something that a lot of people identify with because going back to what we were talking about earlier, often we can recognize that when sleep disruption first shows up, maybe there's an identifiable or obvious cause. Sometimes we can control that cause, sometimes we can't. But we kind of understandably believe that once that trigger, that cause is no longer present or relevant, then everything will get back on track. And normally it does. But in the case of insomnia, sometimes it doesn't. And that can make it feel really mysterious and unique and unusual and lead to a lot of confusion and worry and anxiety and all the difficult stuff that comes with that concern that we've got about our sleep. The truth is there's never really any mystery to it, to insomnia. And from person to person, it's almost identical from person to person.

And it often comes down to the change in our approach to sleep once we're experiencing that sleep disruption. And sometimes we get caught up in this change without even realizing it or we are just completely approaching sleep completely differently. Understandably, because we see it as a problem that we want to fix. So we engage in some changes, behavioral changes, maybe our thoughts about sleep have changed as well. And it's all those changes that we understandably adopt in response to that sleep disruption that are almost like opening that oxygen valve to insomnia and just supplying it with the oxygen that it needs to survive.

When you talked about going down that route of exploring supplements and talking about medication and things like that, you touched upon the fact that now you're able to look back and recognize that your behaviors had changed in a way that maybe wasn't helpful. But at the time, had you noticed that your behaviors had changed? Had you noticed that your approach to sleep had changed when you were kind of tangled up in that struggle? Or did it just all seem very mysterious still?

It really was very mysterious. And to be honest, I wondered if it was more about the aging process. Maybe my body is changing and a lot of us think about, "Oh, I wish I could do what I did when I was younger." Blah, blah, blah, all that kind of thing. And I thought about that. And I thought, well, maybe this is just part of the normal aging process. People talk about when you get older you don't need that much sleep. But I certainly did realize you need some, which I wasn't getting. But what really occurred to me is that, and what was afforded to me when COVID hit, and we were in essentially lockdown as I thought, I can now pay attention to me and really take a look at what is going on here. And so I wanted to completely get off any kind of non... I wanted to get off any kind of pharmaceutical mechanism to help me with my sleep.

I wanted to do something different about it. And so I started reading a lot more and really discovered this whole idea of cognitive behavioral therapy. And being a scientist myself, I really enjoy reading about that kind of stuff and realized, well, maybe I can talk to somebody who really knows what kind of therapy we're talking about here. So I did go see someone in person in my hometown. And for a couple of sessions to really learn more about it. And realized that the type of behavioral changes that were going to be required that I know you've talked about like sleep restriction and the stimulus control wasn't anything that I had ever thought of before. It was almost counterintuitive. And of course gathering the data and all that.

But I certainly realized that I had potential. And as long as I was willing to learn about myself and learn about what was going on with me with some help from someone, that I would be able to have those changes. And whether the sleep was like it was when I was younger didn't matter to me as long as it was enough for whatever I needed to be doing and feel good. That's what I went for. So I actually looked around for a coach. And I discovered Insomnia Coach. And I thought, I want a coach because a coach will really help me learn about the potential I have. And unleash all that. As opposed to saying, "Here's what you have to do." It's really more, "Here's what the potential is and I can help you get there." And so that's when I reached out to you in December of 2020.

In terms of what that sleep was like when it was still difficult for you, were you finding it was difficulty just kind of first falling asleep or was it more to do with you fall asleep fine and then just wake up and find it impossible to fall back to sleep? Or maybe it was a bit of both.

It was primarily just falling asleep. And then as I'm sure everyone who has had any kind of insomnia issues, if you will, or in their life knows, if you find yourself having trouble falling asleep, you get anxious about it, which of course makes it even more difficult to fall asleep. And then you become such that even the thought of having to go to bed to go to sleep is anxiety producing. So you sort of, just that whole idea of even trying to be a normal sleeper... And of course I'm married to someone who can sleep anywhere. So that was tough. It's like, oh, I wish I could do that. And of course, I have a cat who sleeps like 23 hours a day. Was even envying the cat. So it was primarily falling asleep. And so there would be nights where I would have zero hours.

But what was very interesting is that even when I had zero hours of sleep, it didn't really keep me from doing what I needed to do during the day. Although I would worry about that. That, oh, if I don't get enough sleep, then I won't be able to do X, Y, Z. But that really wasn't the case. I mean, I was definitely tired and maybe didn't have quite as much energy, but I didn't realize until much later after having my sort of online conversations with you and going through the course that it is the case that most people can do a lot of things without a lot of sleep. But I wasn't really recognizing that as being a good thing. It was really more of a, wow, I can still do this, but I'm still worried and anxious about not being able to sleep even though I was functioning pretty well.

Yeah, that's interesting you say that. Were you finding that even though when you recalled your own experience and were like, "Well, yeah, I can still do these things that are important, that matter to me independently of sleep." Were you finding that your brain was still maybe telling you other things that were different to your own experience? Maybe your brain was telling you things like, "You won't be able to do those things." Or, "You'll really struggle to do those things." Even though your experience told you something different?

Yes, and... In that, yes, it would tell me that, but then if I did make a slight error or something like that, my brain would always say, "Oh, that's because you didn't get enough sleep." Not because it was just some normal thing that anyone might make, but it was always the reason for anything that was not quite the outcome I wanted was attributed to potentially not getting enough sleep. Which could have or may not have had anything to do with that. So yeah, my brain was right in there letting me know that my sleep issues were... It was telling me it was probably more of a problem than it actually was.

I think that's one of those places where we can really get tripped up when the brain starts kind of firing up, doing its job and looking out for us and generating all these full range of thoughts and feelings. Some are helpful, some are not helpful. Some make us feel good, some don't make us feel good. And when those difficult ones show up, because they don't feel good, I think as human beings, our default response tends to be to try and fight them or avoid them. Because they don't feel good. We recognize that they're not helping us. We just want to get rid of them. And that's what can really kind of tangle us up in a big struggle with the mind that can make everything more difficult. Because the brain then is doing its job, looking out for us, and we are trying to fight what it's doing. Or we're trying to avoid or trying to ignore or push all that information away and then the brain is like, "This is important. Why are you not listening to me? I'm going to yell even louder."

And then we're trying to fight it even more. And then it's yelling even louder and we just get caught so easily in that vicious cycle. Where we experience more of that difficult stuff, more difficult thoughts and feelings. So we fight even harder to get rid of it. And then that stuff gets even harder and we fight harder and before we know it, we're completely exhausted, completely distracted from everything around us and the things we want to do. And what happens? The thoughts still come back anyway, right? So really what can be useful is, which I'm sure we're going to move on to discussing is, figuring out a way where we can break that cycle. Where we can respond to all this difficult stuff that our mind is telling us maybe in a more workable way. In a way that doesn't involve so much struggle.

Because as most of us know from experience, that stuff's going to show up anyway. What if we don't add the struggle on top? Maybe that might make things just a little bit easier to deal with or a little bit better, help us feel a little bit better, if we just imagine that our brain is on the other end of a rope and we're engaged in this huge tug of war battle.. What if we just kind of drop that rope? So all that stuff is still there, but now we've just freed up so much of our energy and our attention because we're not just tugging on that rope all day long and all night long. Maybe now we've freed up to do more of the stuff that matters to us. Was that a journey that you found yourself on? Just responding to all the stuff that your mind was telling you maybe in a different way?

Yeah, for sure. As a matter of fact, I was thinking about, well, these are just thoughts and they're transient and it's not like the thoughts are going to do anything harmful to me. And certainly as you mentioned, it became such that if I would spend energy in trying to eliminate those thoughts, then it just became more of that struggle. And so I just decided that I need to be willing to accept that I have these thoughts and they're just thoughts. And so I actually started doing guided meditations, actually in the morning. That really taught me a lot about what to do with sort of reframing those thoughts into something innocuous.

And I like to sort of think of a lot of those thoughts as sort of mind clutter. It's like how do I clear out the clutter, but not with a heavy, powered tool, but just with a little swipe of a little feather duster or something like that. So I mean, one of my favorite images was thinking of some of those thoughts as some rambunctious little puppy that is bouncing around in my mind. That's so cute and makes me smile.
Or I had one where I could imagine some of those thoughts in a parade on some of those banners and they're just marching along and then disappear. Someplace to put them in, so that they weren't really very arousing and things like that. And just to sort of reframe them in ways so that it almost got to be a habit, that I could reframe most arousing thought into something really more useful and more exploratory about what was going on with me. And then just sort of put them aside. But that took some practice. That took quite a bit of practice. So anyone who's listening out there, that's not something that you're going to master overnight. It takes some practice, but well worth it. Well worth it to sort of reframe those thoughts into something that is just very normal.

I think one way of moving away from that struggle or building skill in moving away from that struggle... And skills require practice. If someone handed me a guitar right now, I'd sound atrocious. It would take me years and years and years to build skill in playing a guitar, for example. And this isn't really that different. It's a skill, it's a new skillset. If we recognize that we might benefit from a different approach to all this difficult stuff, then it probably make sense that it's going to require practice, it's going to require us developing a new skill.

And that does take time. Listening to you describe your approach, it sounds like you practiced going away from trying to directly fight or avoid the thoughts that were turning up and more towards observing them. And you thought to yourself, "Well, how can I observe these so they feel maybe less threatening or I'm less likely to get thrown around by these thoughts?" And you've used that example of, "Well, I kind of imagined these thoughts were like a rambunctious puppy." So the thoughts were there, but they took this form that's a little bit less threatening, and then you just kind of observed them.

Oh, I would even greet them. I would say, oh, yeah. It's like, oh, well, hello thoughts. And you're there and not fight it. It's just like, well, hello there. And you are what you are and welcome. And sort of really put a positive spin on them. So that there wasn't a reason for them to stick around.

So because you weren't going to war with them, then maybe the brain didn't feel like it had to keep on pushing this on you harder and harder and harder.

That's right, that's right. Well, it's, okay, you've done your job. Now it's like, "Okay, I'm going to go away." So that was part of this practice and really retooling in my mind about number one, even welcoming disturbing or arousing kind of thought, and then just allowing them to be and reframing them until they just sort of faded away. And so that's the part that does take a little bit of practice.

Yeah, exactly. And I think one area where we can get tripped up is when our goal is, "Okay, I'll do this. And my goal is to get rid of them." Because then we are just still tangled up in that struggle of trying to fight or avoid them. So we really... We're almost like we're setting ourselves up for struggle. So we're not really going to get where we want to be if our goal is still to get rid of these thoughts and feelings.

It really is just about practicing responding to them without that struggle. And sometimes there's a bonus, they might just disappear. But really what we're doing is moving away from the battle because when we're engaged in a battle with our minds, as far as our brain is concerned, we're at war. We might as well just have that huge suit of armor on, riding the war horse with a big sword in our hand. The thoughts aren't going to disappear when we're at war. And second of all, how likely is sleep going to happen if we're engaged in this huge medieval battle with our minds in the middle of the night?

Yeah, yeah, very much. As a matter of fact, It got to the point where getting rid of those thoughts didn't occur to me anymore. It was really more, oh, there they are. Again. Well, hello. And then I guess they would just get bored and go off.

You mentioned that you practiced a lot of this in the mornings. Did you ever practice it in the middle of the night or when you first got into bed and you were struggling to fall asleep? Did you ever get any practice in with that kind of approach at that time?

I did, but at the beginning I thought, well, I'll do this when I'm trying to fall asleep. But see, I just even said that I was trying to fall asleep, which implies effort. And so the more I would do towards a goal of trying to fall asleep, it was almost paradox. So I found that if I did my guided meditation in the morning and then practiced a lot of that during the day, when I was up and around, and we all have lots of opportunities during the day to chill out a little bit and maybe reframe some things that are happening, that it got to be a habit. So that when I was in bed I didn't even have to try to do things. So it was sort of a part of the way I was thinking. But I did try that at first, but again, as I mentioned, it had that paradoxical effect of putting effort into trying to sleep. Which is, I think you've mentioned, that's the one thing that usually putting effort into something is a good thing, but when it's for sleep, not a good thing.

It's great that you were able to even notice that because I think so much of the struggle can come from, we just don't even notice when it's happening. When we're actually tangled up in that struggle. When our goal or our intent is maybe that roadblock that's stopping us from reaching that goal. Because just like you said, the more we try to make sleep happen, the more difficult it can become. It's kind of like the more we try to breathe, the more confusing it all becomes, right? It's just, breathing is this natural process. And if we kind of decide, "Okay, today I want to take a certain number of breaths. I want to be able to inhale a certain volume of air in my lungs with every breath and average a certain intake of gas every day averaged over a week." Breathing's going to get really confusing and stressful. And sleep is really the same.

It's kind of that the more attention we give it, the more we try to intervene, the more difficult it can all become. And I think if we could just notice that that's what we're tangled up in, then there's that huge opportunity. That word you used right at the start of this conversation, you notice that there's that opportunity to change. And the process of change isn't easy. It does require ongoing practice, but there's that opportunity there to respond, to approach this in a different way. And just knowing that opportunity exists can sometimes be a little bit comforting and reassuring in and of itself. And listening to these kind of discussions as well from people that have been tangled up in that process and unraveled from it can be really reassuring too.

And really the epiphany I had was there's really two parts to the cognitive behavioral therapy. There's what do you need to do to get your body physiologically attuned for sleep with sleep drive and things of that nature, and the various exercises if you will that you have folks do. But then there's the arousal part. And the mind arousal part. And it was like no matter what I did with all the physiological exercises I did to get my body in tune, arousal would win over every time. So I thought I have to focus on that to try to really give my body and mind every opportunity to do what should come naturally. And just do everything I can to just promote sleep without putting a lot of effort into it by sort of retooling a number of what's going on cognitively, psychologically as well as physiologically.

I like to think of it as this kind of two-pronged approach. So we have the behavioral side of things in terms of our habits around sleep or our behaviors around sleep. And then we have all the stuff that goes on inside us. The thoughts and the feelings and how we respond to those. And I think a lot of people do really well just changing that one prong, the behavioral approach. So they might notice that, "I'm going to bed at eight o'clock. I'm really struggling. Before I had any issues with sleep, I used to go to bed at 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock at night. Maybe that's a change. I can kind of go back to my old way of doing things. Maybe going to bed really early isn't helping me, or maybe staying in bed really late in the morning isn't helping me. Maybe trying to nap during the day isn't helping me."

And that approach for a lot of people is all that's needed, just that behavioral change. Change in their behavioral approach, new habits. But then for some people, that's a great way to set the stage for sleep, but there's still that battle going on in the mind. So if we're not falling asleep in a certain amount of time, the brain's like, "It's going to be another one of those nights. You're not going to be able to sleep, you're not going to be able to do anything tomorrow. You're just going to be sitting on that couch. No one's going to want to talk to you because you're going to be so miserable."

All that stuff starts coming up and then we start trying to fight it, distracting ourselves, pushing it away, getting mad at ourselves, being mean to ourselves, "Why am I thinking these thoughts?" And I think that's where exploring a new way of responding to all that difficult stuff that's going on in our minds, that second prong approach is really, is kind of like the cherry on top of the cake. If we can also go down that route as well, which I think to be honest is more difficult. Often more difficult. If we can get down that road too, then really we're setting ourselves up for success. And by success I mean living the kind of life we want to live independently of sleep and regardless of the difficult thoughts and feelings our brain is generating while it's doing its job of looking out for us.

For me, I needed to do the whole hog, if you will. I had to do the physiology as well as the sort of the mind body connection. And I really had to have the willingness to have full commitment. I mean, I thought, okay, I'm just going to do this and make the time for it and do the things that were even uncomfortable. Such as the sleep restriction, was very, very helpful for me. And very interesting to recognize how that worked. And then at the same time, working on what's going on from the arousal standpoint. And naturally sort of all that mind clutter that I mentioned that we have a lot of times.

You touched upon sleep restriction a couple of times now. Can you tell us a little bit more about how that approach panned out for you? Just for someone that's listening maybe has never heard of sleep restriction before, maybe you could just explain what it was or your understanding of it in your own words and how you implemented it and what that process of implementation was like for you.

Yeah, I did some reading up on it of course, and to be honest, I think it should be called bed restriction instead of sleep restriction. Because it has not as great a connotation as what's going on. But as a scientist, I'm used to collecting data. And so I was all for logging really what my sleep was for a couple of weeks to see how much sleep I was actually getting and how much time, from the time in bed, all those kinds of things.

So for everyone out there, you keep track of how much time you're in bed and how much time you're awake versus asleep and various other data points as well. And then a sleep window, if you will, is constructed for you so that you don't go to bed until a certain time. And then you only stay in bed a certain amount of time. And so really what you're doing, the whole point is to stimulate sleep drive. And so I will say that the one thing that was one of the biggest helps to me was because I had been on a long-term sleep medication, I had lost the ability and did not realize this, but I had lost the ability to recognize true sleepiness because I would just fall asleep by virtue of that medication that I was taking.

And so I would misread tiredness for sleepiness. And you can be tired but be wide awake. As opposed to having that sleepiness. And so what sleep restriction, bed restriction did for me was allow me to discover what truly feeling sleepy meant. And so it was a much more natural thing to go to bed. I'm sleepy, therefore I'm going to sleep. So that was very, very helpful for me. And I know it probably sounds funny for a lot of folks, but being able to distinguish between tiredness and true sleepiness was pivotal for me. And a big, big help for me early on in the sleep restriction exercises that we were doing. And so then I was able to extend the number of hours and so forth. Yeah.

It's something I hear really quite common that, "I kind of lost this sensation of sleepiness." Or, "I might feel sleepy earlier in the night, but then it's time for bed and then all that sleepiness just seems to disappear." And I think a lot of people with chronic insomnia do mistake fatigue or tiredness for sleepiness. I think a lot of people without insomnia probably do too because we often use the words interchangeably, but there is a difference. Now you're able to reflect on that yourself. If I'm going to put you on the spot and ask you to describe the difference for you, because everyone is different, but what was that difference like? What's the difference between feeling tired and fatigued, which might not indicate that you're ready for sleep compared to sleepiness, which might indicate that your body's ready to start generating sleep?

Well, tired is really more of a fatigue, and you might want to go, "Well, I just feel like not doing much." And just maybe sitting around and watching some TV or just hanging out. Whereas sleepiness, you get that true where your eyes start drooping and you can just feel the sensation in your brain of true wanting to fall asleep. Whereas in tiredness, you don't have that at all. But where your eyes again, start drooping and you can almost start nodding off. And so when you're tired, you don't necessarily do. But that sort of nodding off sensation I was like, oh, I couldn't remember the last time that I had that happen to me and it was just delightful. It's like, oh, yes, now I'm recalling what this is and this means that truly my sleep drive is kicking in and this is an opportunity for me to actually get some sleep.

I think that's a great way of describing it. And for people that aren't sure what we mean by sleep drive, it's almost like hunger, but for sleep. Like biological hunger for sleep. So we wake up in the morning, most of us are pretty hungry because we haven't eaten all night. So we'll eat some breakfast, then we're not hungry anymore until around lunchtime and then maybe not until dinnertime. And what can happen when we have insomnia and we really want to chase after sleep and make sleep happen is we might start going to bed before we're sleepy, which is a bit like sitting at the dinner table at three o'clock in the afternoon waiting to get hungry for dinner at night. The chances are we're just going to be sitting there doing nothing for a long time until biologically the body's like, "Okay, I'm ready to eat." Or, "I'm ready to sleep now."

And so with a sleep window, all we're looking to do is, all right, if I'm averaging X amount of sleep over the course of a week or two, then I'm going to allot roughly that much time to be in bed. So we're not taking sleep away from ourselves. That's why sleep restriction is probably really unhelpful terminology. Because it implies that we are restricting sleep, but what we're doing really is just restricting the amount of time available for wakefulness.

Because if we know from our own experience that we're averaging three, four, five hours of sleep, then by spending 8, 9, 10 hours in bed, we're setting ourselves up for long periods of wakefulness and we're more likely to be going to bed before the body is actually ready for bed, before it's ready for sleep to happen. And really that's all there is to it. It's not one of these things that can make sleep happen. It's not one of these things that guarantees we're not going to spend time awake at night, but it just helps us move away from chasing after sleep, trying to make it happen in a way that makes it more difficult for sleep to happen.

Yeah, I mean I think your analogy of it being like hunger is great. There was a saying I read somewhere where, sleep to live, not live to sleep. There are a lot of people, "Well, I just like to sleep." It's like, well, if your body is not ready for it... And it also, the other really epiphany that I had was that you need to do what your body needs as opposed to what you want. And it'd be nice if you could just, well, I'm going to sleep whenever I want or do whatever things when I want. But if your body's just... That's not what it needs, then you need to respect that and perhaps alter your thinking on your approaches to certain things. Whether it's eating or sleeping or any of those other things that we do for sustenance and health.

We talked about that sleep restriction as one part of the behavioral changes that you made, just giving yourself an earliest possible bedtime and getting out of bed a reasonably consistent time every morning as well. Were there any other behavioral changes you made that looking back upon reflection you found were useful too?

Well, the one thing that you just mentioned that I didn't allude too much on, but it turned out to be critical, was the consistent time of getting out of bed. That no matter what time I went to sleep, I always got out bed at the same time. So even if I was up till two o'clock in the morning and my get out of bedtime was five, I would get up at five. And whether it was the weekend, vacation, whatever, it was just really important to have that consistent, get out of bed time. And not try to catch up on sleep. A lot of people think that that's a good idea, but it definitely... Maybe it was at one time, but certainly was not helpful.

That catching up on sleep, that idea of, "I need to catch up on sleep." Why sometimes it's not helpful, we can kind of go back to that hunger analogy again, right? Because it would be like, "I really want to eat. I really want eating to happen. I really don't like feeling hungry. I want to feel full." So four o'clock in the afternoon we have this huge three course meal, and then we're kind like, "Yes, I've caught up." And then at eight o'clock or nine o'clock at night when everyone's kind of already eating dinner, you're still not eating dinner yet, you're kind of sitting there, "Oh, I want to eat now, but I'm full."

And it's kind like that when we're catching up on sleep. It can feel great at the time, "Yeah, I'm catching up on sleep." Or, "I've just fallen asleep at four o'clock and my alarm's gone off at five, I'm just going to sleep in until eight or nine o'clock." Well, yeah, it can feel great at the time, but then we're kind of setting ourselves up for difficulties later on.

Oh, absolutely. I actually look back on just my life in general in that I would tend to work all week and then I'd sleep in on Sundays. Till nine in the morning. And then looking back, I always wondered why I couldn't fall asleep on Sunday night. Well, because my body had as much sleep as it needed. And is like, well... Then I'd have to get back on track before I ever had... This was before I ever had, quote, "insomnia". I would not sleep well on Sunday nights because I would sleep in on Sunday mornings. So another two and two together.

And sometimes it's worth it, right? It is just like everything that helps us live a rich and meaningful life tends to come with some downsides and some difficult stuff, and sometimes it's worth it. Sometimes we'll be like, "Yeah, I want to have a lie in on Saturday or Sunday. That helps me live the life I want to live. It might lead to some sleep disruption on the next night, but I'm okay with that." And that's fine. It's just being aware of the fact that our choices that we make, they're going to have consequences. And it's down to us as individuals, we are the expert on ourselves to know if that's a trade off we're okay with. And if we are, then fine. There's no need to change anything.

Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. But I did make that connection. I laughed about it actually. Went, well... Oh, well, that was fine.

When we are dealing with chronic insomnia, there can be so many insights to be gained from reflecting back on what our approach to sleep was before it all seemed so difficult. I think there's so many valuable snippets of information from our own experience that we can use to our advantage there. Because when we are really caught up in the struggle, the brain's looking out for us and it's just laser focused on fixing the problem. And it's that trying to fix the problem, which is often what gets us caught up in that quicksand, caught up in the struggle. And the more we try, the more we keep sinking. If we are able to reflect back, "Well, how did I approach this before?" Whether that was one year, 10 years, 50 years ago, we might be able to get some little insights there that can help us as we move forward.

You talked about you were implementing the sleep restriction or the sleep window. So what was that actually like? Because it's one thing to talk about, "All right, I'm not going to go to bed before a certain time. I'm going to get out of bed no matter what at say, five o'clock or six o'clock in the morning." Whatever your lifestyle is, the time that works for you. Let's just kind of go back to night one. And you kind of set this up for yourself. What did that look like in practice? Was it something that you found really easy to do? Did you find that you were immediately just falling asleep as soon as your head hit the pillow and just sleeping right through the night? What was that actual experience of implementation like?

Oh, no. It was challenging. It was challenging. And that was one of the first things where I said, I need to be willing to commit myself to do this because I knew that it was probably going to take some time for something to happen. So no, that first night I was probably awake the whole night. And so I just told my husband, here's going to be what's going on. And so it was helpful that he was very supportive of all this. But it was probably, I'd say about a week went by of it being pretty tough. But I hung in.
And then I would make sure that of course, that I didn't take any naps. Even though I got, quote, "sleepy" during the day. I was not going to take any naps because I didn't want to use up if you will, some of my sleep drive. I wanted it to build up as much as possible. And I remember, believe it or not, I remember being so excited when I got a full hour of sleep. And I mean, that was a big improvement. And then it was an hour and a half and then two hours and then three hours, and I would have awakenings, but I would fall back asleep.

So I did that for quite some time and realized that the whole idea of needing, of this... There's a lot of advisement out there that you need to have seven to nine hours of sleep, well, that's a recommendation, but however for me, I seem to do just fine at six. And so when I was at six, I was very, very happy to get six hours. And again, I would wake up during the night. That was fine. And then go back to sleep. But over time, my sleep time has increased. But I was at six hours for a long time and felt great with that. I mean, my body felt great. I was clearheaded, the whole nine yards. But as I've managed the arousal part that we talked about earlier, I've extended my sleep hours by at least... Oftentimes it's seven to eight now. Again with awakenings. Just awakenings. Yeah.

And have you found that, going back to that change of approach to the arousal, the thoughts, the feelings, all that stuff that often comes with wakefulness, as you've become more skilled in responding to that in a different way when it shows up, do you find that when wakefulness shows up, when you're just awake during the night, you have kind of a different relationship with that wakefulness now?

Yes, yes, very much. First off, what was important was realizing that having awakenings was very, very normal. And that just with the cycle of sleep, you're probably going to wake up most likely every 90 minutes or so, whether you know it or not. So just knowing that that was a physiological normal thing to do was very helpful. And then the fact that I had been sleeping and then waking, before I would've gotten a little panicky about, oh, no, I'm now awake and I'm not going to be able to go to sleep, and oh, my gosh. And things of that nature.

Whereas it evolved into, oh, this is just a normal thing for me to wake up and then just enjoy the wakefulness. I actually said, oh, I can think about some nice things while I'm here. Or maybe do another little mind exercise for myself just for enjoyment or something like that. And as I got more and more skilled at that then my awakenings were more on the lines of I'd wake up, but I'd feel sleepy still as opposed to being really wake. But I know I was still sleepy and then I would fall back to sleep pretty quickly.

Maybe it comes down to that willingness, like you've mentioned a few times. When we are more willing to experience the wakefulness or when we are more willing to experience the thoughts and feelings that come with being a human being, especially the difficult ones, we become less responsive to those things when they show up. So like you just mentioned, maybe in the past you would wake during the night and kind of the brain would start flashing that red light and the sirens would be going off, here's the wakefulness, everything's going to be a disaster now. And then you're all tense.

Compared to when we are more willing to experience the wakefulness it's kind of, we wake up, "Oh, there's that wakefulness." There's no more alarm bells. There's no sirens going off. But I think it's one thing to say, "Oh, I need to be willing to experience this." It's quite another to actually be willing because it is unpleasant, especially when we're really caught up in the struggle. If someone's listening to this and just thinking to themselves, "Willing to experience insomnia, no. I don't want to be willing to experience insomnia because it's awful. How am I going to be willing to experience something that is this unpleasant?" I'm putting you on the spot a bit here, but what would you say to someone who's feeling that way? Because I think most people with chronic insomnia are like, "No, I'm completely unwilling to experience this because it's very unpleasant." How do we get from there to this place of more willingness?

I think part of it is to accept that everyone, whether you're quote, an "insomniac" or not, everyone's going to have wakefulness. It's not just unique to folks who think who have insomnia per se. And everyone, even good sleepers, if you will, are going to have difficult nights. I mean, that's just the way it is. So there's a lot of company out there, and being awake is really just a natural part of the 24 hour cycle in our lives. And I think that some people think that acceptance or willingness to do something is similar to resignation. And I think resignation is when you feel defeated and there's nothing you can do about this. Whereas acceptance and willingness is, "I can do something different. Perhaps I can learn some things with a coach or something like that to help me get the potential to promote my sleep."

So the willingness to be awake and play around with that in a good way, in a positive way, and learn from that is all part of that whole exercise to get to where you want to be. And it's really the positive end as opposed to, "There's something wrong with me. There's nothing I can do about this."
But if you can transition that to being willing and accepting, then that's a, "No, I can do something about this and reach my potential."

What was the process like in terms of progress? Everyone always wants... As human beings, we always want to kind of measure our progress against other people. And I always try and steer people away from that because especially with sleep, it's something we can't directly control. So we're kind of trying to make something happen that we can't control because someone else was able to make something happen that they couldn't control on a certain time period, and we're trying to match that.

But I think what can be helpful is recognizing that progress is very rarely linear. It usually comes with ups and downs. And progress is really different from person to person. I think what's more useful is just focusing on what we can control, which is the practice. Practice rather than progress. Because if we are practicing a new, more workable approach to all this difficult stuff, then the progress will take care of itself. And we can't control the progress. We can only control the practice. So when you were implementing all these changes that we've been talking about, what was that like for you in terms of progress? Were you finding that each night was just better than the last and that you were just kind of on this straight line uphill where everything was always getting better, or were there some bumps in the roads and some ups and downs and difficulties too?

Oh, yeah. It was anything but linear. And I'll say that when I graduated from your course, it wasn't like everything was hunky dory and we were all done. I thought, I now have the tools, the skills, the information I need along with everything else I've been doing to do what I need to do to try to make improvements. And so things would go well, then I'd have a setback for a few days or whatever. The big difference for me, that was so important was that when I had a setback, I didn't panic. It was really more of a, oh, I know what's happening. Here's what I need to do.

And so the two years since I graduated from your class to now were much better than before. But there was sort of that up and down, but my whole attitude about it was completely different. That, well, I know what to do. I know exactly what's happening. I can do this or that or pay more attention to this or that. And that didn't mean I had to disrupt my life or anything like that. It was really more of a, oh, yeah, I forgot and I got a little lazy on some things. For example, I might've slept in or I took a nap or whatever. I could attribute things. And so it was really more of a, I know what to do now when I do have those setbacks. And it's just been within the last few months or so where I haven't had any setbacks whatsoever, without something that I could attribute it to.

Like there was a very loud noise or something that was going on wherever I was sleeping. But it's not a linear process. I think everyone who does something like this it's, their progress, if you will, is going to be unique to them. And to try not to compare yourself to anybody else. As long as you have the tools and you can just go back and refer to them, reference them. I think one of the great things that you do for folks is you allow everyone to keep all the material that you had so you can go back and listen. And then of course you have podcasts and various other things for people to listen to. So just refresh your memory and your skills and put them into practice and it'll work out.

How long do you think it took for you to get to a point where sleep wasn't something you were just kind of endlessly struggling with? It wasn't kind of on your mind, crowding out all the other things that you wanted to think about or pay attention to, and you just felt better able to live your life independently of what happened at night when just your general relationship changed and you felt, "Yeah, I don't feel like this is a struggle anymore. I might still have some difficult nights, but it's not something that's kind of consuming my attention, my life."

I would say at least six months. It was probably at least six months. And my attitude about it really... And again, it wasn't a sudden attitude change. It was really an evolution in my attitude change, in that, oh, this is just... And my perception of the insomnia part of me was, oh, that's just that. And I don't have to worry about it. It'll come and go. And I would even... People if I was on vacation or visiting with people and they'd say, "How'd you sleep?" And I said, well, for me, I don't sleep like everybody else, but that's just me. And it's just kind of normal.

And I didn't attribute me being an insomniac anymore. It was really more of a, my sleep patterns are evolving over time. And what's normal for me is not going to be normal for somebody else. And so my normality, if you will, my normal state has evolved as well as I think my body has now become accustomed to getting what it needs as opposed to me saying, here's what I want. And me paying more attention to that. And sometimes I'm not sleepy. So if I'm not sleepy, I'm not going to try to go to sleep. But if I'm sleepy well... Like in the middle of the day, I'm going to do my best maybe to have a cat nap for 10 minutes as opposed to sleeping for an hour. Being respectful of the sleep drive that I'd like to kick in later on. But it took me a while to get to that point.

As human beings, we always want to make progress really quickly. We always want to develop new skills immediately, but they require work and effort and ups and downs. It's just a normal part of the journey. So I think it's helpful to hear from other people what that process was like for them. Because it's really easy to hold ourselves to these impossibly high standards.

And it's so ironic that we can hold ourselves to these high standards, but we can't even directly control reaching those standards when it comes to sleep. Because there's no magic sleep switch that we can find hidden away in our brain that we can just activate upon command. So it's really helpful to just hear the more realistic experience from people like you coming on, saying, "Yes, there are ups and downs. It's not easy, is difficult. It requires commitment, it requires willingness. And it requires time. It's not a quick fix. It might take months, it might take even longer. It's ongoing practice." And it's that ongoing practice which really is the key because it's so easy to get disheartened and the brain is telling you, "This isn't going to work. Give up. Go back to all the old stuff that you know from experience doesn't work, but maybe try that stuff even harder." So it's really easy to get pushed off track. And so it is a case of just keeping on going. Persevering.

Yeah, it really is like a journey. It's like a journey. And included in that journey is you have to say goodbye to some old habits. And we know about habit formation. That's very challenging to change, something that's a habit. Because we just do that without even thinking. And you do your habits without even giving it much thought, but realizing that something that could be impacting your sleep is a habit. And you're like, "Oh, my, that's something I have to change." And that can be tough at first, but when you realize the benefit of that, then all the other habits that you may have to change, you're like, "Okay, I understand why I may have to make those changes." But yeah, it's a journey I think. And I am more attuned to a potential habit that might creep in. I'm like, oh, I know where this is going to go. So maybe not.

So Anne-Claire, I really appreciate the time you've taken out your day to come on and just share your experience. I do have one last question for you, which would be great if you could answer, because I think you'd feel a bit left out if I didn't ask you because I tend to ask this question or something similar to it to every guest. So here we go. It's this. If someone with chronic insomnia is listening, they feel as though they've just tried everything, that they're beyond help, that they'll just never be able to move away from that struggle with sleep, with insomnia. What would you say to them?

I think I'd say, be willing to step back and learn about what sleep really is all about. That it is a natural state. And most likely the reason why you're having struggles is because you are doing things that are disrupting your natural state. And if you can learn about what all those things are as well as what promotes the natural state, then everyone has potential. And the best way to do that is not to try to figure it out all yourself, but perhaps reach out to someone like yourself to say, "Here are the tried and true types of things that you can do, and I'm willing to help you along. And ensure that you can reach your potential." But be willing to be patient. You have to be patient and make the commitment to make those sometimes large, but often small changes that can add up in the end.

That's great. Well, I think that's an excellent note to end on. So thanks again for taking the time out of your day to come onto the podcast Anne-Claire.

You're welcome. It was my pleasure.

Thanks for listening to the Insomnia Coach Podcast. If you’re ready to move away from struggling with insomnia and toward living the life you want to live, I would love to help.

You can get started right now by enrolling in my online course or you can book my phone coaching package.

My online course runs for six weeks. It will help you make changes that can create better conditions for sleep, it will help you identify and get rid of any behaviors that might be making sleep more difficult, and it will help you respond to insomnia and all the difficult thoughts and feelings that come with it in a more workable way.

You can work through the course in two ways. You can choose the self-coaching option and work through it by yourself with the support of an online forum that is available only to clients. 

Or, you can choose to add one-on-one email coaching and work through the course with me by your side. With the one-on-one coaching option, you get unlimited email access to me for eight weeks, starting from the day you enroll. 

Any time you have a question or concern, any time you are unsure about anything, any time you want to focus on the challenges you face or any difficulties that show up, you can email me and I will be there to coach and support you. 

You can get the course and start right now at insomniacoach.com.

With the phone coaching package, we start with a one-hour call (voice only or video — your choice) and come up with an initial two-week plan that will help you create better conditions for sleep and practice moving away from struggling with insomnia and all the difficult thoughts and feelings that come with it. 

You get unlimited email access to me for two weeks after the call and a half-hour follow-up call at the end of the two weeks. You can book the phone coaching package at insomniacoach.com/phone.
I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Insomnia Coach Podcast. I’m Martin Reed, and as always, I’d like to leave you with this important reminder — you can sleep.