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Re: Question for Beth

Posted by Beth on November 08, 2001 at 12:17:04:

In Reply to: Question for Beth posted by Cassidy on November 08, 2001 at 10:52:55:

Hi Cassidy, I know how discouraging it is. Some people are OK with sleeping on the couch, but even before I had chronic insomnia, I would have trouble falling asleep if I snoozed too much in front of the TV. This happens to my husband too, and he normally falls asleep within seconds of going to bed. So I avoid it now. When I was really sleep deprived, it was very difficult, I could not even sit on the couch without nodding off and I would have to get up and walk around or find something else to do other than TV. (Slow walking on the treadmill helped, or sitting on one of those exercise balls and goofing around with that). Now I don't lay down in front of the T.V. unless it is very close to bedtime and if I catch myself closing my eyes I get up and move around a bit or I go up to bed a little early if it is at least after 10 p.m. With time, the "window of opportunity" did not play such a big role. You have to just keep working on dealing with your anxiety and telling yourself that if you don't sleep, it will be OK-- you can handle it and tomorrow you will be that much more likely to sleep. An interesting thing I've noticed lately is that many nights I feel really wide awake, for example, if we've been out socially or I'm just not that tired when I go up to read. If after reading for a few minutes I notice that I am not getting sleepy, the fear starts to creep in. But I can usually ignore it now or reassure myself, and I am always surprised how quickly I get sleepy after that when I thought I was going to have to read a really long time. I don't know if this is a conditioned response or what, but now I can remind myself that just because I'm feeling a little tense or too wide awake, that doesn't mean I won't be sound asleep in a few minutes. It is wierd how fast it happens, like a switch going off.

As far as reading in the night, I used to get really keyed up too sometimes, but all I can say is just stick with it and hopefully you will see gradual improvement. My main goal was always ending nights of 0 sleep, which just freaked me out, so even if I got only 1 hour of light sleep, I felt like I was improving. I think it is important to get as warm and comfy as you can, read laying down so your body at least gets some rest. That is tough when you don't have a couch on the same floor as your bed. I found going up and down the stairs really woke me up and a therapist I went to suggested making a spot out in the hall. That was not comfy or private (3 kids to trip on me in the night!) so I ended up actually getting a couch in my bedroom and that has been great. Strangely enough, if I doze off while reading it seems to help me to fall asleep when I move to the bed, the opposite as when it happens in front of the T.V. But maybe that's because the T.V. is downstairs. Hope this helps.

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