Posted by Tom-N-Texas on October 03, 2005 at 14:09:00:

In Reply to: Re: How to change after 12 years of it? posted by Brightonbelle on October 03, 2005 at 11:25:20:

Well, first of all when I didn't sleep it was very difficult to be happy. This was very upsetting for me because I'm usually a very upbeat, high-energy type person. But in reality this quickly reduced me to a pretty miserable person. Oftentimes I couldn't muster up the energy to even get off the couch all day or play with the kids. All in all it was generally an awful experience that still haunts me today. I never really did learn how to deal with multiple nights in a row of no sleep.

But somewhere along the way I learned despite being miserable and negative that I could grasp on to little pieces of hope that occasionally came my way. One of the most powerful pieces of hope took shape like this: I started noticing after a successful night of sleep, that I would often wake up in the morning and suddenly think to myself "wow...this going to sleep thing really isn't really that hard!" And I would make a point to constantly remind myself of this fact throughout the day. This thought would always relax me. Then at night I might repeat to myself "Ok..remember...sleeping is not that hard....sleeping is not that hard."

But I went through some of the same things you talk about where you find it very difficult to sleep before a big event the next day. I often told my wife not to tell me if we had plans later in the week because I would often start worrying about my sleep days in advance of the event.

This is a problem because these big events only seem to add to the pressure we're putting on ourselves. However, if you continue to remind yourself that 'sleeping is not that hard,' it might help take some of that pressure off of you.

Also keep in mind that once you DO actually sleep a little before a big day, you can always use that victory and refer back to it later. You can use it to PROVE to yourself how it IS actually possible to sleep before a big day. To me there's nothing more powerful than the truth.

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