Insomnia, anxiety & the fear of sleep.

 *This is not intended to address sleep difficulties caused by underlying physical or mental health conditions, which may require individual assessment and support*

Today I would like to take a few minutes to talk about anxiety, the fear of sleep and insomnia. About a year ago I had a sleepless night. That story would have stopped there very thoroughly and beautifully and everything would have gone back to normal but whoever knows me and my anxious brain would most likely beg to differ. So let’s start his story again. About a year ago I had a sleepless night. I lay awake until the early hours of the morning unable to sleep. And that’s how I was introduced to the dark monstrous world of insomnia that I am sure many of you are familiar with. Night after night I would lie awake in bed, mind racing and heart pounding. Everyone around me fast asleep, snoring- have you ever been envious of sleeping people before? I would get up and pace up and down, sit in the living room in the dark (probably scared my cat to death a few times) conversed with the ghosts of the night and begged the Gods of *sleep sweet sleep* to show mercy on me. Every single night for a month. I was sleep deprived, scared and desperate for a solution. However, this is not a story of a therapist losing her sanity in the scary shadows of the night (and apologies to the people that thought that us therapists didn’t go through the same thing other humans do and have us sitting on a pedestal).

That month I did a lot of research on insomnia - if you want a research done quickly and promptly give it to the anxious brain. I looked for solutions everywhere. Reddit at 12am at midnight had become my best friend. The more stories I read the more freaked out I became. Doom scrolling, people had not slept for years feeling like vampires, torturous states of mind, tears, desperation, fear fear fear fear, sleeping meds, CBT-I (what the hell was that- so many people swearing by its miraculous results-clicking on their profiles it looked like people trying to sell it). I was desperate and the more I couldn’t sleep the more I panicked, the more I panicked the more I couldn’t sleep- sounds familiar?

The thing with sleep anxiety is that it’s a proper loop. Once you are in it, it’s like a hamster wheel. It’s difficult to get out of it. One thing I learned that month of insomnia is that sleep cannot be forced, you also don’t have to do anything to get yourself to sleep. Nothing. Sleep is a biological function - like eating, peeing or drinking water- that your body knows how to do. You don’t have to do anything to fall asleep. You don’t have to have a sleep hygiene, take melatonin, swallow down sleeping pills, count endless rows of cheerfully sheep. Nothing. You will sleep again when you learn that sleep deprivation is not going to kill you and you can live your life nonetheless of how many hours of sleep you got last night. And it was so interesting that not only I could function and work even sleepless but I felt more present in my tired body and more present with people.

I learned all this in a very beautiful YouTube channel I was lucky enough to discover in those endless sleepless nights that is called The Sleep Coach School (https://www.youtube.com/@thesleepcoachschool8192) I wanted to share this information here, just like that school so generously shared all this information freely, without trying to prey on human pain and vulnerability.

Befriending my sleeplessness was my saving grace. There is something deeply spiritual in learning to live life in all our human, imperfect, unpolished, painful and happy moments.

Have you struggled with sleep? If so, leave me a comment below. Thank you for being in my blog and taking the time to read.