DON’T BE A SLEEP SABOTEUR

ONE client, Patricia, had struggled with insomnia for three years.

She had given up her job, in case stress was causing the problem; ended her relationship, because she couldn’t bear to sleep in the same bed as her boyfriend; and had next to no social life.

By the time she came to see me, she was exhausted — mentally and physically.

Thankfully, through the same Acceptance and Commitment Therapy-based methods I have been describing to you this week, I was able to help Patricia lean in to her insomnia,

and soon she was sleeping well again. But on her return from a holiday in the US, she experienced jet lag, which caused her to be awake at night.

The shock of lying in bed awake again instantly stirred her old feelings of anxiety. Obviously, this was the last place she wanted to be and I received a panicky phone call early the next day.

I knew Patricia had been hooked by the sleep sabotage that so many of my clients go through when poor sleep returns.

What she was experiencing was normal; the wakefulness associated with jet lag had triggered all her old fears.

When I asked her what she meant by ‘nothing had worked’, she realised that, in her desperation to prevent poor sleep from returning, she had inadvertently tried to control her insomnia, rather than accept it.

It meant she had spent the whole night struggling with sleeplessness, rather than just being awake because of jet lag.

Jet lag passes — the key is not fighting it, because that can lead to long-term sleep problems.