Curing Stress-Related Insomnia

On any given night, around 1/3 of the people around you aren't sleeping. And they're not having a party, either. They'd like to sleep-in fact, they may be desperate for it, but they're suffering from insomnia. Thumping pillows, ruminating over life events and thinking about the future, not with the eagerness of people getting ready for an all-expense paid, first-class trip around the world, but with dread. Many people experience insomnia because they're chronically worried. Worried about money, about work, about trouble in their families. Worried about what they're doing with their lives, or lying awake regretting past mistakes. There's something about the deep darkness of 3am that stimulates the human mind, usually to our detriment. What could be lonelier than lying awake in the small hours of the morning, feeling you're your world is hopelessly out of control? Insomnia is all too often a product of our own troubled minds. But there's some good news. If you're a worrier, it's a habit. And habits by definition, can be broken. Here are some strategies for handling the habits that lead to insomnia.

Stop the inflow of negativity. "Entertainment" has morphed into something more like "Adrenal-tainment", with shows that alarm, shock, disgust and horrify. Many people have come to associate these negative mental and physical states with entertainment, and that's a problem because bad feelings have a nasty way of remaining in your system long after the initial stimulus is gone. Believe it or not, you are a sensitive system, with delicate balances. When you're exposed to violence, crassness, horror and injustice, even in play, your system reacts to it. Your body produces stress hormones, releases or inhibits neurotransmitters and decides whether or not to digest your food based on the stuff that enters through your eyes and ears, rolls around in your brain and settles into the crevices of your mind. Bad entertainment literally poisons you from the inside out as your body tries to cope with hormone surges, ugly visual memories and the accompanying subconscious ideas about your world. To combat insomnia, your job is to notice the bad stuff-and then keep it out.

Use your awareness to calm yourself down. If you watch TV, play computer games or listen to the radio at night, either turn it all off, or only watch and listen to things you find calming, restful or funny. No matter how interesting you find the evening news, it's a guaranteed anxiety-raiser. CSI-type and forensic programs, cop shows and anything called "reality" are also terrible for your state of mind. Sure, you want to stay informed, but for the purpose of staying mentally healthy and for sleeping at night, avoid anything with guns, loud noises (including music and games), people arguing or fighting and the high-speed camera tricks that go with most modern TV shows.

Travel back to simpler days. If you can't sleep without TV, find "new" entertainment look for old TV shows from your childhood, where endings were always happily wrapped up after 25 minutes, or classic comedy films. If you're dying to find out about robberies, mayhem and civil war, you can catch up on that stuff in the daytime-after you've refreshed yourself with a good night's sleep. Try reading easy poetry about nature, or something philosophical or artistic.

Break the worry habit. Waking up to worry? Since when has worrying improved anything? Worry is an attempt to control situations, but since it's internal, it rarely succeeds. But worriers have a tough time breaking the habit, so compromise. Set yourself a worry time, preferably sometime in the early afternoon. Promise yourself ten minutes of solid agonizing, followed by a treat to make yourself feel better. Make a deal with yourself that you will worry in broad daylight if you can be "allowed" to sleep all night, every night. When you do wake up and catch yourself worrying, remind yourself that you made a deal and that whatever else you may do tonight, you're not going to worry.

Change your thoughts. Awake and feeling panicky? Distract yourself by looking at a garden magazine or fantasizing about the perfect lover. Still sleepless? Get up and have a cup of hot herbal tea, preferably chamomile, which is a classic insomnia treatment. Or warm milk, which contains an amino acid called tryptophan, which tends to make people sleepy. Or have a hot bath, sprinkled lavishly with essential lavender oil. (Make sure it's an essentialoil, which comes from the natural plant. "Fragrance oils" are chemically manufactured and don't contain the natural relaxants from the plants.) Towel off tenderly, put on some fresh pajamas and head for a cozy bed.

Learn a simple relaxation exercise--and use it. Too tired to sleep? This technique works wonders. Lying in your bed, take a deep breath, hold it a second, then let it out. Do it again, concentrating on making it deep and slow. Remember to hold each breath for just a second before slowly letting it out. If you find thoughts intruding, count each breath to yourself. You are doing great things for your body and brain, increasing your oxygen intake (which is great for all the cells in your body) and calming your heart. You are lowering your blood pressure, too. And you are re-teaching yourself what you instinctively knew in infancy: how to breathe easily, deeply and smoothly. Don't be too surprised if you also fall asleep before you get to 100.

Give yourself a slumber party. Insomnia on the weekend? Bonus! Be a kid again-remember when all you wanted to do was stay up all night? Now you can! Find an old movie or a book you've been wanting to read, or even an art project you haven't had time for. Raid the fridge-since you're not planning to sleep, who cares if you have a snack? Make it a slumber party for one and tell yourself you're not an insomniac-you're a night owl! Give yourself permission to stay awake, knowing you're also allowed to sleep in the next day. Enjoy the feeling of doing things while everyone else is asleep. No energy? Lie on the couch under a soft blanket with your favorite pillow. Watch YouTube movies or read until you can't keep your eyes open. Now, wasn't that fun? And you can have a nap tomorrow, just like when you used to sleep through civics class.