How Adam released himself from the prison cell he had built to protect him from insomnia (#40‪)‬ Insomnia Coach® Podcast

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Adam's insomnia began the night before an important work presentation. After a really difficult night, Adam ended up calling in sick — and this planted a seed in his mind that told him that difficult nights would mean he couldn't go through with important plans.



Safety behaviors such as canceling plans or avoiding activities in order to protect his sleep helped Adam feel a bit better in the short-term but over the long-term they were preventing him from living the kind of life he wanted to live.



In other words, his comfort zone became more like a prison.



In this episode, Adam shares how he learned to let go of his anxiety, his anger, his fear, and his intense desire to avoid nighttime wakefulness. He also talks about the benefits of self-kindness and how he managed to separate how he slept at night from his ability to engage in things that would help him live the kind of life he wanted to live and be the kind of person he wanted to be.



Today, Adam has released himself from that prison cell. He is living his life and sleeping a lot better!



Click here for a full transcript of this episode.



Transcript



Martin Reed:

Welcome to the Insomnia Coach Podcast. My name is Martin Reed. I believe that by changing how we respond to insomnia and all the difficult thoughts and feelings that come with it, we can move away from struggling with insomnia and toward living the life we want to live.



Martin Reed:

The content of this podcast is provided for informational and educational purposes only. It is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease, disorder, or medical condition. It should never replace any advice given to you by your physician or any other licensed healthcare provider. Insomnia Coach LLC offers coaching services only and does not provide therapy, counseling, medical advice, or medical treatment. The statements and opinions expressed by guests are their own and are not necessarily endorsed by Insomnia Coach LLC. All content is provided "as is" and without warranties, either express or implied.



Martin Reed:

Hi, Adam, thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to come onto the podcast.



Adam Currie:

Thank you for having me.



Martin Reed:

It's great to have you on. Let's start right at the beginning like I do with every single guest. Can you tell us a little bit about when your sleep problems first began and what you think triggered that initial sleep disruption?



Adam Currie:

Sure. Yeah, so I probably first experienced real problems with my sleep I would say about probably two, two and a half years ago. I think the trigger was I had an event where I had to present to some quite important people at work and the night before I found myself thinking about what I needed to do the next day. And I thought I've got an early start tomorrow and I need to be up at 5:00 AM and I've got the train to catch and I've got a taxi and I've got all these big things to do. And what if it goes wrong tomorrow? And I just had this kind of snowball of really quite intense negative thoughts about what would happen the day after. And I had a very difficult night. I actually had no sleep at all to the point where I actually unfortunately called in sick the next day.



Adam Currie:

And I felt that I couldn't go through what I needed to go through. And that unfortunately, was then imprinted in my mind. So every time I had something like that that cropped up again in the future, I then felt the same anxiety and I was worried about whether I would sleep or not. And it was almost like the trauma of having a completely sleepless night.