Reddit Reddit reviews Say Good Night to Insomnia: The Six-Week, Drug-Free Program Developed At Harvard Medical School

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Say Good Night to Insomnia: The Six-Week, Drug-Free Program Developed At Harvard Medical School
Say Good Night to Insomnia
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15 Reddit comments about Say Good Night to Insomnia: The Six-Week, Drug-Free Program Developed At Harvard Medical School:

u/cyanocobalamin · 15 pointsr/AskMenOver30

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"Say Good Night to Insomnia: The Six-Week, Drug-Free Program Developed At Harvard Medical School" by Dr. Gregg Jacobs.

The first few chapters have a weird hucksterish tone. Hold your nose and read on anyway. The program laid out in the book was developed over the course of a decade at Harvard. It has been clinically proven to be effective. I followed the program and found it to be very helpful.

While you are waiting for the book to arrive Google on "Sleep Hygiene" to learn all about little habits that look harmless that can add up to disrupt your sleep.

As others will mention you may want to get tested for sleep apnea. Caveat emptor! Selling the equipment has become a money maker. Insurance companies are also pushing people to take home wrist bands to monitor their vitals as a means of diagnosing sleep apena. The wrists bans are not accurate. If you get test for sleep issues insist on going to a sleep lab where you are monitored for a night while you sleep. It isn't true for everyone, but most cases of sleep apnea ( or snoring ) clear up with weight loss.

There are two kinds of insomnia.

  1. trouble falling asleep
  2. trouble staying asleep

    The second type usually indicates an issue with anxiety or depression. Don't let the words "anxiety" or "depression" phase you as they don't necessarily mean big problems. Mild anxiety or depression can get you up in the middle of the night. The human body has "core sleep" that lasts about 5 hours which it uses to keep the basics in the body running. After that the brain starts sorting & processing things and after that point is when people who have trouble staying asleep begin getting up. Unfortunately the only cure for this is sorting out your life. You may find it helpful to open up something to journal in, and divide the page into two columns. The one on the left title it "what is on my mind" and the one on the right title it "what can I do about it". Doing that sometime after dinner can help. If self help like that isn't enough seeking psychological counseling can help.

    As far as short term solutions go some people use these things to help them get to sleep or back to sleep

  • benadryl
  • CBD oil capsules - legal, can help you fail a drug test, is legal, you build a tolerance to it
  • various herbal teas, capsules, or tinctures.

    Give Celestial Seasonings "Sleepy Time Plus" a try. It is likely in your supermarket, cost only a few dollars, and is harmless. Many people simply don't make it strong enough. Bring a big pot of water to boil, turn the stove off, and let the tea bags soak in it for 20 minutes. 1 tea bag per 8 fluid ounces ( 1 cup ). Let it cool to room temperature and put it in a pitcher to save in your refrigerator. You will need to drink several cups. You can drink them before you go to sleep to help you get to sleep or drink them when you wake up in the night to help you get back to sleep. If your problem is falling asleep start drinking a cup once an hour after dinner.

    There are stronger herbal teas and concoctions out there for you to explore. Anything that relaxes or that decreases anxiety will help as it is mental stimulation in the brain that gets people up keeps people up.


    Breathing exercises are another thing to try. Research has shown that people doing breathing exercises consistently as little as 15 min a day sleep better, are less anxious, and less depressed. 4-7-8 breathing is extremely relaxing. Dr. Weil has a great audio CD for learning a full range of breathing exercises.

    Lastly, I ran across this post from an MD who specializes in sleep problems and saved a copy as I think it applies to many people for their sleep issues as well as their mental health issues:

    ---

    Original URL:

    https://www.reddit.com/r/LifeProTips/comments/4tg4oe/lpt_request_how_to_avoid_having_a_midlife_crisis/d5hjmhf/

    >ICUDOC 12.3k points 2 years ago3

    Sleep doctor here, including someone who has been involved in the treatment of PTSD. Lots of good advice here. The most important thing I can add however is that organizing your thoughts and recalling and digesting impactful, emotional events in your head is actually how the human mind works. Being alone with your thoughts, minimizing external stimulation to focus on the internal dialogue is an important daily activity even for as little as 15 minutes a day.

    The problem with the modern lifestyle is you probably go from morning radio to podcast in car to Facebook, to work and Reddit during breaks and then back home to the TV. There are few opportunities for quiet reflection so is there any surprise that the first moment there are no distractions (once your head hits the pillow on your bed) you would start having your inner dialogue?

    Your coping mechanism should not be more distraction and sleeping pills, but rather forced routine that involves that internal voice. Here are powerful coping mechanisms successful people use on a daily basis:

  1. meditation 2) writing a diary 3) working out with minimal distractions 4) prayer 5) light house work with minimal distractions 6) sitting down and planning your daily agenda 7) opening your thoughts to a close friend or psychotherapist over regularly scheduled periods

    These routine activities force you to confront your inner thoughts and you will have these necessary internal dialogues during appropriate times rather than moments you are trying to sleep.

    People with PTSD (for example) who get in trouble are the kinds of people who ratchet up the distractions in their life because an inner thoughtful reflection on the horrors of life would be too painful. After awhile, distracting yourself becomes ineffective and sleep is often the first victim of a distracted lifestyle.

    Good luck, I know this is hard!

u/GenderNeutralPat · 12 pointsr/AskMen
  • go to bed the same time every night
  • stop taking caffeine a minimum of 6 hours before your bed time
  • avoid alcohol, it disrupts the electrical patterns you brain needs to run through for regular, sound sleep.
  • make sure your electronics have blue light blocker software installed
  • stop using electronics 30 min before you go to bed.

    https://www.amazon.com/Say-Good-Night-Insomnia-Drug-Free/dp/0805089586
u/Bannedfromfun · 3 pointsr/fatpeoplestories

Mood is actually the very first thing affected by sleep deprivation. Which can be a serious concern if you're dealing with other complications like anxiety or depression.

A good resource is "Say Goodnight to Insomnia". We recommend it in our sleep clinic to aid patients.

Not that I have anything against Trazodone. Bit sedatives are, well, sedating and can result in increased fatigue during the day.

Regular vigorous exercise will also help, it consolidates your slow wave sleep resulting in fewer awakenings during the night.

u/WasabiLobby · 2 pointsr/insomnia

Thank you for posting this! I was just getting ready to post the same thing and ding here you are! I'm on day five of CBT-i after receiving my results from a sleep study and learning that while I don't have Apnea, I do have a highly f-ed up sleep architecture. So...here I am, doing CBT-i and FEELING LIKE HELL It's expected, I know, but I'm so tired, I can barely figure out what day it is. In fact, I'm really only typing this in a desperate effort to stay awake until my specified bedtime. I'm literally counting the minutes until I can go to sleep.

I now have a VERY strict bedtime and wake time, and am restricting to 7 1/2 hours of time to sleep. It's scary how bad you feel while you're going through this, but it just goes to show how f-ed up our sleep architecture is. Anyway, last night I had my best night of sleep in a long time.

You should check out Gregg Jacobs book. He takes you step-by-step through the process.

I'd be totally happy to be your CBT-i buddy through this process. It might help us to have someone to gripe to until our sleep architecture readjusts.

u/thundahstruck · 2 pointsr/sleep

First of all, good for you for caring so much about your son's health and sleep. Please forgive the armchair psychology that follows. Of course you can just disregard what I say if I'm way off base.

From the sounds of it, your son has a lot going on, and you are feeling a lot of pressure to help him through it. I wonder whether you are expressing anxiety that he picks up on and reflects back to you. Children look to adults for guidance on how to manage emotions and stressful situations. (See, e.g., Ginott, Between Parent and Child.) In the abstract, a child doesn't know that sleeping poorly is stressful, but that child can learn to associate lack of sleep with stress, which creates a horrible feedback loop that can lead to insomnia. (See, e.g., Jacobs, Say Good Night to Insomnia.) Overcoming insomnia can involve unwinding negative thoughts and behaviors associated with sleep; it seems to follow that one should do one's best not to form those associations to begin with.

I see that you've tried many things to help him sleep. As a parent myself, I get the urge to try one thing and then another etc. But I often realize in my own life that trying different things is a behavior that makes me feel better ("hey, at least I tried!"), but it just leaves my own 7-year-old bewildered -- I can imagine that from his perspective, it just makes the world seem like an arbitrary place where the people who care for you don't really know what's going on. Perhaps from your son's perspective, it looks like this: I didn't sleep well; parents freak out about it, so it's a "freakoutable" thing and now I'm freaked out; parents see my freak-out, and they love me so they try desperately to fix the problem; nothing works and parents freak out about it; etc.

So what might one do rather than try to solve the problem? I would try to be calm; show him through your words and behaviors that this isn't a big deal. That might not reflect your reality -- it's a big deal to you, and if he doesn't sleep well it will become a big deal for him. But it's important not to trigger the stress response, which is at cross-purposes with sleep.

As for more specific interventions, you might want to check out this guidance from NIH. It's a short document, and if you look around for sleep advice, you'll find these same tips (consistent bedtime, cool bedroom, no screens before bed) again and again.

All that said, it's probably worth consulting the pediatrician. If there's something medical at issue, it'd be good to know. And if there's nothing, it'll help you and him to hear it from the doctor. I'm not sure I'd seek melatonin; although it's useful for resetting a circadian rhythm that's out of whack, it could be that the rhythm is fine but failing to express itself strongly because of bad sleep hygiene or stress, so I'd try to iron out those wrinkles first.

Good luck.

u/katie_bric0lage · 2 pointsr/insomnia

https://www.amazon.ca/Say-Good-Night-Insomnia-Drug-Free/dp/0805089586

This book has a good run down of cbt techniques

u/Rhodinia · 2 pointsr/insomnia

If you haven't already, invest a negligible amount of money into the book Say Good Night To Insomnia by Gregg D. Jacobs. Read it slowly, do what it says.

I think your system is just waaaay too used to all these pills. Extensive use like that will definitely mess up your homeostasis. You might have started down this path because of some other problem, but it has created an entirely new problem. This book will help you slowly move away from sleeping pills and find your native ability to sleep back.

Good luck to you my friend, and remember, whatever you set your mind to, you can accomplish.

u/GlobbyDoodle · 2 pointsr/insomnia

Seriously, you need some CBT for insomnia. It's very simple and will probably solve your issue or at least make it like 80% better. (BTW - Alcohol makes insomnia worse and can permanently destroy your sleep architecture!)

This book walks the reader step by step through the process! $10 + 6 weeks and you will probably feel a lot better. (It really, really helped me!)

u/theinsomniacoach · 2 pointsr/insomnia

What do you think triggered her sleep problems? Does she have a history of dieting and/or overexercising? Or a period of a lot of stress?

  • Some ideas:

    -> Make sure your mom gets enough light exposure during the day (ideally sunlight). Sitting inside all day is not good for your circadian rhythm. Try to get half an hour of sunlight exposure as soon as waking up. If that's not possible, buy a blue light lamp, like this one:

    https://www.amazon.com/Philips-Therapy-Rechargeable-HF3429-60/dp/B00M3SGD4Y

    -> Make sure your mother eats enough. I've seen lots of people, including myself, who got insomnia due to excessive dieting and overexercising. Eating enough in the morning and at lunch is key. Make sure every meal contains a good amount of protein, fruit and vegetables, to make sure your blood sugar levels remain stable.

    -> The right kind of exercise is important. Weightlifting is a great way to improve metabolic health without exhausting yourself. Improved metabolic health is a key factor in insomnia. The increased amount of mitochondria and improved insulin sensitivity make sure your cells are able to produce a lot of energy, thus reducing levels of stress hormones. Endurance type exercise is less ideal because it can wear you out.

    -> I'd also recommend taking some CBD oil for resetting your nervous system and calming you down. I don't know if it's legal where you live, but if it is, definitely try it. It's one of the best supplements there is for insomniacs.

    -> Finally, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a good way to improve sleep as well. There's a number of good books on CBT that you can find on Amazon. I recommend this one to start:

    https://www.amazon.com/Say-Good-Night-Insomnia-Drug-Free/dp/0805089586/ref=sr_1_1?s=hpc&ie=UTF8&qid=1524235804&sr=8-1&keywords=gregg+jacobs
u/ndwignall · 1 pointr/sleep

Given that Sleep Restriction seemed to help, I'd recommend looking into Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I). It's a research-backed behavioral approach to sleep problems. Most people don't know it, but it's actually widely considered by most medical associations to be the treatment of choice for insomnia.

Look for a clinical psychologist (PhD or PsyD) who is trained as a cognitive behavioral therapist and also does CBT-I.

These two books are also very good:

Say Goodnight To Insomnia by Gregg Jacobs

The Insomnia Workbook by Stephanie Silberman

Good Luck!

u/greysky7 · 1 pointr/electronic_cigarette

No sleeping drug works long term, as in for more than a month or so. If you've got insomnia, I feel your pain.

Here's the thing; insomnia actually ruined my life for quite a long time, and I tried just about everything. As cheesy as the name of this book is, it saved me. I know that sounds overdramatic, but I really mean it. Here's a link to it on amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Say-Good-Night-Insomnia-Drug-Free/dp/0805089586

Legitimate science behind how it works. And all of the research on sleep you need, including the effects of every popular sleep medication available. I get a bit preachy about this book to everyone who tells me they have insomnia, because mine was brutal and ruining my school career.

Oh, and don't vape anything other than ejuice. There's no way to know how to dose another chemical, or if it reacts differently when being vaporized as well as how that affects your body.

u/Isopbc · 1 pointr/DSPD

Insomnia is very often a mood issue, assuming nothing physiological like sleep apnea.

I found the book Say Goodnight To Insomnia immensely helpful with my difficulties falling asleep; as that doesn’t seem like a problem for you I think you may find it helps you get back to sleep.

I got it from my local library, and would recommend you check yours for it.

Good luck!

u/theLiftedMind · 1 pointr/insomnia

I'm sure not everyone has seen all of these tips. and while they likely won't solve chronic insomnia, they may help in small ways! And it's not like this guide is doing anyone anything bad!

And yes, fixing insomnia is not an easy thing.

You make a good point that unconditioning your brain is a very important aspect in treating insomnia. The author covers that aspect in this book pretty deeply http://www.amazon.com/Say-Good-Night-Insomnia-Drug-Free/dp/0805089586/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1463595683&sr=8-2&keywords=insomnia

u/roncey · 1 pointr/xxfitness

If you suffer from insomnia, I really recommend this book. It's by a prof at Harvard who is one of the foremost sleep experts out there. Don't waste your money on supplements -- especially ones that may be unproven or have unpleasant side effects.

u/looselyspeaking · 0 pointsr/INTP

This helped me