Ferberizing Myself

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I’m a bad sleeper. Notoriously. Record-breaking. I was born a bad sleeper. Ask my mom.

I didn’t go to sleep.

I didn’t stay asleep.

When I was a teenager, I didn’t go to sleep and I didn’t get up.

Now, I have such anxiety around going to sleep that you can’t knock me out with the strongest sleep meds available. I can ride out a dose of Ambien CR like it’s a baby aspirin. My brain views it as a challenge. “See if you can make me. I dare ya.”

Enter the only solution left, short of a nightly elephant tranq dart (which my husband is about ready to volunteer to administer): Sleep Training - Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for Insomnia (a.k.a., Ferberizing for grown-ups).

Fortunately, Kaiser offers an online version of the program, so I don’t have to drag myself to a weekly class.

I’ve just finished Week One, which consisted of an educational piece and the start of my sleep journal. To say my sleep patterns are a little fucked up would be like saying Dolly Parton’s a little busty. I average a normal number of hours of sleep in a 24 hr period, but it often takes me upwards of 7 hours to fall asleep. Yes, seven. Hours.

In Week Two, I have to go to bed at the same time each night and get out of bed and the same time each morning, whether I’ve slept or not. WHETHER I’VE SLEPT OR NOT. Let me repeat myself. WHETHER I’VE SLEPT OR NOT. When it takes you 7 hours to fall asleep, there’s a strong possibility the alarm to get up is going to go off before you’ve fallen asleep.

Wish my family luck.

I don’t get to take naps this week, either, unless they’re under 45 minutes. That’s not a nap. That’s a blink.

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Comments

[Karen]

Good luck! I also suffer from insomnia, but unlike you, I have no trouble falling asleep. My problem is that I wake up around 2am as alert as if I just shot a double espresso, then finally wind back down just before I need to get up for the day anyhow. And I can't nap at all. On those rare occasions when I do succumb, even if just for 10 minutes, two bad things happen: (1) I feel drugged out for the rest of the day (2) I will NEVER fall asleep that night.

[Heather]

My husband struggles with insomnia and has tried something similar on himself but due to other issues (severe asthma and mild bipolar both of which get REALLY bad when he doesn't get 8 hours sleep) week 2 is really out of the question. Hope it works for you. Goodness and ick.

[MisterMike]

Try reading selected articles from back issues of "The Vanguard." You'll practically be in a coma.

[califmom]

I've opted for rereading some of the literary classics I read in high school and a few of the ones I missed. Still, I manage to stay awake. I'm telling you, I have super-human powers. So far I've knocked off Slaughterhouse Five and am working on Ethan Frome. Great Gatsby is queued up next. Managed to fit Craig Ferguson's  and Kathy Griffin's autobiographies in there in between (needed a little trash for contrast). Oh, and I finished Infinite Jest, which makes all other books feel like 5-paragraph essays (just the lack of end notes is a fucking holiday on ice).