What is the Best Treatment for Insomnia?

Oct 11

Welcome to my blog and today I am going to talk about the various treatments available for Insomnia and also what the best treatment for Insomnia is. Before I can dig into the treatments available for Insomnia, let me first talk a little about the root causes of Insomnia. There is so many factors that can have an influence on Insomnia that it is going to be hard to name them all.

What causes Insomnia??

It can be physical or psychological factors. The physical factors are much easier to eliminate after it is recognized, so I have came up with a list to identify them.

Any disease or chronic pain that can keep you up and awake during the night

Chronic back pain
Asthma
Depression
Restless leg syndrome
Migraine
Allergies
Cancer

The best thing you can do in this situation is to go to your general practitioner and request a solution for these problems.

Any outside factor or physical discomfort

Barking dogs
Drunk neighbor
Snoring partner
Too much light entering the room
Hard and uncomfortable mattress

If you are experiencing these problems, then you can easily change it.

Any psychological problems related to Insomnia

This is probably the biggest cause for Insomnia and also the least understood. If you are lying in bed at night and you are having the following symptoms, then you have primary Insomnia.

Rising heartbeat while in bed
Stress
Inability to relax
Racing thoughts
The less you sleep, the more you stress and then the more you try to sleep because of your stress, the less you sleep.(This example is an ongoing cycle that needs to stop)
Spend more time in bed trying to compensate sleep loss.
Hating the night as you develop a fear for sleep.

Now that we have discussed the roots and symptoms of Insomnia, we can now talk about the treatment.

How is Insomnia treated?

The best treatment for primary Insomnia is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia or in short CBT I. This is by far the most effective way to deal with Insomnia. CBT is a mind and habit identifying changing program developed by leading psychologists to help retrain the mind to sleep better.

CBT is not hypnotherapy, because it has nothing to do with hypnosis. You will also not get results overnight and it is hard work to accomplish. The reason for this is that the mind or rather the subconscious mind is very powerful and it takes time to reprogram the mind to sleep better.

Just think of it this way. Chronic Insomnia does not just develop overnight (Only in rare occasions can it happen overnight). It takes a while and a lot of work to actually get insomnia. You are now probably thinking” Why the hell would anyone work at getting Insomnia“. The reason for this is that when you have a short period of sleepless nights you develop habits to try and compensate for sleep loss. When you develop these habits, you are actually digging your own grave regarding Insomnia because it is making the situation much worse.

These habits may include the following:

Spending more time in bed
Sleeping during the day
Drinking sleep medication.
Changing your sleep routine to accompany your Insomnia
Looking at the clock all night

If you have any of these symptoms feel free to look at how to cure Insomnia:The 5 steps. These examples are only a few in a list that only you can identify. The best way to deal with Insomnia is not drinking sleep medication, because sleep medications only tackle the symptoms and not the root, while CBT tackles the root.

If you have a splinter in your foot and your foot swell up with a burning sensation because of the splinter, what would be the best way to deal with it? Are you going to keep on rubbing salve on your foot hoping that the pain is going to go away or are you going to tackle the root?

If you have any questions regarding CBT or Insomnia or if you have any story or other treatment that you have tried, please leave a comment below as I would love to hear from you.