Struggling to fall asleep night after night can feel like a never ending battle. If you have chronic insomnia, the frustration you feel lying awake while everyone else sleeps takes a toll on your physical and emotional well-being.
Sleep medications may provide some relief, but they don’t work forever and may cause unwanted side effects. Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) is an effective nondrug treatment that helps you get to the root of your sleeping problem so you can rest better now and in the future.
At Respacare, our sleep medicine experts, Dr. Nehal Mehta and Dr. Prashant Patel, understand how deeply insomnia can affect your life.
We know there’s no single solution that works for everyone. That’s why we use advanced sleep disorder testing to understand your sleep pattern and create an effective plan that may include CBT-I.
Almost everyone has an occasional restless night. But when your struggle to fall asleep or stay asleep persists for months, you have chronic insomnia.
Sleep is essential for good health. Ongoing sleep deprivation can leave you feeling drained, irritable, and unfocused. It can also increase your risk of heart disease, obesity, and depression.
Getting help for your chronic insomnia is vital. Treatment may include lifestyle changes, medications, and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT).
CBT is a highly structured and goal-oriented therapeutic technique that helps you identify and change negative thoughts to improve mental health. It’s often used to treat conditions like depression and anxiety.
When tailored specifically for insomnia it’s called chronic behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-I) and is one of the most effective long-term treatments for chronic sleep issues.
The highly structured six- to eight-week program uncovers and reframes the unhelpful thoughts and worries you have about sleep. Then, you work on establishing a healthy sleep routine that restores your body’s natural sleep cycle.
CBT-I includes several evidence-based strategies that help retrain your brain and body for sleep. The core components of CBT-I include:
Spending extra time in bed hoping for sleep may work against your efforts for better rest, giving you too much time to ruminate about not sleeping.
Sleep restriction therapy limits the time you spend in bed to the hours you actually sleep. You then gradually increase the time as your sleep improves.
This method rebuilds the connection between your bed and sleep by eliminating activities that can interfere with rest like reading, watching TV, or scrolling through your phone while in bed.
Sleep hygiene refers to the lifestyle and environmental factors that affect sleep. CBT-I teaches you good sleep hygiene practices such as: Don’t drink caffeine after noon, create a comfortable sleep environment, and go to bed and wake up at the same time every day.
Negative thoughts you have about sleep like, “I’ll never fall asleep,” or “I need eight hours or I’ll be useless,” may contribute to your sleep problems. CBT-I identifies and replaces negative self-talk with more realistic and calming thoughts to improve the nighttime head chatter.
You may want to keep a sleep diary before and during CBT-I to monitor and track your progress. Your therapist can also use the diary to make adjustments to your treatment plan.
CBT-I helps you break the cycle of negative thoughts and beliefs you have about sleep so you can get the rest you need. It retrains your brain and body to restore trust in bedtime, lowering anxiety so you fall asleep naturally.
Most people experience improvements in sleep within the first 2-6 sessions, and results are long-term.
Sleep is essential for physical and mental health. Don’t let your insomnia rob you of the rest you need. CBT-I may be the key to restoring your sleep and life.
Our team at Respacare can help you get started. Call us today at our office in Bridgewater, New Jersey, or request an appointment online to learn more about CBT-I and other effective treatments we offer for chronic insomnia.
