I also don't sleep well — but I suppose that's just how it is

Good morning

I hear this almost every week.

Someone comes to talk about anxiety, or chronic stress, or simply feeling overwhelmed. We are perhaps ten minutes into the conversation when they add, almost as a footnote: "I also don't sleep well. But I suppose that's just how it is at my age. Or with my schedule. Or with everything going on."

I gently push back on that every time.

Poor sleep is so common that it has started to feel normal. It is not normal. It is the body telling you, clearly and consistently, that something in the system needs attention.

The connection between sleep and anxiety runs in both directions. Stress and anxiety keep the nervous system in a state of vigilance — and vigilance is fundamentally incompatible with sleep, which asks the brain to accept, at quite a deep level, that it is safe to let go. When that signal does not come, sleep becomes fragmented, shallow, or simply hard to reach.

And then the lack of sleep makes the anxiety worse. The tired brain is a more reactive brain. The cycle is self-reinforcing, and it can run for years before someone decides it is worth addressing.

Hypnosis works on several parts of this at once. It addresses the hyperarousal that prevents sleep onset. It works on the anxious relationship many people develop with sleep itself — where the bedroom has gradually become a place associated with frustration rather than rest. And it teaches clients how to make the transition into a quieter state, in a way they can use on their own at home.

You do not have to have a diagnosed sleep disorder for this to be relevant. If you are regularly waking at 3am with a busy mind, that is enough.

One more newsletter in July — next week I'll bring the threads together and talk about what a first session actually involves.