Living With Insomnia
约翰霍尔科姆已经失眠他的一生。她的e's how he and his family manage when he can’t sleep.
Getting a good觉总是困难的约翰Holcomb, a 35-year-old married father of two who lives in South Orange, New Jersey. He’s tried many strategies to help himself feel rested and raring to go in the morning.
When did you first realize you had insomnia?
It was right around puberty that I realized other people went to sleep quickly and weren’t tossing and turning for hours before they fell asleep. It just took me a lot longer. When I was in elementary school, I would lie in bed awake for hours. My mother used to tell me to just lie there and I would fall asleep, but sometimes it would take me two or three hours. Then, when I was a teenager, I got more sleep for a couple of years—maybe because my body required it for growth. On weekends, I would sleep until noon like your average teen. On school days, I had to get up earlier and I’d set the alarm for 7:00 a.m., even though I wasn’t going to bed any earlier at night.
Once I had my kids—who are now 4 and 6—my sleep patterns didn’t change much. I was just as awake with them in the middle of the night as other parents, and both my wife and I were physically exhausted getting up with them. Now, I have to be to work at 9:00 a.m., and if I were the only one who had to get ready, I could wake up at 8:00. Instead, I get up at 6:30 to get the kids fed, dressed, and ready for the bus. I often wake up on my own now at 6:00 or 6:20 a.m.
Have you tried sleep medications?
The doctor will tell me to take a sleep medication for three days in a row, but I haven’t been able to get my sleep cycle right this way. This approach may work well for some people, but it just hasn’t for me.
What else have you tried to fall asleep?
I’ve tried getting up at the same time every day, making sure I have a sleep routine, going to bed early, going to bed at the same time every night, lying in bed and waiting to fall asleep, getting up and reading a book, and not being on my phone at bedtime. I’ve also tried oils, like lavender or vanilla. I put them on a cotton ball and put it near my pillow, or I poured the oil into an aerator or humidifier. But I’ve never found that any of these things consistently helped me get to sleep.
What is your sleep routine like now?
These days, I usually go to sleep around midnight or 1:00 a.m. I sleep until 5:00 or 6:00 a.m., though I wake up a few times during the night for a couple of minutes and go back to sleep. It’s not always easy to fall back to sleep.
One thing that helps for sure is to stop doing things once I notice it’s gotten late. I put down the project I’m working on or the thing I’m playing with. Despite it being a big no-no for sleep specialists, TV seems to help me fall asleep. It acts as a white noise machine for me. Listening to music can have the same effect, but it’s not as consistent because I get more excited over music.
Darkness always helps. I’ve always loved blackout curtains.
It sounds like you’re at peace with your insomnia.
Acceptance is the thing that really helps me most. Just being at peace with life, even when it’s hard, is helpful for me when it comes to falling asleep.
What I’ve learned over time is that I just have to believe my body will put me to sleep when it wants to sleep.
I also think my insomnia has gotten a little better as I’ve gotten older. When I was younger, three or four hours of sleep could seem normal, but now I often sleep for five to six hours. Doctors seem so focused on making sure you get your eight hours of sleep. But maybe some people have different body rhythms. Trying to force yourself out of your own body rhythm may cause problems of its own.
I think, over time, my body became used to not sleeping. Getting six hours of sleep is a lot for me. If I happen to get more sleep on a particular night, I have so much energy the next day. It’s such an incredible boost, that feeling of being so rested and alert. And on days when I get enough sleep and feel rested, I don’t know what to do with all of that energy. In some ways, I just can’t handle getting a good night’s sleep.
How the Other Half Sleeps
“Luckily, I fall asleep pretty easily,” says John’s wife, Verna, “so John’s insomnia doesn’t usually keep me awake. I will sometimes notice when he comes to bed very late at night or wakes up early, but I can usually go back to sleep.
“The hardest thing for me is not getting annoyed if he naps. If he can fall asleep, I want him to sleep; but naps in the middle of the day when the kids want to go outside or at dinnertime can be challenging. That said, John manages to push through when he has to, or when I need him to, and I really admire and appreciate that. I’ve found it helpful to read about how insomnia affects others and what they try that helps. I sometimes use what I read to inform discussions with John, but it’s usually better if he educates himself.”
