Overcoming Insomnia with Lana Walsh

Tanya Gill: 00:00:01

The trifecta of joy is welcoming Lana Walsh to the house my friends. Lana is a sleep and insomnia expert. So listen up. If you're having trouble sleeping, welcome, Lana to the trifecta Joy podcast.

Lana Walsh: 00:00:19

Thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Tanya Gill: 00:00:22

I am so excited to have you here and share you with our listeners. Now, here's the cool thing. Lana, you and I have not actually physically met. However, we live in the same city. And so what's so cool is that, you know, our little small city of 100,000 people has so many incredible resources. And, and and I've got lots of questions for you. And sleep is a huge challenge for a lot of us. So I was really excited to share asleep and insomnia expert with our listeners, because I think I need some gems too. So here's the deal, because I think some people might be able to relate to this, Lana. About a year ago, I started menopause, I started having wicked hot flashes, and my sleep became a nightmare. And like many people, guess where I ended up going to my doctor. And guess what I started taking a sleeping pill. And in a conversation with my doctor, just two weeks ago, we had a conversation about starting to taper off. And how it's such an incredibly intense process that takes four months, she actually printed out a sheet for me to show me how to taper off of this drug. And I thought to myself, Oh my God, there's so many people who struggle with sleep. And I personally don't want to be on this drug forever. I understand that it's tremendously addictive. And I'm like, we need to offer some tips to listeners so that if they're in my position, they may have ways out. Or if they're thinking about drugs that they may find other ways to deal with insomnia and sleep challenges. So my friend, give us the goods like how do we how do we do this like out? First of all, how does someone become a sleep and insomnia expert?

Lana Walsh: 00:02:33

Well, for me, it came from 30 years of insomnia. So I am yeah, I struggled with my sleep mine pretty much my entire life, it felt like while since I was probably 12 or 13 years old, I would wake up in the morning, completely exhausted. I would tell my parents, I was too sick to go to school because I was just too tired. I'd fall asleep in class. I just I just couldn't sleep. And it was the result of undiagnosed restless leg syndrome, which is one of over 80 different sleep disorders that are out there. But when I finally got that diagnosed, I still had trouble sleeping because I had developed insomnia. And then for the last Welford, not the last I cured my insomnia about three years ago. But up till then, the decade before that, I was like you I was on sleeping pills every day. And for me, they didn't even work. So I don't know what it was like for you. If they were working for you, you were actually getting some sleep. But for me, I still had trouble sleeping about five days a week, even though I was on medication every single day. But that part of that addiction is not just a physical addiction, right? We we can physically become addicted to very various drugs. And when we stopped using them, we get a physical response. For me, I was psychologically addicted. I 100% believed that the two days of sleep I was getting a week was only because I was taking those drugs and that the other five days that I was taking those drugs and not sleeping was not because of the pills, it was something else. So psychologically, I literally believe that that drug was helping me only two days a week.

Tanya Gill: 00:04:20

Okay, so this is super interesting, because I'm going to I'm going to rewind you back in my personal life. So, in 2007, I was widowed and when I was widowed, I was given sleeping pills because I wasn't sleeping. I was averaging about two hours a night. Obviously some of that was a trauma response. And my my boys were really little I had an eight month old and I had a four year old. I took a sleeping pill once and I and I slept through the night beautifully. But I didn't hear my children and it scared the hell out of me. And so I was like, forget it, I am never taking this these drugs again, fast forward 16 years. And here I am taking my little blues off of Cologne to go to bed at night. And I'm like it, I appreciate that I'm getting like a good solid seven hours of sleep. But I also recognize that I, I want to be doing it in the healthiest way possible and not relying on that pill and there is a psychological piece to it because I'm like who, like I'm not tired yet but I better take my better take myself McClung because I need to get rest. And the challenge is that for me personally, I I coped, and I'm not going to say I will survived cope to whatever, much like you did, on very few hours of sleep for a very long time. And so like, when you talk about being an insomnia expert, I think we should also talk about what defines insomnia. Right, is that right? So what how do we define insomnia Lana,

Lana Walsh: 00:06:08

very basic definition is taking an hour or more to go to sleep at the beginning of the night, or to go back to sleep after waking during the night. And that waking during the night can be like middle of the night to three in the morning. Or it could be waking up at four or five when you don't want to get up till six or seven in the morning. Right. So it's waking up too early. It's waking up in the middle of the night, it's not going to sleep at night, but it taking an hour or more to go to sleep, how you can have trouble like you can have some trouble, like you mentioned last your spouse, most common reason people can't sleep is because of something really stressful in their life. Stress, anxiety, something usually external happening to them. You know, maybe it's a death, a divorce, maybe a financial or medical crisis, like those are reasons why people might have trouble sleeping. But if it's been happening, like three or more times per week, and it's been going on for a few months, that's when it falls into the the chronic diagnosis of insomnia. And that's when it starts to become problematic. And that's when you start to get this belief in your subconscious that you can't sleep or you don't know how to sleep, you start to get more and more anxious about your sleep. And then if you start to perceive a detrimental consequence during the day, so if you feel stressed, anxious, frustrated, unmotivated, unproductive, are any other negative emotion because of your night, bad night, then that's when the clinical diagnosis comes into play. And it becomes that compounding effect, right? It is yeah, very much. Mm hmm. And the more you have trouble sleeping, the more anxious and frustrated yet about your sleep, you start to anticipate not sleeping, and then you start saying things like, I hope I sleep tonight. I've never I haven't been so tired. I got to be able to sleep tonight. And then you start to see really pity like a really bad mantra in your head. I never sleep good. I always have a bad night. I'm gonna have a shitty day today because I had such a crappy night last night. It's my day is ruined. And all of that compounds into the subconscious belief that you're just can't sleep.

Tanya Gill: 00:08:24

And then it becomes that self fulfilling prophecy. Right? Absolutely. And, and I mean, I've experienced it that, that getting into bed and then laying there thinking, Oh, my God, what if I don't sleep tonight? I've got so much to do tomorrow, What's tomorrow going to bring? How am I going to handle this, this and this if I don't sleep instead of focusing, and we get so narrowly focused on the not not being able to sleep and being so tethered to all of that negativity is what I'm hearing that it then just keeps compounding. Hmm. So yeah, like, is it just me because I don't think it's just me and you like, how pervasive is how pervasive is sleep challenges and insomnia in society today?

Lana Walsh: 00:09:14

It's huge. I mean, experts think about 30% to 35% of people have insomnia episodes throughout the year. They think as many as one in five people have a chronic sleep disorder. But at the same time, they also say 90% of people with sleep apnea are not diagnosed. Only 60% of doctors actually ask their patients about their quality of their sleep. Only 20% of people actually ask their doctor specifically for help with their sleep. So it's so it's widespread, and people aren't asking for help. and their doctors aren't asking them if they need help. So to know how bad of an issue or how prevalent this problem is, we can't say because there's just not enough data. There's not enough people getting the support that they need.

Tanya Gill: 00:10:16

Wow. Wow. Okay, so I can tell you that I have received all kinds of different advice around sleep. And I mean, there's the obvious ones that we've heard about, like, for example, here's a perfect one, right? Like, our cell phones, and the light from our spit or cell phones admits, you know, train changes brain patterns, and how it makes it harder for us to kind of slow down and go to sleep. I've also heard all kinds of different things like oh, go for a walk before you go to bed or sit and meditate or do some yoga or there's so many things, what are some of the worst pieces of advice you've heard?

Lana Walsh: 00:10:58

Okay, so the number one thing that I want people to know is do not lay there trying to sleep. I have to tell you a story. I went to my boss, once I had so much trouble sleeping like I would be coming into late work to work every single day, I would have two to three times the sick days of anybody else. Because I was always chronically tired. I struggled to function. I had one week where I spent three days I took three days off because I didn't sleep hardly at all. And I went to my boss and I said, I I'm not sleeping. I haven't saw me. And she said to me, total deadpan. All seriousness. Can't you just close your eyes and go to sleep? Oh, I said, Oh, fucking case. I was sorry. I totally fucking forgot to go to bed last night. Sorry.

Tanya Gill: 00:12:02

Oh, my gosh. Well, and you know, there are some people out there who can do that. Right. Like they literally down close your eyes. And they're, they're out. And then there are

Lana Walsh: 00:12:11

the rest of us. Right. Exactly. That is?

Tanya Gill: 00:12:15

Wow. That's a pretty incredible statement. Can I ask a question? Yeah. How? How did it feel to have someone respond in that way?

Lana Walsh: 00:12:28

You know, you feel misunderstood. You feel? I don't know. I can't think of the word right now. Like you feel like they don't see you. They don't understand what it's like they it's um, it makes you realize that the reason why you haven't told anybody you have trouble sleeping is for that reason alone, because they just don't get it. Right. And

Tanya Gill: 00:13:01

what I hear is that there was a real lack of honoring your experience and having empathy for you in that experience. Right, like, so I talk about honor, empathy, love and presence as the way we truly help people. And, and that help that honor, empathy, love and presence wasn't there, when you were having a really vulnerable moment. Right? Because it is a vulnerable moment when you're especially when you're exhausted. Right? Because when we don't get enough sleep, everything seems to be amplified.

Lana Walsh: 00:13:36

Yeah. Wow. Like when I so I do speaking engagements for businesses. And one of the things I talked about is accept what they're saying to you is their reality, like this is really happening to them it and they're struggling, and they're coming to you because they want you to understand what's happening, that they're not just, they're not disengaged. It's not that they don't care about their job or what's happening. They truly just don't know where to go or what to do. And they want you to understand, so have some empathy, like you say, have some empathy about it. And then I also give this example I'm like, if somebody told you they were tired all the time. Do you look at them and say, like, geez, can't you just frickin get some sleep? Like, I'm tired of hearing how tired they are. Right? But if you knew that that person had a newborn baby at home, would you say the same thing? And so it's that and that's what I want people to take into this conversation. If somebody's telling you, I'm tired all the time. I want you to treat them all like they have a newborn baby at home and have some empathy for them.

Tanya Gill: 00:14:47

Yes, yes. Yes. And this Yeah, empathy is so important because it is it's it's it's like having a condition that is invisible because nobody sees you strong. toggling in your sleep. That's the other thing, right? It's one way. And it's almost like it could be, in some ways. And I hate to use the word invisible disability, but it's it impedes your ability to function. And it's invisible because nobody's watching you sleep. So okay, so Lana, as a sleep and insomnia expert, like, what, what? What do you do? Like, really? What do you do? Like? What would what would be your first piece of advice to me, as someone who takes sleeping pills and is saying like, this is not the road I want to be on for the rest of my life. I know people and my doctor has shared with me that she's had some people who've been on sleeping pills for 30 or 40 years. And I've made the conscious decision that I will be free of sleeping pills. And it is, and it's going to take a hell a lot less than 30 or 40 years. So how do you help people walk me through this?

Lana Walsh: 00:16:05

Okay, well, so what I do is, I follow a process called cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, which is considered the gold standard in treating insomnia. And it's an all natural process, but it's a step by step process. So for somebody like you on sleeping pills, we start out with just doing some basic understanding of sleep. So learning more about how sleep works, you know why you've been hacked, why you had trouble sleeping. So it's totally normal that you had trouble sleeping. And because of the trauma that you were going through, that's completely normal. But to understand how sleep works, why you have that trouble, and the strategies that you can implement to overcome that trauma experience. Those are some of the places we start with somebody without sleeping pills, I always start with stress reduction, it's the number one reason people can't sleep, that anxiety that the brain spinning out. I take, I take my clients through a daily stressors exercise, because we don't really understand psychological stress, right? How that affects our sleep. So we start with that we do sleep education. So understanding like the longer you stay awake during the day, the more sleep drive you have at night, right? So for a lot of my clients, they're going to bed too early. They're going to bed at nine o'clock because they're tired, and then they're trying to sleep until seven. And that's just way too long to spend in bed. Nobody should be in bed longer than eight hours, especially if you have trouble sleeping. So for a lot of people, I will tell him just go to bed a little bit later. Wait until you're drowsy. So there's a difference. There's drowsy and there's tired.

Tanya Gill: 00:17:52

Okay, what? drowsy and tired.

Lana Walsh: 00:17:55

Yeah, so drowsy is a biological need for sleep. That's when you're ready. You're shutting down, you're nodding off your excessive yawning with you or to close your eyes, you would go to sleep within 15 to 20 minutes. Tired is a weariness or a desire for sleep, but not necessarily a biological need for it. So we feel tired throughout the day. And I hear this from a lot of my clients. Oh, I can't nap. I can't take that 20 minute nap. We're that tired but wired? Yeah, not drowsy.

Tanya Gill: 00:18:32

I love that you said that tired but wired? Because that is that's a really powerful statement. Because I think many people go through life feeling tired but wired. And oh, and I have to visit the NAPS thing. Like, are you an advocate for napping? Are you are you on the don't take a nap bus like it's because there's I think that napping is a double edged sword.

Lana Walsh: 00:18:57

Nothing can be. So it so depends on what's happening. It depends on the person. But for most people, I would say, you know, if you are sleeping, you sleep mostly okay. You maybe have a the odd bad night, having a short 20 minute nap before 4pm is not it's probably not going to hurt you. If you're really struggling with your sleep. napping during the day can sometimes be too detrimental to your nighttime sleep, so you might not want to. Okay, so it's just really, but you know, when I'm taking my clients, and we do a little bit of sleep restriction where we shorten up their night to try and get them to sleep more consistently through the night. Sometimes I will tell them like if you're really struggling through the day, then take that nap because that's will help you feel better during the day because what happens with us as we feel so bad during the day and then we can't function we can't do anything in that content. Use that negative loop in our brain. So you're better off to have just that short 20 minute nap. And I'll give you a little tip on how to get a 20 minute nap. So the strategy is to remember, it can take 15 to 20 minutes to fall asleep. So don't get frustrated when you try to lay down and you don't fall asleep right away. But set a timer for about 45 minutes. And if you wake up naturally before the timer goes off, great, turn off the timer and just go about your day. Or when the timer goes off, then get up and go about your day. But just to remember that length of time that it takes to go to sleep, so you don't get frustrated. And then another strategy I'll give you, which you can also use at night, is to breathe deeply into your abdomen. When we're fully relaxed and sleeping we breathe into our abdomen, when we're stressed and anxious and going about our day, we breathe in our chest or hold our breath. So when we're totally relaxed, we breathe into our abdomen. So you can use that breathing deeply into your abdomen, just naturally how it naturally rises and falls don't You don't have to count, you don't have to think about it. Just that you're breathing into your abdomen. And that'll help mimic how you breathe when you sleep. And that can help you go to sleep as

Tanya Gill: 00:21:21

well and breathing into your abdomen as it is also used in grounding, right? So it's a way to kind of that to, to bring us into our sympathetic nervous system versus our parasympathetic and to just like, bring us into that space of presence. So like I know, for myself, like now that you're talking about I'm very aware of Oh, yeah, it's good to breathe into my belly. I think too, is one of the other advantages is if you're actually paying attention to breathing into your belly that maybe your brain is slowing down and not racing quite so damn much.

Lana Walsh: 00:21:58

Yeah, so when I coach my clients, I also tell them to do a mantra. So and for a lot of people, I'm like, just like, think breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out. And that can help shut down the brain as well. But yeah, cuz the brain spinning out is the biggest challenge that people face. And so finding a way like practicing meditation, practicing mindfulness, practicing, that you're shutting down your brain throughout the day, will help you be able to do that at night as well.

Tanya Gill: 00:22:30

So it's that practice, wash, rinse, repeat, wash, rinse, repeat, get connected with yourself, wash, rinse, repeat. When you start working with clients, I'm curious. I mean, everyone comes with their own unique challenges around sleep. And and, of course, it does have to do with our personal circumstances. So how do you? What kinds of questions do you ask? That's what I'd like to know what kinds of questions do you ask your clients to understand their challenges and find out where they're at before you even get started?

Lana Walsh: 00:23:07

Yeah, I do like an hour long in sessions, like an HR just to, yeah, just to determine whether or not they have something I can help them with. Because I talk to a lot of clients, I've had hypersomnia, I've had sleep apnea, I've had all kinds of people talking to me that don't have insomnia that are just looking for, they're just so tired. They want some help.

Tanya Gill: 00:23:30

What is hypersomnia

Lana Walsh: 00:23:33

it's basically the opposite of insomnia. It's like having a full night of sleep, or even as much as 12 hours of sleep and still feeling exhausted, like you need more sleep. And some it's a type of narcolepsy if you know what narcolepsy is? Yeah. Yeah. So it's that just being the opposite of insomnia, just being really tired all the time. It's, it's pretty uncommon, but it is one of this. Like I said before, at some sleep disorders that have been discovered, so

Tanya Gill: 00:24:02

and so you don't treat hyper insomnia and you don't help clients then who are also experiencing sleep apnea. So now, and we should talk about what Sleep apnea is for people who don't know, so how would you define sleep apnea?

Lana Walsh: 00:24:20

The Sleep apnea is when you stop breathing during the night, so it's for at least 10 seconds, I think five or more times an hour. I can't remember the exact definition. But for a lot of people with sleep apnea, they will feel like they have insomnia or they could also experience insomnia. And it's usually like some of the symptoms would be you know, if you wake up gasping for breath, snoring is can be a sign of it. If you wake up with dry mouth, sore throat, you've slept the whole night but you wake up feeling unrested the biggest one As usually a loved one will tell you that you stopped breathing at night, right? And I have to tell you, if you think you might have sleep apnea, or you know somebody who you think has sleep apnea, please, please, please get tested for it, it is so hard on your heart, what happens is when you stop breathing, your heart rate slows down to conserve oxygen. And when it gets oxygen levels get too low, your blood pressure shoots up in your heart races to wake you up. So you start breathing again. And if you think about some people are doing that, at least once a minute, you know, like that your heart rates doing this all night? It's so so dangerous. So please, please, please, I cannot say it enough.

Tanya Gill: 00:25:44

Yeah, stressful on your body. And and, and actually, yeah, it's a health. It's a health challenge. So we definitely want to encourage listeners, if you think you have sleep apnea, get it checked out, talk to a doctor. If you think though, that you just need some work with sleep challenges and moving through insomnia, a sleep expert, like you is a great place to start in conjunction with your doctor, have the conversation with your doctor notice, like you said, is your doctor asking you about your sleep? Are you talking about your sleep with your doctor? Or is this kind of some invisible thing that you're just suffering with? And then if you're finding yourself suffering, find Lana and talk to Lana and and dig a little deeper into this sleet challenges. What other advice do you have for people who are struggling with sleep?

Lana Walsh: 00:26:44

Yeah, so Well, the one thing that I didn't to finish earlier was the theory don't that's okay. No way, conversation just naturally flowed. But the one thing is like Don't, don't let yourself toss and turn. So if you're just there staring at the ceiling, don't go into that mindset of, if I lay here long enough, I'm gonna go to sleep because that's actually increasing your cortisol and your stress level, because you're lying there and your brain is like you're not sleeping. You're not going to sleep. And then it goes down. Yeah, exactly, you start to get more anxious about it. And it causes more trouble. There was a research study done with good sleepers brought into the sleep lab, half of them were told to just have a good night. And the other half were told that they were going to give a cash prize to the person who could go to sleep the fastest. And the group with the cash incentive took three times as long to go to sleep as the regular sleepers. So it really even if you're a good sleeper, telling yourself I need to go to sleep causes so much anxiety and stress that it makes it harder to go to sleep.

Tanya Gill: 00:27:57

Doesn't that tell you the power of our minds, the power of our minds and the impact it can have on on the way that we sleep? How quickly we go to sleep and probably the quality of our sleep too. Wow.

Lana Walsh: 00:28:16

Yeah. So yeah, so don't don't lay there just thinking, you know, I'm gonna go to sleep eventually. You know, if you feel like you know, 2030 minutes has passed and you haven't gone to sleep, then get up and do something relaxing. And you can do that right in bed. Research shows that you don't have to actually leave the room to read, to try to go back to sleep. The most important thing is to not lay there trying, quote unquote, trying to go to sleep. It's do something relaxing, and that could be watching TV, it's not the most ideal. But reading a book, turn on there's bedtime stories for adults, and you can turn on or, you know, listening to something to help you go to sleep. But I also want you to be careful of what the material is you're you're going to read. Like I tell people I can't read James Patterson anymore because his you know when to two page chapters are that's too fast paced. I want to keep reading, reading, reading. But you also want to be careful that it's not something that's too engaging. You don't want to listen to a podcast that you're that like this where you're trying to learn something because that's going to keep your brain going as well. That's right.

Tanya Gill: 00:29:31

If you are listening to this and you are struggling to sleep and it's two o'clock in the morning, hit pause and come back to it because we want to make sure that you are actually doing the most nurturing things for yourself to invite sleep. You know what I used to do Lana? This is This is terrible. Well, seeing here I am judging myself because that's what we do. Right? Right. Yeah, but I used to get up and clean. I used To get up and clean for hours, I would I would get the boys to bed, I would get in bed, I would lay there for an hour or two and feel frustrated. And then I would get up and I would clean for like 234 hours, probably not the best thing to do now that I'm listening to you. So watching something that's not too engaging, listening to some music, reading a book that maybe you're not super invested in, listening to a meditation, those kinds of things can help, I'm hearing those things can really make start to make a difference.

Lana Walsh: 00:30:41

Right. And your experience is not uncommon. I hear from people all the time that you know, they're awake. So they're like, I might as well do something, right. But it's it's not providing a conducive environment to go to sleep.

Tanya Gill: 00:30:54

So do something. So what I'm hearing is do something, but do something that is going to yes, do something that is going to foster and nurture sleep, versus get you wired, and even more unable to sleep. So for example, watching the news may not be the best thing, especially if you're an empath, excuse me or a worrier. Right, because that, like that's not gonna that that is not going to help, though it's really having that awareness of what you're consuming, too.

Lana Walsh: 00:31:29

Yeah, and that includes, you know, the hour before you go to bed, I had a client to her and her husband, they had four kids, I think, and the only time they had to talk about anything was when they got into bed. So they would have all the important conversations of the day, were right before bed, and her husband was like, hit the pillow and go to sleep. And she would sit there for two hours thinking, thinking thinking and I said to her, you have to quit having those conversations in bed. Like, you know, that time before you go to sleep and throughout the night has got to be all about relaxing, calming down your brain, shutting things down, shutting yourself off, getting ready to be relaxed, and ready for bed.

Tanya Gill: 00:32:18

And I think too, like I know that you you take a cognitive behavioral therapy approach to this. So that's obviously using your mind and your behaviors to mesh together. And I think to that, like really, we have to recognize that we're a mind body spirit system, right? So doing whatever we can with our mind, whatever we can to nurture our bodies for sleep, but also like just getting in touch with ourselves and feeling safe in our being to know that sleep can come and it can come gently. Does that. Does that sound hokey to you?

Lana Walsh: 00:32:56

No, it's actually one of the things I talk to my clients about all the time. I'm working with a client right now who's really psychologically dependent on her medication. And I, as part of the tapering off process that you mentioned before is her feeling confident in her ability to sleep because right now she has a belief that she can't sleep unless she's taking this pill. And so as we taper off, it's like each step of this process is about being confident that you know how to sleep without any of these outside influences. Because that's the truth. Everybody knows how to sleep, you're born with the ability to sleep, we just have forgotten how to do it.

Tanya Gill: 00:33:42

Like we're busy to our ability to sleep away, and then we get in our heads. And so then we just per separate or whatever we're doing in our minds that prevent us from from tapping into that knowing, right that naturally our body and our mind and our spirit knows. So it's it's really that it's almost like a relationship of trust.

Lana Walsh: 00:34:07

Yeah, it is. It is and it's and it's so important to the whole, overcoming insomnia, specifically, other sleep disorders have a physiological Parkinsonian Yeah, but component, but insomnia is, for the most part, a psychological problem. It is our subconscious brain is kind of like Pavlov's dog learned how to salivate at the sound of a bell, our psychological or subconscious brain has started to associate bed and nighttime with being awake. And so that often offered advice of making sure you're not doing anything but sleep or sex in bed. That's part of it. It's that when the more time you spend in your bed and in your bedroom, doing things Other than sleeping, the more that brain, the subconscious brain starts to associate the bed with doing other things. For me, what it's turned into is that's the time I create stuff. So last night is a really good example. Last night, I was awake in the middle of the night, and I was thinking about, well, this podcast, but also, I have an article that I'm writing right now, and I have a new speech that I want to write. And I just had this really great conversation with the researcher that I hope to collaborate with. And I'm was thinking about all these ways we could collaborate. So in the middle of the night, I'm not worried about anything, I'm not stressed about it, it's just like, all of these ideas come to me in the middle of the night. And that's what I have to deal with, with my psyche, my subconscious brain, I have to figure out how to have those ideas during the day, and stop having them at night.

Tanya Gill: 00:35:55

So this is a, this is a great thing, because I think a lot of us can relate to that I know I can, I will wake up at three o'clock in the morning with like, some idea and be like, Oh, and this and this and this and this. So what do you recommend to people who do that kind of thinking and that creative processing in the night,

Lana Walsh: 00:36:16

I recommend the same thing I did, I used to be an event manager, and event management. And I when the first palm pilot came out, I bought it right away, because I would have so many like details would come up in the middle of the night, and I needed to write them down. So I, I recommend, like get up and write that stuff down. Because in the middle of the night when you think about stuff, and you can probably relate it's kind of like rumination, it, you go over and over and over and over and over and over again. And you look at it in different ways. And and from that perspective, and what if I add this in and, and it just spirals into all these ideas. So get up at a scene with your to do list, or anything that you are thinking of even if you had a conversation that you're replaying in your mind, get up and write that down. So you can like brain dump it. And then your brain can go okay, don't need to think about that anymore.

Tanya Gill: 00:37:07

So here's what's so funny, I have to show you let me see if I can find it got I know I've got it here on my desk or not. Oh, here it is. My brain dump journal. And I and I often have it next to my bed so that if I wake up, I can just jot things down because I'm one of those people who gets like, I don't want to forget this. So then I'm like, I've got it, I've got to remember this. And then I get into this spiral of not wanting to sleep because I don't want to forget. So now I just dump it and it's just like dump and I can come back to it. Now, there's something you said there that I want to touch on because you said Get off. And so are you suggesting that rather than staying in bed and writing things out? Are you suggesting actually removing yourself from bed? Or is it okay just to hang out in bed and write stuff down and then try and get back in?

Lana Walsh: 00:38:00

Well, I would I would suggest start with you could just get up in bed and write it down. Okay. I think the longer you go having trouble sleeping, and you stay in bed and do that stuff, it can still reinforce that idea that the bed isn't for sleeping. So if it's if you are struggling to go back to sleep, even when you do that, then you might want to start leaving the room going to another room, writing it down and then waiting for you to either get drowsy or at least 20 to 30 minutes has passed before you try to go back to sleep while you're doing something relaxing.

Tanya Gill: 00:38:38

Okay, Lana, I got it. I've got to touch on this drowsy thing a little bit because what if, hypothetically speaking, you don't really experience drowsiness?

Lana Walsh: 00:38:51

Like ever? We've never Hmm.

Tanya Gill: 00:38:55

I do. I do experience drowsiness, but I feel like it's in a really small window. Like it's like, I have this drowsiness and then it's it's like it's a sweet spot. So if I don't get my ass into bed in the drowsiness, then I'm screwed. Like, do you know what I mean? And I think that's, that's the story I tell myself, right. I know. That's the story I tell myself. But like, I actually know someone who says that they so rarely get drowsy that they just don't bother. It's very hard for them to go to bed.

Lana Walsh: 00:39:31

Okay, so I'll just work with you because I can't talk to this other person. So do you mind if I ask you some questions that I do. Okay, so what what then? Yeah, okay, so what time do you go to bed? Usually at night?

Tanya Gill: 00:39:44

I go to bed around 930.

Lana Walsh: 00:39:48

Okay, and what time do you get up in the morning? Typically? Yeah, typically around

Tanya Gill: 00:39:53

six, well, six or seven.

Lana Walsh: 00:39:57

Okay. And you said you We're taking zopiclone. Yeah.

Tanya Gill: 00:40:03

Well, my clients are our listeners. There we go there.

Lana Walsh: 00:40:08

Yeah, this so this is kind of what I what I take my clients through. So you just walk me through just like a typical a typical night. Like what? What happens when you like, what do you do before you get into bed? What happens during the night? And, and how was your morning? Okay, so

Tanya Gill: 00:40:22

I have a routine. When it's bedtime, I go and grab my wheat bags, and I put them in the microwave, because I can't see without my wheat bags. Even if it's hotter than Hades, I still love that comfort of the warmth on my chest when I'm sleeping. Or when I'm relaxing. And so I heat my wheat bags, I have a little snack, go brush my teeth, take my sleeping pill, and then climb into bed. And Peter and I chat for a little bit. And then we cuddle and watch TV for about half an hour. And then my sleeping pill kicks in. And he has kind of rearranges me, because I'm out of it. And then I sleep for the night. Prior to that it was the same thing except that rather than going to sleep, I would just lay there and think for hours, and then beat myself up because I wasn't getting because I wasn't getting sleep and then start to play the dwindling our game. So it's like, oh my god, it's one o'clock. That means I've only got five hours. It's like, oh my god, it's two o'clock. That means I'm down to four hours of sleep and then start playing that game in my head.

Lana Walsh: 00:41:34

Mm hmm. Okay. And so So does this. The whole bedtime routine, the wheat bag, the microwave?

Tanya Gill: 00:41:45

Snack?

Lana Walsh: 00:41:46

How's your tea? The sleeping pill? The the cuddling, all of that? Is that all happened after 930 or before? 930

Tanya Gill: 00:41:54

after 930. So I start so yeah, I start my sleep routine at 930. And I would say I'm in bed by about 945.

Lana Walsh: 00:42:04

Okay, and then you turn out the lights to go to sleep usually by like a time Are you falling asleep by

Tanya Gill: 00:42:11

I would say 1030 at the latest?

Lana Walsh: 00:42:17

And the sleeping pill. You're sleeping through the night. So you're just waking up in the morning between six and seven? Yeah. How do you feel in the mornings? I feel I actually

Tanya Gill: 00:42:28

do often. Most of the time I feel rested, and I feel ready for the day. Yeah, I would say I mostly feel rested and ready for the day. I did make a mistake. A few weeks back before I had this conversation with my doctor where I just decided I was actually experiencing drowsiness. So I was like, You know what, I'm just gonna go to bed. I'm just gonna go down. I'm gonna have a sleep with a sleeping pill. And then I woke up oh, you know, like, seven or eight times in the night. And, and sometimes it was just for a few minutes. And then a couple of times it was for longer periods where it was like, I could get up and do some cleaning. Instead, I was just laying there going, oh, oh, I might my inner critic was going into see Tanya, you're addicted to these things. See, Tanya, you'll never sleep without a sleeping pill. Again, all of those kinds of conversations, right?

Lana Walsh: 00:43:27

Yeah. Do you mind sharing how how much is a clone? Like what? Your doses? You don't have to if you don't want to?

Tanya Gill: 00:43:35

I don't I actually it's a tablet. I don't even the doses?

Lana Walsh: 00:43:40

I think that's 7.5 milligrams. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So on a scale of 01 to 10. One being not at all 10 being extremely. How much stress do you think would you say you're under right now you're experiencing?

Tanya Gill: 00:43:59

I would say probably around a six or a seven.

Lana Walsh: 00:44:05

And you have regular stress reduction strategies that you use? Oh, yes. Yeah, lots

Tanya Gill: 00:44:12

of regular stress reduction strat.

Lana Walsh: 00:44:14

Okay. That's great. Do you exercise every day? And eat a pretty good diet, I think. Well, you bet. Oh, that's what I wanted to get back to you. What kind of what when you have your snack before bed?

Tanya Gill: 00:44:30

What are you eating? Typically, um, it varies. So this is a funny thing. This is a real this is Oh, this is like a vulnerable thing. It varies. Sometimes it's like a piece of toast with peanut butter or a banana or Apple and cheese. But it always ends with a couple of squares of chocolate. I've chocolate every day. Yeah. And I usually have chocolate at The end of my day.

Lana Walsh: 00:45:03

Okay, you have trouble going to sleep or staying asleep or both.

Tanya Gill: 00:45:10

Yeah, without the medication. I have trouble going to sleep and staying asleep.

Lana Walsh: 00:45:14

Okay, both going. Okay. So

Tanya Gill: 00:45:18

there's tried a different sleeping pill before. This isn't interesting, too, right? I tried something else. And then I was waking up many times in the night and also waking up feeling so groggy and so gross and like just like lit. So. So that's an interesting thing to like it was that one was not a fit for sure. Do you remember what that was? No.

Lana Walsh: 00:45:49

So like there's there's two different kinds of sleeping pills. Typically, there's benzos, which are, you know, sedatives. And then there's the non benzos, which can still be a sedating type of drug. There's the kinds that I was on, which was a anti anxiety prescribed off label for for sleep. So zopiclone is a sedating. Right drug. But it's not a it's a non benzo. So it's less addictive than what events are

Tanya Gill: 00:46:24

would be. That's a good sign. Yay.

Lana Walsh: 00:46:28

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Oh, well, one more question before I, before I tell you what I think, okay. Do you drink coffee during the day or drink energy drinks or coffee? I do eat?

Tanya Gill: 00:46:44

I do not. If I do. It's like a little tiny, tiny bit. And it's rare. But I do drink green tea in the morning sometimes.

Lana Walsh: 00:46:57

That's good. So like caffeine, can can take as much as 12 hours to metabolize. So for some people, I tell them, make sure you stop drinking coffee by noon.

Tanya Gill: 00:47:10

That's a good, that's a good piece of advice. Because there are lots of people out there that are drinking coffee till four or five o'clock in the day, right?

Lana Walsh: 00:47:18

Yeah, and you know, in the middle of the afternoon, that's another good tip for everybody out there in the middle of the afternoon. Everybody's energy level drops, we all have our circadian rhythm sort of fluctuates throughout the day. And around to three o'clock. We're all kind of in this slump. For me, so. Yeah, exactly. So it's four o'clock. Yep. Right. So one of the strategies that I give people, instead of drinking a cup of coffee, just get some exercise. 10 To 15 minutes of exercise will boost your energy just as much as a cup of coffee without affecting your sleep.

Tanya Gill: 00:47:52

And if you're getting vitamin D, it's good for your mind, body and spirit. Yeah,

Lana Walsh: 00:47:57

exactly. And sunshine is so important for regulating your sleep wake cycle. So getting the sunlight is really important. Okay, so based on this really short conversation that we've had of me asking some questions, there's a few things I would recommend for you. And the first one is stop the snack before bed. Yeah, cuz especially with the things that you're eating, you're making your blood sugar. Right, so then that's causing challenges for like going to sleep and staying asleep because then it drops overnight. And then that causes some problems. Chocolate can also have some caffeine in it. So if you're really sensitive that could be causing the problem. So the snack moved out an hour earlier. If you can, yep, that would be the one of the big things. And then the other thing is nine, so lights out at 1030 and getting up at 630. That's eight hours. So that that's not too bad. But for the drowsy thing, what I would recommend is try going to bed even a half hour later, but shorten up the time that you're in bed before you turn off the lights. So one of the things that we talked about is the half hour half hour rule. Okay, I want you to be turning out the lights within 30 minutes of getting into bed and getting out of bed at 30 minutes, at least 30 minutes or sooner after waking up in the morning. So don't languish in bed, not sleeping before you go to sleep. And when you wake up in the morning, so sad sometimes. Right? Sometimes we wake up, you know, a little before alarm goes off, and we're like, oh, I just want to I just want to go back to sleep and then we try to go back to sleep when we can't and then you know pretty soon hours gone by or an hour and a half that's gone by and you know, so then we've spent that time sort of languishing and reinforcing that whole subconscious. We don't sleep in bed.

Tanya Gill: 00:50:06

Well. So it's interesting that you talk about the morning thing because I recently heard a statistic that the average person who hit snooze stays in bed. Another was the number was stuck with me is 23 minutes. And so I was thinking about that 23 minute window because sometimes I'm a snoozer, and sometimes I'm not. And what I recognize personally, is when I snooze, I do exactly what you said, I languish, I lay there and go, Oh, I just want to have a little bit more sleep. But I know that I have to get up and so it's not like I'm really resting anyway, I just lay there and languish. That's just the perfect description of it. So if your alarm goes off in the morning, like, maybe get up,

Lana Walsh: 00:50:55

huh? Yeah, right. Yeah. And I mean, I understand somebody with insomnia I kept as soon as, I can't even tell you how many times every single day because you're just you feel like, you want to get more sleep, but it's actually counterproductive to having a good night's sleep. Because if you got up when the alarm went off, even though you're exhausted, that night, you're going to have more drive to go to sleep because we build up in our brain, a neural sleep neural transmitter called adenosine. And adenosine builds up through the day as we're up and about and active throughout the day. And we need about 16 hours for a denizen to build up. And then overnight while we sleep that depletes. So there's an inverse relationship between adenosine and glucose glucose as an energy source, that's what sugar turns into to give us energy throughout the day. So glucose depletes throughout the day, as adenosine rises, and then when we sleep. Adenosine depletes, and glucose rises. So that that helps us get through the day. And the night. That's that's the physiological process that's happening. So the longer we're awake, the more adenosine builds up, the stronger our drive our desire to go to sleep, the easier it is to sleep, the deeper we sleep. And the better we sleep without awakening during the night. So one of the biggest strategies I give people, and I would give it to you, yeah, shorten your night by even half an hour, I usually recommend an hour to start with, shorten it up by an hour at first, and see if that helps with the sleeping through the night.

Tanya Gill: 00:52:54

So I may be more tired during the day for a little while, but, but my actual physiological ability to sleep, that natural being the state that we're meant to have is more likely then to kind of kick back in and be like, Hey, this is what we do when we're tired. Okay, yeah, that is incredible advice. And I really appreciate it. And, you know, man, I have to tell you, I didn't expect to get this personal, invulnerable, whatever. If this helps one other person who is struggling with sleep, like it's worth it, because I know how, and you know, to how painful and how challenging and how it can affect every aspect of your life. It can affect every aspect of your life. Wow. Okay, so Lana, there are going to be listeners who are like, how do I talk to this woman? How do they get in touch with you?

Lana Walsh: 00:53:54

Yeah, well, I'm on like, all the social channels under Lana Walsh coaching. Lana walls. coaching.ca is my website, there is a big button at the top that says, Speak to me. I think it says free consults or something like that. Just, you know, book a meeting with me, I'm happy to talk to you. And if I can't help you, I will tell you, but and the other thing too, don't wait. Don't lay there in frustration every night. have the opportunity to chat with me and I'd be happy to give you a few pieces of advice.

Tanya Gill: 00:54:30

Well, and you know, ultimately, right, it really comes down to quality of life. And and what I really appreciate Lana is that that's what you're here for. That's what I'm here for. We are trying to encourage people to have the best quality of life that they can and live authentically and juicy and good and be able to have the energy to live our life purpose because we We are able to rest and actually follow those natural cycles that our bodies are meant to have. At last salutely This has been absolutely incredible. I appreciate you so so much. One last piece of advice. If there's one thing you want our listeners to take away from this, this conversation, what do you want them to make sure they've heard you say

Lana Walsh: 00:55:26

that, you know, being tired every day all the time isn't normal. And you don't have to live that way. Don't put up with it because you think because our society has normalized it, we've really become a 24/7 society where you sleep less because they say you're only successful if you're up at 5am. And you know, all those celebrities out there that are like, I only get five hours of sleep, but look at my life. You don't have to live that way. It doesn't make you more successful. In fact, it it actually takes away from your ability to be productive. So you know what, you don't have to live like that. Please get some help if you need it. I'd love to help you, if I can.

Tanya Gill: 00:56:16

Thank you so so much, Lana. This has been incredible. My friends, Lana Walsh, coaching.ca Lana, wash Walsh, coaching.ca. Go check her out, book yourself a consultation if you're struggling with sleep, sleep. And remember, it is a process and it is a practice. And it looks like I'm giving up my snacks. Actually, I'm not giving up my snack I'm moving in earlier. So I'm moving at earlier. And I'm going to go to bed a little bit later. And those are the two things that I'm committing to at this point. And we'll see where it goes from here. Oh, from my heart to yours. Lana, thank you so much for being here.

Lana Walsh: 00:57:01

Thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed this conversation.