From Brain Zaps to Peaceful Landings: The Summer I Didn’t Sleep
“You could think of it like an insect buzzing past your ear,” the man on the Zoom call is saying. “The moment you recognize it, it’s already gone.”
“Or you could see it like an airplane landing,” he hovers a hand in front of him and tilts it from side to side. “There’s some turbulence before it comes to the ground.”
I nod my head politely thinking about how much I really hate to fly. Even on plane flights, however, I was always able to fall asleep.
Before this past summer, I was a great sleeper. Brilliant, if I may. I used to joke that sleep was the one thing I could do best in life. I’ve slept through sleepovers, noisy dorm rooms, college parties, car rides, family gatherings, TV shows and movies and concerts, camping trips, a night on a rural Montana picnic table (long story), a lifetime of cats and dogs in my bed, and 20 years of a husband snoring soundly beside me.
But today I’m on a Zoom call talking about the strange hypnic jerks someone with insomnia can experience as they transition from awake to not-quite-asleep.
I’ve been sleeping an average of two or three hours a night for over three months, and sometimes I don’t sleep at all. At this point in my insomnia, I’m experiencing ‘brain zaps’ — a form of hypnic jerk that some believe are localized, harmless seizures. The experience is like an electric shock that buzzes into your brain, explodes, then jolts your whole body up three inches in the air.
The man on the screen is sleep coach Daniel Erichsen, a fit man with kind eyes and a sympathetic smile. His three books and family photographs are displayed prominently on the shelves behind him. At one time, Coach Daniel was an MD. I like to imagine he got so disgruntled with western medicine’s fearful, medication-first approach to sleep issues that he quit to start the Sleep Coach School program.
As you can see, he also loves a good metaphor. In fact, Daniel Erichsen’s ingenious teachings are more like Lao Tsu’s philosophies than are quite easily digestible by an anxious and sleep-deprived person like me.
Peace of mind and peaceful sleep are effortless, is one of his primary principles.
Four months ago, back when I thought full-blown insomnia was a thing solely for fictional characters and this conversation was something I never could have imagined, I would have easily understood and agreed. I mean, I meditated regularly and even carried around my own pocket-sized copy of the Tao te Ching.
But the world had been through a few years of a global pandemic and held an ever-present sense of doom and gloom. We were all struggling to stay, if not serene, then at least highly distracted. My seemingly foolproof approach: keep my head down and keep working. Meanwhile, I’d had friends die, helped my father through heart surgery, and taken in a troubled niece.
And then there was the loud pulsing in my ear that went on and on. It reminded me of a traumatic brain bleed I’d had in my twenties. I finally got worried enough that I went to my doctor. “Pulsate tinnitus, nothing to do about it,” she said. “And you also seem anxious.”
But I couldn’t be anxious, not me. I mean, I’d never been anxious before… except on plane flights.
A few days later, after nights of noisy neighborhood fireworks in early July, I stopped sleeping for a week.
I was bewildered.
I was beyond bewildered — I was utterly freaked out.
I would later learn this freak out is what triggered a multi-month-long insomnia journey that I’m still unwinding. But, at the time, I once again called my doctor.
“I told you that you were anxious,” she said, sounding a little too pleased, and prescribed Lorazepam, used for short-term relief of anxiety and sleeping problems. I rarely take aspirin for headaches, but started taking at least 1 mg of this benzodiazepine each night. I needed to sleep, right?
I wound down my life. I stopped taking on new clients and canceled a few big jobs in the queue. I stopped helping family that needed me. I stopped volunteering, going on dates with my husband, and visiting with friends. How could I do anything when I wasn’t sleeping?
For the first time in my life, I experienced runaway anxiety. Fear burned like fire in my chest. I lost fifteen pounds. My mind played an endless loop of despairing thoughts. “What if I never sleep again without meds?” “What if something is seriously wrong with me?” “What if I go crazy?”
But, by early September, I was more scared of the drugs than anything else. Internet chatrooms told me that benzos can result in nasty tolerance and withdrawals in as little as two weeks.
I was also exasperated by living a life driven by my anxiety. I discovered Daniel Erichsen’s teachings and wanted to be brave. So, even though my doctor encouraged me to explore other sleeping pill options, I signed up for the Sleep Coach School’s Insomnia Immunity program and tapered off the meds.
The theory behind the program is that insomnia is a fear of not sleeping. A part of the brain that can’t be rationalized with has learned to fear being awake at night, and I needed to teach it through experience that I was safe.
The program’s counterintuitive methods: let go of all rituals and supplements that control sleep, lower attachment to sleeping, stop watching the clock, make friends with being awake at night by doing something enjoyable, accept unpleasant thoughts and emotions, and be kind to yourself while trying to live a normal life.
By the time Coach Daniel and I are talking about hypnic jerks, it’s mid-October. I’m off sleep meds and my mind is clearer than it’s been in a while.
I spend part of each night welcoming in my hyperarousal—the fire burning in my chest, the scared looping thoughts, the twitches, the jolts, the brain zaps. They’re all invited to come hang out with me.
I’m no longer tracking my sleep. It doesn’t matter, despite how little I sleep, I find I can still function okay during the day.
I keep a stack of novels and favorite snacks on hand and throw solo parties when I’m awake at midnight.
“Whatever happens,” I tell myself, “I am safe.”
Slowly but surely, my brain starts believing me.
Now it’s mid-November, and sleep has returned like a long-lost friend that I have to squint to recognize.
I sleep as much as I did before insomnia, but I wake often and easily. I’m still in a twin bed in the guest room, my husband’s snores from down the hall are all it takes to rouse me. But I keep promising myself I’ll soon move back to our bed.
And oh — the dreams! So many dreams! I’ve visited with dead grandmothers and pets, wandered vast landscapes searching for things I’ve lost, been different creatures in different worlds, and run and run like I did when I was a kid.
Apparently, recovery isn’t a linear process. The brain likes to make sure it’s truly safe. So, wakeful nights still pop up here and there, and will likely continue doing so for a while. Each time they do, I try to remember everything I learned before.
What exactly did I learn? That’s the question I keep mulling over, a thick knot that probably only writing can unravel.
So, here goes:
I’m lucky. I’m so grateful for Coach Daniel and his excellent co-coach Michelle and their program of good-hearted students. Some students in the program have struggled with insomnia for years if not decades, so I know I was lucky to find these teachings before my fears, habits, and rituals around insomnia got fully rooted. My recovery was likely much easier and faster than it would have been otherwise. Also, for once in my life, I’m glad for a personality that leans — if not entirely lazy — let’s say mellow. Fellow students say they are of the high-achieving, ambitious, Type A sort — a disposition I’ve always admired but have never been able to reach for myself. Going with the flow and releasing control are critical in getting past insomnia. I also know that, as much as I wouldn’t wish insomnia on anyone, there are many more difficult experiences to face in life.
The brain is weird. The brain is a safety machine that wants to protect its host. It should be respected and handled with care, but it can’t be fully trusted. During severe insomnia like mine, the brain believes that not sleeping is a life-threatening (or at least highly life-disrupting) experience, so it starts to monitor the action of falling asleep to make sure it’s done correctly. And, of course, conscious monitoring and falling asleep don’t mix, which perpetuates the cycle of not sleeping. In order to break this cycle, another part of the awareness — the non-scared-brain part — pays attention and gets involved. It acknowledges the brain’s thoughts, because fighting, resisting, and ignoring just make the brain scream louder. Meanwhile, it also teaches the brain not to care so much about not sleeping, something that’s extremely hard to do when you’re exhausted. Insomnia has taught me, probably more than any other experience in my life, that I’m more than my thoughts. It also makes me wonder what else my brain has unknowingly mixed up.
Sleep is weird. Though up to 50% of Americans experience sleep disorders and up to 15% are estimated to have chronic insomnia, few healthcare experts seem to truly understand what’s going on. Of the half dozen doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists, and alternative practitioners I saw early in my insomnia (in addition to the resources of a huge healthcare provider), no one I talked with had ever worked with someone dealing with sudden, severe insomnia. I got recommendations for medications, supplements, getting out of bed when I was awake, avoiding screens at night, diet, exercise, clean sheets, hypnosis, challenging my thoughts, and analyzing my childhood. But no one told me straight out that insomnia was a safe experience that wouldn’t harm me until I joined the Sleep Coach School program. It was only in the program that I learned that, as much as we may want to use every tool we can to control our sleep, interfering just gets in the way. And, despite our methods that mistakenly intervene, sleep is a natural process and the body ultimately gets what it needs.
People are weird. I used to avoid reaching out to others about painful experiences. But, in recent years, I’ve been invited into the lives of a few people who were suffering. I found these to be difficult but beautiful growing experiences. Maybe because of this, and also because my discomfort during insomnia felt so overwhelming, I wanted to share my problems with others. But pain often makes other people uncomfortable. We all suffer, we all seek compassion, but we have a hard time being open to others’ struggles while staying centered within ourselves. We give advice, seek to blame (often the person suffering), and tend to avoid the situation altogether. I was very lucky to have sleep coaches, an amazing husband, a few friends, and even some clients and colleagues who could sit with my pain while staying present and peaceful. We were able to talk, laugh, and make things lighter together. I believe this is one of the greatest gifts we can give each other. I have so much more empathy now for those who are struggling with painful situations, and I hope to be more present for the people in my life going forward.
Befriending wakefulness is important… at any time. In the sleep program, we are asked to befriend wakefulness by doing things we enjoy when we can’t sleep at night. This was initially a highly puzzling dilemma, and it took me a while to figure out what I could possibly do in the middle of the night that could in any way be enjoyable. Along the way, it occurred to me that I’d been neglecting fun activities in my life for a while. Most of what I did all day, every day checked a box on my never-ending to-do list, and much of that related to work. In befriending wakefulness, I rediscovered my love of feel-good novels and bought all of Katherine Center’s paperbacks. I also started a few art and writing projects that I could easily pick up in the middle of the night when I felt inspired. One of my favorite parts of insomnia recovery has been falling asleep with creative ideas in my head.
“Practice not-doing, and everything will fall into place.” I found that caring less and surrendering control while trying to live a life that is as full as possible were key in allowing sleep and serenity to naturally return to me. I also learned that beyond life’s difficulties, there’s a refuge within where we can sit with ourselves and accept all that we are experiencing. When we can face what’s unwelcome instead of fighting or running away, over time this is how we fall through turbulent times to peaceful, restful landings.
