§ Understanding Insomnia Disorder: Self-examination of Insomnia

Before entering this article, we should first understand our sleep status and the meaning of insomnia. So please check yourself first. Do you encounter any of the following three kinds of sleep or situations?

1. It is difficult to fall asleep (usually more than 30 minutes before falling asleep).

2. Difficulty in maintaining sleep is characterized by frequent awakening or difficulty in falling asleep again after awakening.

3. Wake up early and never fall asleep again.

The above three are the definitions of insomnia or insomnia in the Diagnosis and Statistics Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM-5), compiled by the American Psychiatric Society in 2013.

In short, when we talk about insomnia, insomnia does not just refer to the state of having difficulty falling asleep and counting sheep in bed.

There are also two other situations. One is that although it is easy to fall asleep, it is easy to interrupt sleep, possibly because of nightmares, or because it is difficult to maintain sleep steadily for unknown reasons.

Another is that it's easy to fall asleep, but it doesn't last long.

Nevertheless, even if you've had a similar situation, it doesn't mean you have insomnia.

For example, when we want to distinguish "depression" from "depression", for a newly lovelorn person, there may be severe depression, and the relevant scale can also reach the indicators of severe depression.

But over time, psychological self-regulation, the average person can get out of lovelorn, rather than in depression, long-term physical and mental disorders.

Therefore, in the above three insomnia cases, the following definitions should be used:

Sleep disorders can cause clinical pain or damage to social, vocational, educational, academic, behavioral or other important functions.

That is because insomnia, bring physical or psychological pain.

The old man's deep sleep needs are low, and his physiological clock tends to wake up early, but his early awakening does not bring any physical and mental pain, so it is not insomnia.

Secondly, the time and frequency of insomnia should also be considered to achieve:

1. Sleep difficulties occur at least three nights a week.

2. Sleep difficulties occurred for at least three months.

Other considerations for the analysis of insomnia include:

A. Do you give enough sleep opportunities and still have difficulty sleeping?

B. Insomnia can not be attributed to the physiological effects of a substance (due to drugs, drugs).

C. Insomnia can not be better explained by another sleep-wakefulness disorder, nor can it only occur in the course of another sleep-wakefulness disorder.

D. The coexistence of mental disorders and physical conditions does not fully explain the complaints of insomnia.

There are three types of insomnia: difficulty in falling asleep, difficulty in maintaining sleep, or early awakening.

And any symptoms should reach an average of three times a week, lasting three months, and excluding other factors that may cause insomnia before they can be identified.

For ordinary people, most insomnia belongs to short-term or temporary insomnia, which is a psychological distress, not a mental illness.

§ Insomnia to Sleep: The Lost Nervous System

If our heart is like a ship, a healthy mind is like a compass installed on board. Even in the occasional storm, we can use the compass to find the direction of shore.

So sleep is important because it can examine a person's physical and mental health.

When our nervous system is disordered, it often causes insomnia. There are three nervous systems about sleep:

1. Constant system: regulate the degree of daytime awakening and the amount of sleep at night.

As you can understand, constant systems allow us to maintain a high level of wakefulness during the day, so that we can accumulate energy that is easy to fall asleep at night, and maintain the time of falling asleep, so that wakefulness and sleep "balance" between income and expenditure.

2. Daily and Night Regulation System: Regulate the sleep time of the cycle by receiving the time of illumination. For example, students stay up late before the final exam, but within a few days they can readjust their sleep to the external environment (day and night changes).

3.Excitation system: Compared with the constant system, the excitation system has the function of maintaining individual alertness and wakefulness.

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Here is another perspective on insomnia, except insomnia, in fact, "stay awake" is a capacity.

In ancient times, people had to face all kinds of threats to the external environment at any time, such as the eager carnivores, and all kinds of alarming and unknown threats at night.

In order to protect their own and relatives'safety, they can remain awake for a long time to become a life-saving amulet under the threat and insecurity.

Despite years of evolution, people still retain the ability to save themselves, which is why people suffer from insomnia under pressure.

Therefore, insomnia due to stress is not an abnormal reaction, or it should be more appropriate to use "overreaction", that is, insomnia can be used as a factor to examine a person's ability to resist stress.

Dr. Christopher L. Drake of the Detroit Sleep Clinic developed the Ford Insomnia Response to Stress Test (FIRST), which shows that some people are prone to stress insomnia, while others are not susceptible to stress.

Furthermore, some studies have shown that people living alone (divorce, widowhood), unemployed and those with lower socioeconomic status are more likely to suffer from insomnia.

In fact, most people fall into such a social dilemma or stressful living environment, will easily produce insomnia problems, insomnia problems can not only depend on people, but also on what kind of life this insomniac person is in.

That is to say, as DSM-5 said, insomnia is one of the adverse reactions of psychological stress.

If we focus too much on the single case of insomnia, sometimes we lose sight of trees instead of forests. In order to save insomnia, we neglect other real causes of psychological problems.

Therefore, in the face of insomnia, if the doctor or consultant, detailed observation and statement of the overall situation of life, insomnia for the relief of the situation is often more appropriate.

§ A Small Way to Relieve Insomnia

Yang Jianming, a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Political Science and Sleep Medicine in Taiwan, puts forward the following methods from the aforementioned studies of the nervous system. Readers who are troubled in this respect may wish to refer to them:

一、ration

Sleep can be regarded as a "waking" and "sleeping" income and expenditure topic, so in order to have enough sleep savings during sleep, we can increase the consumption of physical and mental energy during the day. Here we can add and subtract: reduce daytime sleep; increase exercise and daytime waking time.

二、timing

In the past, most people focused on fixed sleeping time. Professor Yang pointed out that the "wake-up time" should be more fixed.

The human body's physiological clock is affected by light, so we can receive outdoor light as much as possible during the day, while at night it may reduce light, which can keep us sleep regularly and steadily.

三、Ordinary mind

Maintain mental and physical relaxation and avoid stimulating bedtime diet.

Especially don't count sheep. The more we deliberately want to sleep, the more psychological pressure we will have to fall asleep. It is more difficult to fall asleep because of the rising pressure.

When you can't fall asleep, do some relaxation activities and wait until you are sleepy to go back to bed and continue the sleeping procedure.