CBT · Baseer Maroof, LCSW
Sleep Reset
Basics from CBT for insomnia: a steady wake time, a wind-down, and a plan for when you can’t sleep.
Kept dark and dim on purpose. Saved only on this device.
What do you need tonight?
Not medical advice. If poor sleep has gone on for months, or you snore loudly, gasp or stop breathing in your sleep, or doze off when you shouldn’t, like at the wheel, tell a doctor.
How long have you been lying awake?
Guess. Don’t check the clock.
Stay put for now.
Let your body rest, even if your mind won’t. Don’t check the clock.
If it starts to feel like a fight, or it’s been about twenty minutes, come back here.
Get up for a bit.
Go to another room if you can. Keep the light low and warm. Do something calm and a little boring until you feel sleepy.
The bed is for sleep. Lying there fighting it teaches your body that bed is where you stay awake.
Pick one:
Skip, if you can:
- Screens. This page is dim on purpose; put it down once you’ve picked.
- Checking the clock.
- Food, work, the news, anything exciting.
- A drink to knock yourself out. It tends to break up sleep later in the night.
Use a low light so you don’t trip.
Go back when you’re sleepy.
Sleepy means heavy eyelids, head nodding, yawning, reading the same line twice. Not just tired. Sleepy.
Back to bed.
Lights out. If you’re still awake after what feels like twenty minutes, it’s okay to get up and do this again.
This works through repetition over nights, not on the first try. Tomorrow, get up at your usual time anyway, even after a rough night. Skip sleeping in. If you nap, keep it short and early.
Build your wind-down.
Pick three to five things for the last part of your night. Tap them in the order you’ll do them.
Start winding down
Worry dump.
One worry per line. Get each one out of your head and onto the page.
It’s written down. It’ll be here in the morning. You don’t have to hold it tonight.
For anything you can act on: pick one small first step in the morning, not now.
Pick one wake time.
The same time every day, weekends too, even after a bad night. It anchors your body clock, and it’s one of the core habits in CBT for insomnia.
Roughly when do you start to feel sleepy at night?
Goodnight.