There are many possible reasons to sleep poorly . . . stressful work, relationship conflict, pregnancy, moving, even summer heat. When your sleep is first disturbed, it can be helpful to keep in mind that everyone’s sleep is disturbed periodically for good reasons. If you’ve recovered from that initial event, but your sleep still remains poor after one month, then it is time to take steps to improve your sleep.
Insomnia is defined as spending more than 30 minutes at the beginning of the night to fall asleep, or awakening in the night for extended periods of time. When this happens most nights of the week for a month or more it is classified as “chronic insomnia.” It’s interesting to note that typically patients wait 7 years before they seek treatment for insomnia. In my clinic, the average duration of adult’s insomnia is closer to 20 years. As we’ll discuss in the future, insomnia has lots of daytime impact on mental, emotional and physical health.