Zhuangzhi, Butterfly dream
If you are wide awake at 3'oclock in the morning and all you want to do is sleep - you tried fluffing your pillows, you sprayed lavender on you wrist, you tried sleeping tablets and even Andy Puddicomb's voice doesn't even make you blink - acupuncture might just be the thing that will help you completely relax and finally get the restorative night's sleep you need. Imagine not crawling to work like a zombie, feeling sharp and creative, thinking better, listening better and even managing a smile?
What is insomnia?
If you suffer from insomnia, you may have difficulty in falling asleep or getting back to sleep when you wake up in the night. It may mean that you wake up very early in the morning. You may also find that sleeping does not refresh you, and that you feel constantly tired. You may experience disturbed or light sleep, or wake up and fall back to sleep several times in a night.
The effect of Insomnia on your health
Lack of sleep has a whole list of effects on your physical and mental health. It
· Reduces your cognitive faculties: Sleep plays a critical role in thinking, learning and remembering. Lack of sleep can impairs attention, alertness, concentration, reasoning, and problem solving. This makes it more difficult to learn efficiently.
· Kills your sex drive
· Can make you gain weight
· Ages your skin
· Can lead to serious physical health problems like heart disease, high blood pressure stroke, diabetes
· Is depressing: In my practice, I see many people with various levels of anxiety and I can see first hand how mental health problems can be both a reason and a consequence of insomnia.
Stress and anxiety can cause you to have thoughts racing through your mind, making it difficult for you to sleep. If you have sleep problems over a long period of time, you may also develop anxiety or phobias about going to sleep and a vicious circle has started.
With Depression you might find it very difficult to face your day-to-day life, and you may find yourself sleeping more in order to avoid them – either sleeping late in the morning or a lot during the day. Oversleeping can cause fatigue and lethargy, but make it also difficult to sleep well at night. If you experience difficult or troubling thoughts as part of depression, this can also cause insomnia. You may find it harder to fall asleep, or you may wake early and be unable to get back to sleep.
Over a long period of time, a severe sleep problem could lead to a mental health problem, or may make an existing mental health problem worse because tiredness reduces your ability to deal with difficult situations as well as the challenges of day-to-day life and may lower your self-esteem, make it harder to cope. You may feel lonely because you’re too tired carrying out your usual social activities, leading you to become socially isolated. You may also experience low mood or negative thoughts
So why not give acupuncture a try?
With acupuncture, the focus is on the individual, not the illness. The underlying principle of this highly individualised treatment is that imbalance, illness and pain occur when the body's qi, or vital energy, cannot flow freely.
During your first acupuncture session, the causes of your insomnia are the first things I’ll try to uncover. Acupuncturists look at a patient holistically and I’ll spend the first 30 min of the consultation finding out about your sleep routine, your sleep environment, your sleep patterns, your eating habits, your work and family life, your thoughts and level of stress, worry and anxiety, mental health issues, infection, injury, pain or physical illness that might be causing your sleeping problem. Our initial conversation allows me to organise your symptoms into a coherent Chinese medical diagnosis and devise a treatment plan.
Your treatment
Each treatment involves inserting ultra-fine sterile needles into specific acupuncture points. I use a combination of body acupuncture and auriculo (ear) acupuncture points to re-establish the free flow of qi, release blockage, restore balance between your yang and yin energies and trigger your body's natural healing response. In order to restore balance I address your insomnia as well as its causes and the effects it has on you.
Along with your acupuncture treatment you might need to make changes in your lifestyle to support your return to good sleep and good health in general. Different things work for different individuals so during sessions we also discuss a wide range of routines, relaxation techniques, changes in diet and physical activities that can work for you and can ultimately make you feel better if you’re able to implement the appropriate changes.
If you are interested in trying acupuncture and how it may benefit you, please book in for an appointment or email me with any questions, sophie@silverwoodacupuncture.co.uk