5 Invaluable Benefits of CBT for Adult ADHD
Life with adult attention-deficit disorder (ADHD) has unique ups and downs. Here are five ways you can use cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) to successfully manage your adult ADHD.
Custom Insomnia Solutions So You Can Get Back to Sleep
When you toss and turn in the middle of the night suffering from your chronic insomnia, you might feel alone in your struggle. However, you’re actually among the 25% of people who develop insomnia during their lifetime. The even better news is that 75% of those individuals have found relief and recovery from their insomnia, and you can, too.
Our team of experts at Greater Lowell Psychiatric Associates, led by board-certified psychiatrist Ronald P. Winfield, specializes in developing a customized insomnia treatment so you can experience life with a full night’s sleep.
Insomnia basics
When you have trouble falling or staying asleep, you have a sleep disorder known as insomnia. Insomnia can be short-term (lasting one night to a few weeks) or chronic (lasting at least three nights per week for over three months).
There are two basic types of insomnia: primary and secondary. Primary insomnia means your sleep issues aren’t caused by a health condition. Causes of this type can include stress from big life events like losing a job or the death of a loved one, atmospheric elements like light or noise, and changes to your sleeping patterns like jet lag or shift changes at work.
Secondary insomnia happens when your trouble sleeping is a result of an underlying health condition like depression, substance abuse, arthritis, or asthma.
No matter what’s causing your insomnia, we’re equipped to provide you with custom solutions to help you recover from your insomnia. Here are a few solutions we recommend:
Learning to manage stress
Often, you develop insomnia as a result of a stressful situation in your life. You’ve just received terrible news, and as a result, you’re left tossing and turning all night suffering from worry and fear. We’re here to help you learn how to manage your stress in a way that works for you. Here are a few examples:
- Increase your exposure to sunlight
- Find time to exercise
- Engage in wellness techniques like yoga or meditation
- Start journaling
Depending on your lifestyle, we can guide you toward strategies that make sense for you and your needs.
Counseling and psychotherapy
Sometimes the solution to your insomnia problems depends on your recognizing unhealthy patterns and changing the way you think about sleep. We can help you do this through counseling and psychotherapy.
Falling under the umbrella of psychotherapy is cognitive-behavioral therapy or CBT. Some methods we recommend as a part of CBT are stimulus control therapy, sleep restriction, and sleep environment improvement.
Stimulus control therapy
With stimulus control therapy, we encourage you to remove any factors that make your mind and body resistant to sleep. With CBT you’ll learn to set a consistent bedtime, use the bedroom only for sleeping, or leave the bedroom if you can’t fall asleep within 20 minutes.
Sleep restriction
Sleep restriction involves you reducing the amount of time you spend in bed. This helps you become more and more tired each day, improving your chances of falling and staying asleep.
Sleep environment improvement
We might also help you create a better sleep environment. Getting rid of the TV, moving the clock out of view, and keeping your bedroom dark and cool are all ways we can improve your sleeping patterns.
Where psychotherapies like CBT seek to treat long-term problems, we also offer counseling services that focus on a specific problem. Counseling is especially helpful if your insomnia is stress-related. We can help you work through your problems and discover peaceful sleep.
Lifestyle changes
Often, the things you do on a daily basis are what’s causing your insomnia. Some of these lifestyle factors include consuming nicotine and caffeine, frequent napping, and eating or drinking right before bed. We can help you to identify those habits and find ways to eliminate them.
Medication
Depending on your specific needs, we do prescribe prescription medications in combination with promoting good sleeping habits.
Transcranial magnetic stimulation
We offer transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) as a part of our comprehensive list of insomnia treatments. TMS therapy uses magnetic pulses to target the areas of your brain responsible for mood regulation. We recommend TMS to treat insomnia especially if you have depression.
You’re not your best when you’re sleep-deprived and suffering from insomnia. We’re dedicated to finding the right combination of treatments and solutions that will get you the full night’s sleep you need. Call our office or book an appointment online to start your journey towards sleep you’ve only dreamt about.
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