With a former research background in sleep health and clinical expertise in treating insomnia, sleep is one of my treatment specialties. If you struggle with falling asleep, getting back to sleep after awakening, waking up on time in the morning without multiple alarm snoozes, or getting good quality sleep despite getting enough hours of sleep, you could be a great candidate for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I). You don’t need to experience clinical insomnia to benefit from improving the quality and/or quantity of your sleep. If your sleep troubles started, or have been exacerbated, by your children’s sleep, I am also a Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant and can incorporate my expertise in pediatric sleep training into our work together to further support parents’ efforts in getting themselves some sleep, too! 

While it is certainly not the only factor, one major factor that impacts sleep health is stress. If you are experiencing chronic stress, you are more likely to stay awake later, experience restlessness before bed, and are unlikely to feel rested upon awakening. Stress management work includes identifying sources of chronic stress in your life, managing your mindset in terms of problem-solving to handle the stress, increasing coping strategies, and setting boundaries to ensure space and time for self-care. 

A very common area of life that can be consumed by stress is work. Demanding careers, unrelenting hours, continuing to adjust to changing modes of work (whether it be remote, return to in-person, or some combination), as well as navigating the current job market, are just some ways that work can cause and exacerbate stress. Adapting, re-adapting, assessing career satisfaction, and staying persistent in the job market, can be emotionally depleting. Working through your thoughts and feeling about work, setting boundaries with co-workers, engaging in assertive communication to get your needs met, and staying disciplined and focused about finding a new job or switching careers, are worthwhile projects that can feel less daunting with the support, structure, and focus that therapy can provide. If you are currently working on your relationship with work, you don’t have to navigate it alone!