Sleep coaches primarily treated newborns (and their tired parents). But recently, as concerns about sleep have grown, adults have found they too need help with their habits. A 2023 Gallup poll found that 57 percent of Americans think they would feel better with more sleep, up from just 43 percent in 2013. Only a quarter of those surveyed reported typically getting the recommended eight or more hours per night — down from 34 percent 10 years ago.
Sleep professionals are seizing the opportunity to help adults achieve their dream of waking up rested. WIRED spoke to a sleep consultant who, after working with children for years, reached out to that underserved population. She says it’s entirely possible to change daytime and nighttime habits for better sleep. Why not start tonight?
Usually, an adult One of two things comes to me: First, a major life event – work stress, having a baby, losing a parent, the end of a relationship – destabilizes their system. Sleep is always the first thing to go. The second is that they have a chronic pattern. There are people who actually struggle with sleep since childhood, and then it becomes a part of the way they see themselves. They’ve tried everything, and then they say, “I’m an insomniac.”
In both cases, they are exhausted. I always laugh, because when I get cornered at a dinner party it’s like, “Oh, I just have a little question. I haven’t slept through the night in 19 years.”
I have been a sleep consultant for over 20 years. After receiving my master’s degree in clinical psychology, I began practicing sleep for children. I was working with a lot of parents, and I started to see a really common problem: their kids’ sleep problems were literally pushing them to the brink of divorce.
Even once I got my kids to be great sleepers, parents were still struggling with long-established habits my kids had formed before they arrived. That’s when I realized I needed to help adults too.
There are camps: trouble falling asleep or trouble waking up at night – or both. So that’s my job: to uncover the mystery that keeps someone up at night. Some of the most difficult cases are those of people who focus only on their nighttime habits and do not disclose things that happen during the day.
A client of mine had been having trouble sleeping at night for several years. We realized that they eat most of their calories at night, and none during the day. So they stayed awake to eat, and this completely wrecked their system.
Another client, a woman who exercised all the time and drank 200 ounces of water a day, never made the connection that she was literally getting up every hour to pee. We had to reduce the amount of water he drank and at a certain time he had to stop drinking water.
Sometimes people actually stop working. I’m thinking of a mom who says, “I forgot to wear my child’s seat belt in my car.” “I put my keys in the refrigerator.”
I’ll start with the basics. Of course, we’re doing sleep hygiene, but it’s also anything you can search on Google: get blackout shades, have a sleep sanctuary. Most people think they have a good setup, but their habits or their environment are working against them. This is where coaching helps, because I can identify what they are lacking.
People have these stories they tell themselves, like, “If I sleep, it means I’m not working hard enough” or “I’m young and I don’t need as much sleep.” What new story can you tell yourself about sleep? From there, I use a lot of journaling, cognitive behavioral therapy techniques, mindset work, breath work.
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