The last time I slept poorly

Hi there, it’s been a while. I hope you’re doing well. ❤️

About a week ago, I spent a week at a seminar and had to sleep in a hotel. The room was alright, but the ambience... not ideal. Every single night, a group of very enthusiastic frogs held a full-on concert at the nearby lake. On top of that, I had what might have been the most uncomfortable pillows in the world – seriously, they gave me neck pain and a headache.

Many of those nights were pretty disrupted. One was nearly completely sleepless. My mind didn’t want to shut down – I kept thinking about everything that had happened during the day. The pillow was making my head sore. The frogs were louder than usual. The whole night felt like drifting in a shallow fog. If I had to guess how much I slept, I’d say maybe two very shallow hours… if that.

And you know what?

Thinking back to my insomnia days, a night like that would’ve completely freaked me out. I would’ve spent hours trying to reassure myself, trying to “save the situation”, desperately waiting for sleep to come. Not to mention the next day: the whole day would’ve revolved around that night – analyzing it, fearing the next one.

Now? There was nothing. Zero sleep anxiety. Zero desire to fix it. It honestly didn’t even cross my mind to do anything about it.

Did I enjoy that night? Absolutely not. It was annoying, it was long and boring… But it was also completely ordinary.

I got up at 6 a.m. because the seminar started early and I had some work I wanted to finish before that. Later, I went to an evening yoga nidra class, played cards, caught up with friends I made on a seminar. It was a long day on very little sleep – and it was fine. Sure, I felt tired at moments, but it was understandable, normal tiredness. I drank more coffee than usual to stay focused. But none of it was scary, no panic, no mental spin.

And the nights that followed were totally normal again.

Back when I was struggling, I doubted whether it was truly possible to be completely free from the fear. I wasn’t sure if that was realistic.

Now I know: it is.

In my 1:1 work, I often get asked: “What does recovery really mean?”

And this is what I keep telling people: after recovery, you can still have a rough night. Of course you can – that’s just part of life. Bad pillows, noisy frogs, a racing mind. We can’t avoid that. I’m sure I’ll have more sleepless nights in the future, just like anyone else.

But a life without the fear, without the obsession, the spiraling, the pressure – is absolutely available to anyone.

It took me over a year to overcome the big fear – the one that used to throw me into a spiral after every imperfect night.

But it took even longer for the residual echoes of anxiety to fully fade. For a long time, anytime I had a choppy night, there was still a little flicker of tension. A little mental check-in: “Is this going to be a thing again?”

It didn’t throw me into a spiral anymore – but it still showed up.

So my message is this: yes, it’s absolutely possible to get to a place where we don’t think about this. Where it’s no longer a thing. Where sleep is just sleep, and wakefulness is just wakefulness.

But it doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time. Sometimes, it takes a long time.

And that’s okay. That’s normal. It doesn’t mean something is wrong or that you aren’t moving fast enough. It just means this is a process – a real, gradual, human process.

Take care ❤️

Fearless Sleep Library
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