No matter what caused your sleep issues or how long you've had them, these 4 simple steps are crucial to overcome insomnia naturally.


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Episode Transcript:


Have you tried everything from natural to pharmaceutical? Just to get a good night's rest? Join me, Martha Lewis, certified sleep expert and functional health coach, as I unpack what's really keeping you up at night and how to change it. This is the Sleep Detective podcast and I'm going to show you how to sleep well so you can enjoy your life.


Hello and welcome. It is good to talk to you to today I want to talk about the four simple steps to overcome insomnia. So no matter what caused it or how long you've been struggling, there are literally only four simple steps. And I'm not trying to simplify this too much or make it seem unrealistic. There really are these four steps that I want to talk about today and sleeping. I used to be the best sleeper until age 39 when I got insomnia in late pregnancy.


And it turned out there were a lot of imbalances in my body that caused it and I didn't get better even after I had my son, even after my son was sleeping through the night, even after I had become a pediatric sleep consultant to help parents with their baby's sleep. And so I just want to say that no matter what caused your insomnia, whether there was trauma or mental stress that caused it, or it was after you got sick or had surgery or had a baby or something like that, or you don't know why it happened and whether it happened all of a sudden your sleep changed or it's gradually happened over time and it's just been getting worse over time. No matter what's causing it, there are four simple steps to fix it. So let's talk about the first one. The first step is to start with the essentials.


So what I mean by that are your habits, your diet and your blood sugar. Now, you may know a little bit about habits. If you Google why can't I sleep or how to sleep better, you're going to come across the same generic tips of what to have this long bedtime routine. Don't watch screens before bed, all of those things. There's more to it than that, and there's a lot of confusion and contradictory information and noise out there. But there are some key things you can do during the day and before bed that will set you up for better sleep, but it's not going to be enough if there are imbalances in your body that are also affecting your sleep. So it's also really crucial to look at your diet because if you're eating inflammatory foods or foods you're sensitive to, then that's going to affect your sleep. And blood sugar is also crucial because if you're on this extreme rollercoaster day and night, that's going to wake you up in the middle of the night too. So I call these the essentials or the foundations. This is actually where I start with all of my clients and all of my programs.


So whether even if you're a private one-on-one client or you're in my group program, we're going to still start with these essentials while we're waiting for your test results to come in. And I even have a sleep essentials course that you can purchase for the low cost of $37 on my website and learn all of these essentials, but they are crucial and they're where you want to start for sure. Now the second step is to test your body with functional labs. So I use functional labs that are different than blood work. They show how the different systems in your body are working that will identify exactly what's going on in your body that's keeping you awake, so they will find the imbalances that are affecting your sleep even if your blood work is always normal. Now, there are many possible causes of poor sleep, right?


There can be sex hormone imbalance, high cortisol at night, liver detox issues. An unhealthy gut, especially a pathogen in the gut can keep you awake at night. Neurotransmitter deficiencies, mineral imbalances, toxins like heavy metals and mold. There are all these possible reasons why you weren't sleeping. And the lab tests I use will show what those are, so then we know what to address. Now for this third step, you also need to address the mental aspect of not sleeping. So even if your sleep issues have physical causes, if you worry about sleep, if you talk about how tired you are all the time, if you dread bedtime, if you feel anxious about sleep, then it's gotten in your head as well. So for me, I had a parasite, I had hormone imbalance, I had heavy metals, I had neurotransmitter deficiencies. All of these things were affecting my sleep.


But I also, I talked, I complained about sleep all the time. I complained about how tired I was to anyone who would listen to my husband when I first got up in the morning to my coworkers. When I got to work to my friends and I was constantly researching about sleep and I was trying different supplements about sleep, it pretty much consumed a lot of my thoughts and a lot of my day. And that makes sense. Our bodies need sleep, so we're going to obsess about what we need. That is how our brains protect us and help us get what we need. But it's not helping. It can actually be sabotaging your sleep to feel this anxiety about it. So changing your mindset and negative thought patterns is also a crucial step that can't be overlooked.


Now the fourth step is to then have a plan and follow it to correct both the mental and the physical reasons why you weren't sleeping. The second step is to test your body with functional labs. Those show why you can't sleep. Then you need a plan to get your body back imbalance to correct those imbalances, so then you can sleep normally without waking up all the time, all night long. So following the plan, getting a plan of following the plan is really key. And so this is what I give my clients in the Insomnia Insight Program is I use the lab test to see the imbalances in your body. Then I give you a step-by-step simple plan to get back in balance so then you can sleep normally, and then you also want to have help implementing your plan, right?


I work with many clients who have gone to other practitioners and they've got a list of supplements taken all these changes to make, and it was so overwhelming that they didn't do anything, and so they didn't get better. That plan might've worked, but they didn't have any support in actually implementing that plan. And so in the Insomnia Insight program, I offer daily chat support Monday through Friday and also weekly live group coaching calls. So you always get your questions answered within 24 hours. You don't have to wait a month or two until your next appointment to get those questions answered. Now, you'll also get help following through with your plan by holding you accountable if that's what you need. And by helping you more easily make the changes that we recommend.


A lot of times it's hard to make some of these changes, whether it's diet, whether it's habits, whatever it is. So sometimes our clients have a hard time with one part of the plan or the other, and so we get going on the part that's easy, and then I help them implement the rest of the plan. And we start talking about, okay, in what situations is it hard to implement this? Okay, well, let's start doing it in the situations where it's easy. And then we'll start working on those situations where it's hard. So that way by the end of a few months, you've implemented everything and then you're just able to follow it and then get the results of being able to sleep better as your body gets more back in balance. Now also, sometimes our clients need to refine their plan. For example, a certain supplement might not work for someone, and so then I can recommend an alternative or tell you a way to get it with food.


So you can still fix the imbalances in your body that are affecting your sleep and not just say, well, this one didn't work. Shoot, I guess I'm just going to have to live with this. If you don't fix that imbalance, you probably aren't going to get better. So we want to troubleshoot and refine the plan as necessary. I also work with a lot of clients who are sensitive to supplements, so I really help people stabilize their bodies first and then walk through gradually adding each supplement step by step so that you don't feel overwhelmed so your body doesn't get overwhelmed. And again, so then we're able to start correcting all those imbalances. So in the Insomnia Insight Program, I cover all four of these simple steps to address everything you need to sleep well permanently, so you don't have to depend on medication any longer.


And to recap those steps are the first step is to start with the essentials, looking at habits, diet and blood sugar. Second step is to test your body with functional labs. Find why you aren't sleeping normally. So if you, excuse me, the third step is to address the mental aspect of not sleeping. And then the fourth step is to have and follow a plan to address both the physical and mental reasons why you are awake at night. So we cover all of those. You won't have to see another therapist, another doctor or practitioner about sleep ever again. And I just want to point out, if you lead out any of these steps, you probably won't get better, then you won't be addressing everything that's causing your sleep problems from a body and mind perspective. So let's say you have, I did a parasite and hormone imbalance that are affecting your sleep, so we can address those.


But if I'm also still complaining about sleep, worried about sleep, that's also going to sabotage my sleep. So we need to address both. And same, so many of my clients have done cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, and so that's great. They're addressing the mental part, but if they also have a parasite and hormone imbalance, it's literally keeping them awake. Addressing the mental part isn't enough. So it very much needs to be a body and mind approach. So until now, you haven't been able to get better, you don't know why you can't sleep, and you haven't had a comprehensive plan to fix all the causes of your insomnia. So this is good news, right? Because even though it seems like you've tried everything, you haven't, if you haven't tried this from a body and mind perspective. So in the Insomnia Insight program, you'll know why you aren't sleeping from the lab test.


So in 30 days, we'll have your results back and we'll be able to see exactly what's keeping you awake so you don't have to search for answers online after a bad night's sleep anymore of why can't I sleep? And you'll know exactly what to do to fix it. So no more guessing at random supplements that promise to help with sleep but aren't what your body actually needs. So I will put the link to the information about the Insomnia Insight Program in the comments. You are welcome to message me to comment on this at any time with any of your questions, and I am happy to answer them. But I just want you to know that if you struggled to sleep for a while, you've tried so many different things and you haven't gotten better, it doesn't mean that you have to live with insomnia forever. It just means that something has been missed and we can find and fix everything that is keeping you awake so you don't have to live with insomnia forever and you don't have to take drugs to sleep. All right, thanks for listening, and I will talk to you soon.

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