This is a grounding exercise for when you are feeling anxious. Anxiety takes us out of the body and into our thoughts. This exercise puts us back in our bodies and in the present moment. You can practice this anywhere, anytime. This exercise is also known as 'square breathing.'

Square breathing is a grounding exercise that brings you back to the present moment and your body, easing anxiety.

Reduce Anxiety - Grounding

A tale about Jim and the time he accidentally lassoed Father Time. A story by Lyman Frank Baum.

Jim's accidental lassoing of Father Time is recounted in a short story by Lyman Frank Baum.

Father Time

Explore the consequences of an ambitious Claribel Sudds when she pays a visit to an ancient chemist to make her dreams come true. A story written by Lyman Frank Baum.

Claribel Sudds visits an ancient chemist to fulfill her dreams with unforeseen consequences. Story by Lyman Frank Baum.

The Magic Bon Bons

Little Martha is very curious about the large and heavy trunk in the attic of her home. While her parents are out for the day, she decides she must see what is in that trunk. A story by Lyman Frank Baum.

Curious girl seeks to uncover contents of mysterious trunk in Baum's short story.

The Box of Robbers

Simple has his first experience at a coastal beach with his two humans, Mom, and Best Friend.

Simple goes to the beach with his humans for the first time with Mom and Best Friend.

Simple's Beach Adventure

Animals are interesting creatures; they might even be angels.

Animals, possibly celestial beings, captivate with their fascinating nature.

How I Know Simple Is an Angel

Our thought habits influence our beliefs, emotions, and behaviors, but we can form new thought habits by practicing changing the way we think.

Changing Thought Habits

Insomnia is diagnosed by a mental health professional who should be consulted before starting a program such as CBT-i. If you are a person with insomnia, we’ll talk about how you got there using the 3 P model; predisposition, precipitation, and perpetuation.

Insomnia diagnosis requires consulting a mental health professional before starting CBT-i program; 3 P model used to identify causes.

Understanding Insomnia

A brief description of the body's recognition of a stressor and how it might respond.

Summary: The body's recognition of stressors and its response explained briefly.

Stress Response & Relaxation Response

The last two tracks had a ton of information so in this one, we’ll slow it down so you know exactly what you are doing over the next few weeks. We are working on stimulus control and sleep restriction at the same time. This is the behavioral side of the program. So, take out a piece of paper or open your notes on your phone and get ready to put some things down.

This week's goal is to work on behavioral aspects of the program- stimulus control and sleep restriction. Take notes to track your progress.

Putting It All Into Practice

The goal with stimulus control is to increase the value of your bed for sleep and decrease the value of your bed for other activities. Another way to think about it is a cue or trigger. Like how a dog is cued for a walk when their human grabs their leash; they associate the leash with walking. When in your bed or bedroom, there are things you are cued to...reading, scrolling under a comfy blanket, turning on the tv. These become associated with your bed.

Stimulus control aims to increase the association of bed with sleep and decrease its association with other activities like reading, scrolling, etc.

Stimulus Control

The first step in CBT-i is to track your sleep with a sleep diary. The sleep diary helps you to understand your current sleep patterns a bit better and to understand the quality of your sleep and how much time you are spending asleep and awake throughout the night. Sleep Diary & instructions here: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1_2gK5ke2K_yN917oVsTU2HZhPjtSB3Xb

Track your sleep with a diary to understand your sleep patterns and quality of sleep in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-i).

Sleep Diary

In this practice, we are going to challenge the thoughts you wrote down from the last practice. Take one unhelpful thought and we’ll take some time to look for evidence for and against this thought. This is to help debunk this thinking...take the power away from this thinking.

Challenge and debunk unhelpful thoughts by finding evidence for and against them to take away their power.

Challenging Your Thoughts CBT-i

Here we go over where you are now and what to do after completing CBT-i. This includes what to do if you relapse and how to prevent relapse.

Learn how to prevent relapse and what to do if you relapse after completing CBT-i for sleep disorders.

Relapse Prevention

There are two processes at work when it comes to sleep: the homeostatic process and the circadian rhythm process. Here is a brief overview of both.

Sleep involves two processes: the homeostatic process and the circadian rhythm process.

Understanding Sleep

The thoughts we entertain influence our beliefs, our behaviors, and our emotions. When suffering from insomnia, it is common to have thoughts about sleeping that are unhelpful.

Unhelpful thoughts during insomnia affect beliefs, behaviors, and emotions.

Cognitive Restructuring CBT-i

Here we will practice identifying unhelpful thoughts you have around sleep. Situation, unhelpful thought, emotion & percentage.

Practice identifying unhelpful thoughts about sleep through situation, unhelpful thought, emotion, and percentage.

Identifying Unhelpful Thinking CBT-i

Christine Mangum

Mental Health Therapist

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