Using Hypnosis for Insomnia for Recovering Alcoholics

From ScienceDaily.com I believe is this article about Alcoholism.

"Insomnia can get in the way for recovering alcoholics. What happens especially in the first few months of recovery, is that there is a loss of the sedative effects of alcohol. In addition, there is also long-term sleep-disrupting impact that alcohol dependence can have on the brain.

A new study gives further evidence that insomnia can get in the way of recovery from alcohol problems. The study also found that a person's perception of how bad their sleep problems are can be just as important as the actual sleep problems themselves.

In the new issue of the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, the research team from the University of Michigan's Department of Psychiatry reports the of a small but thorough evaluation of sleep, sleep perception and alcohol relapse. The study was conducted among 18 men and women with insomnia who were in the early stages of alcohol recovery.

The authors say how important it is for alcohol recovery patients, and those who are helping them through their recovery, to discuss sleep disturbances and seek help. Even though sleep isn't discussed in alcohol recovery programs they feel it should be. "

"The University of Michigan team have started a new study that aims to help those who have just entered treatment for alcohol problems, and are having trouble sleeping. Instead of using sleep medications, (which can be addictive in the own right) they feel that there should be a series of "talk therapy" sessions with a trained sleep therapist who can help patients change behaviors and patterns of thinking that contribute to sleep problems." This is certainly a place where I feel trained hypnotherapists can be of help.

"The researchers also found that those patients who had the biggest disconnect between their perception of how they slept and their actual sleep patterns were most likely to relapse. They felt that the results suggested that long-term drinking causes something to happen in the brain that interferes with both sleep and perception of sleep and therefore, sleep problems must be addressed.

Another interesting fact from the study was that the patients overestimated how long it took them to fall asleep.They thought hey had been awake in the middle of the night for far less time than they actually were. These perceptions about how they slept were actually more accurate in predicting their potential for relapse to alcohol use than were the actual sleep measurements.

The researchers explained that poor sleep quality can lead to mood disturbances and therefore more vulnerable to return to drinking. Previous studies show that nonalcoholics with insomnia actually think they are sleeping worse than they are, so they may be more likely to seek appropriate treatment. "

Read more about the study online by visiting http://www.umengage.org and searching for sleep studies.