For years my problem wasn't falling asleep, it was waking at 3am and immediately doing the maths on how little sleep I had left, which just made it worse. The harder I tried to force it, the more awake I got.

What finally helped was CBT-i, the clinical approach for insomnia that sleep clinics use before they ever reach for medication. The counterintuitive part is it tells you to spend less time in bed, not more, so bed stops being the place you lie awake dreading. It genuinely rewired the 3am panic for me over a few weeks.

I felt strongly enough about it that my wife and I ended up building an app around it (Lunara), but honestly even if you never touch an app, look up CBT-i sleep restriction and stimulus control. It is the thing that worked when nothing else did.

One thing I would add, since CBT-i doesn't work for everyone. If it doesn't get you all the way there, the part I am most proud of is the report side. It pulls your real sleep data from Apple Health, Apple Watch, Oura and similar, and turns it into an accurate report you can actually hand to your GP or a sleep clinic, rather than trying to describe your sleep from memory in a ten minute appointment.

Happy to answer anything about what the process actually felt like.

Body: I have been struggling a lot lately with hitting snooze five times every morning no matter how early I go to sleep. A friend recommended getting one of those light alarms that slowly brighten up the room before the sound goes off.

For those of you who have tried them, did it actually make a difference long term or did you just end up getting used to the light and sleeping right through it? Would love to hear if it is worth trying out.