Inside Dr Creado’s Overcoming Insomnia Program And The Drug-Free Strategies It Uses To Restore Sleep

Many people know what tired feels like, but insomnia is something else. It is lying awake at 2 a.m. trying bargaining, breathing techniques, and mental math. It is waking up after a full night in bed and still feeling like you never really slept. It is brain fog, irritability, and a constant worry that tonight might be just as bad as last night.

Overcoming Insomnia, taught by sleep specialist Dr Shane Creado through Amen University, is built for that reality. Instead of offering another quick tip list, the course walks you through a structured, drug free, science based roadmap for understanding why you are not sleeping and what to change, step by step, so your nights and days start to feel different.

What The Overcoming Insomnia Program Is Designed To Do

This course is meant for people who struggle with getting to sleep, staying asleep, or waking too early, and for those who wake feeling unrefreshed even when they think they had enough hours in bed. It is also useful for loved ones and professionals who want a clearer picture of how sleep works and what actually helps.

A Focus On Drug Free, Evidence Based Tools

The program puts its emphasis on non medication strategies. That includes behavioral changes, environmental adjustments, and thought based tools drawn from approaches like cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, as well as practical sleep hygiene. The message is not that medication is always wrong. It is that many people can improve sleep using methods that strengthen the brain’s own ability to sleep.

Throughout the course, you are encouraged to work with your own clinician when you have complex medical issues or are taking medications that affect sleep. The training is educational. It does not replace individualized medical advice.

From Vague Advice To A Clear Plan

Most people with insomnia have already heard generic guidance, avoid screens, relax before bed, cut caffeine. These ideas are not useless, but they are not a plan. Overcoming Insomnia organizes what science knows about sleep into a sequence of steps, so you can move from guessing to testing specific changes in a sensible order.

How The Overcoming Insomnia Course Is Structured

The course is delivered online through a series of video lessons taught by Dr Creado, a board certified sleep specialist who also works within the broader Amen Clinics brain health model. The lessons are divided into manageable segments so you can watch and revisit them without needing long stretches of free time.

Clear Phases Of The Roadmap

Although exact module names may vary, the program generally follows several phases:

• Understanding how normal sleep works and why insomnia develops.
• Identifying your personal sleep patterns and triggers.
• Adjusting behaviors and schedules that keep insomnia going.
• Optimizing your sleep environment and evening routine.
• Working with thoughts, beliefs, and anxiety about sleep.
• Addressing lifestyle and medical factors that interfere with rest.

Each phase builds on the previous one. Instead of throwing every possible technique at you at once, the course shows you when and how to apply each strategy.

Worksheets, Sleep Logs, And Practical Exercises

In addition to video teaching, Overcoming Insomnia includes written materials such as sleep diaries, questionnaires, and checklists. These tools help you track bedtime, wake time, awakenings, caffeine use, and other factors that influence sleep. They are not busywork. They give you a clearer picture of your patterns and help you measure change as you work through the program.

By the end of the course, you have more than information. You have a personal record of what contributes to your insomnia and what helps.

The Science Based Framework Behind The Program

Overcoming Insomnia rests on well established principles from sleep medicine and behavioral science. Understanding these principles makes the strategies feel less random and more logical.

Sleep Drive And Circadian Rhythm

Two key systems control your sleep. The first is sleep drive, which builds pressure to sleep the longer you stay awake. The second is your circadian rhythm, your internal clock that tells your body when to feel alert and when to feel sleepy across the 24 hour day.

Many home remedies for insomnia ignore one or both of these systems. In contrast, the program shows you how irregular schedules, excessive daytime napping, or long time in bed can weaken your sleep drive, and how light exposure, shift work, or inconsistent bedtimes can confuse your circadian rhythm.

Conditioned Insomnia

Over time, the brain can learn to associate the bed with frustration, worry, and wakefulness instead of sleep. This is called conditioned insomnia. You may feel sleepy on the couch but become wide awake the moment you lie down. The course explains how this conditioning happens and how to reverse it using specific behavioral changes.

Once you see that your brain has learned insomnia as a pattern, it becomes easier to understand why random tips rarely help and why a structured plan can.

Drug Free Strategies The Course Teaches

The heart of Overcoming Insomnia lies in the concrete actions it guides you to test. These strategies are practical and designed to be tailored to your situation.

Strengthening The Link Between Bed And Sleep

One of the main tools you learn is improving stimulus control, which means teaching your brain that bed is for sleep and intimacy, not for worrying, scrolling, or problem solving. You are encouraged to:

• Go to bed only when you are genuinely sleepy, not just because the clock says you should.
• Get out of bed if you cannot sleep after a reasonable period, instead of lying there in frustration.
• Avoid using the bed for wake activities like watching television, working, or using your phone.

These steps may feel uncomfortable at first, but they gradually help the brain rebuild a strong connection between your bed and the act of falling asleep.

Adjusting Time In Bed To Match Actual Sleep

Another technique drawn from behavioral sleep medicine is sleep scheduling. People with insomnia often spend more and more time in bed trying to catch up, which can backfire by weakening sleep drive. Dr Creado explains how to match your time in bed more closely to your actual sleep time, then slowly expand it as your sleep becomes more solid.

This process should be handled carefully, especially if you have certain medical conditions, which is why the course repeatedly emphasizes working with your healthcare provider where needed.

Calming The Body And Mind Before Bed

Overcoming Insomnia includes guidance on creating an evening routine that signals to your brain that the day is winding down. This may involve simple relaxation techniques, reducing stimulating activities and bright light in the hour before bed, and planning the next day earlier in the evening so you are not trying to solve problems at midnight.

Instead of offering a rigid ritual, the program gives principles you can adapt around your own preferences and schedule.

Changing Your Relationship With Sleep Worry

Many people with chronic insomnia are not only tired. They are afraid of being tired. They monitor every sensation, count lost hours, and brace themselves for the next day. That worry itself keeps the brain in a more alert state.

Dr Creado addresses this by teaching cognitive strategies drawn from researched insomnia treatments. You learn to notice and question thoughts such as I will not cope tomorrow or I am broken because I cannot sleep. By testing these beliefs against real evidence and replacing them with more balanced statements, you can reduce anxiety around sleep, which makes it easier to drift off.

Aligning Daily Habits With Sleep Goals

The course also looks beyond the bedroom. Caffeine timing, alcohol use, late heavy meals, irregular exercise, and constant screen time all feed into how your brain sleeps. You are encouraged to adjust these factors one by one, based on science about how they affect sleep architecture and brain recovery.

The emphasis is on realistic change, not perfection. Even shifting caffeine earlier, adding daylight exposure in the morning, or moving vigorous exercise away from bedtime can support better rest.

How This Program Fits With Amen Style Brain Health

Because Overcoming Insomnia is part of Amen University, it does more than talk about sleep in isolation. The program connects sleep to broader brain health. You learn how poor sleep affects mood, memory, decision making, and long term brain aging, and how brain issues such as anxiety, depression, or head trauma can disrupt sleep in return.

This two way view is helpful. Instead of seeing insomnia as a separate problem, you see it as part of a larger picture of how well your brain is functioning overall. That perspective can motivate change and guide conversations with your doctor or therapist.

Who Overcoming Insomnia Tends To Help Most

This course is often a good fit for people who:

• Have trouble falling or staying asleep several nights a week.
• Wake feeling unrefreshed and struggle with daytime fatigue or brain fog.
• Prefer to focus on behavioral and lifestyle tools rather than starting with medications.
• Are willing to track their sleep patterns and make gradual, structured changes.

It is less suited as a stand alone solution for people with severe untreated medical conditions such as uncontrolled sleep apnea, advanced psychiatric disorders, or those in acute crisis. In those situations, direct medical or mental health care is the first priority, and the course can function as a helpful complement.

Getting The Most From Dr Creado’s Overcoming Insomnia Program

As with any educational program, the benefit you receive depends on how you use it. Watching all the lessons in a weekend without changing your habits will not move much. A steadier, more deliberate approach usually works better.

• Move at a sustainable pace. Watch one or two lessons at a time and apply the strategies before advancing.
• Fill out the logs. Use the sleep diaries and checklists even if they feel repetitive. They give you and your clinician valuable information.
• Involve your household. Let family members know what you are trying so they can support quiet routines and schedule changes.
• Coordinate with your doctor. Share what you are learning, especially if you are on sleep related medication or have other health problems.
• Expect gradual progress. Insomnia patterns often build over months or years. It is reasonable for improvements to arrive in stages rather than overnight.

Used this way, Dr Creado’s Overcoming Insomnia program becomes more than a set of sleep tips. It can serve as a structured, drug free roadmap that helps you understand your own sleep, make targeted changes, and move toward nights that restore your brain instead of draining it.