Ep 64. Grieving the Life You Had Before Insomnia

When insomnia shows up, it can feel like more than lost sleep. 

You may grieve the loss of freedom, spontaneity, and the trust you once had.

In this episode, Beth talks about:

• Why grief is a normal part of insomnia recovery
• The two main ways it shows up
• How it changes over time and becomes a source of wisdom
• Her own story of loss, healing, and learning to trust life again

If you’ve ever felt sad about how much insomnia has taken from you, this episode will help you feel understood, connected, and hopeful. 

 

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Work with Beth:

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About Beth Kendall MA, FNTP:

For decades, Beth struggled with the relentless grip of insomnia. After finally understanding insomnia from a mind-body perspective, she changed her relationship with sleep, and completely recovered. Liberated from the constant worry of not sleeping, she’s on a mission to help others recover as well. Her transformative program Mind. Body. Sleep.® has been a beacon of light for hundreds of others seeking solace from sleepless nights. 

 

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The Hidden Grief Behind Insomnia

Grief is one of the most common, yet most overlooked, parts of insomnia. You don’t hear much about it, but it’s something almost everyone who’s struggled with sleep has felt in some way.

And it makes sense, doesn’t it?

When insomnia takes hold, it’s not just the loss of sleep that hurts. It’s everything that sleep touches—your energy, your peace of mind, your sense of safety in your own body.

So in this post, I want to explore grief as it relates to insomnia, and how, over time, it can transform into something softer, wiser, and even healing.

When Sleep Feels Like It’s Been Taken Away

If you look up the definition of grief, it’s simply a natural response to loss. It’s the brain’s way of reorganizing around a new reality after something we valued or relied on has changed or disappeared.

And while grief is often associated with death, we can grieve all kinds of things: a relationship, a phase of life, our health, or even an old identity. For people with insomnia, there’s often a quiet, background grief that comes with the perceived loss of your ability to sleep.

It can feel like life suddenly splits into two versions: life before insomnia and life after insomnia. And for many people, that contrast can feel incredibly stark.

The First Kind of Grief: Missing Your Old Life

You’re not just grieving the loss of sleep itself—you’re grieving the life that used to feel free and easy.

You might miss the version of yourself who stayed out late, made plans without hesitation, or simply lived without sleep ever crossing your mind. You might grieve the spontaneity, the fun, the sense of being fully present in your life.

And perhaps most of all, you might grieve the sense of safety that gets shaken when sleep starts to feel uncertain.

That kind of grief runs deep because it’s connected to our identity. It can feel like you’ve lost a part of yourself and don’t know if or when it will ever return.

When I think back to my own life with insomnia, that’s what stands out most—how much it seemed to steal my inner freedom.

It’s not that I wasn’t living life. I was. There were wonderful moments and milestones along the way. But I never fully enjoyed them, because everything revolved around the status of my sleep.

That constant calculation of “Will I sleep tonight?” or “Can I handle this tomorrow if I don’t?” quietly robs so much joy.

When Grief Shows Up Like Envy

Because insomnia began so early in my life, I didn’t have a “before.” There was no clear dividing line between life with and without it—it was simply my reality.

For me, grief showed up more as envy. I envied people who could sleep easily. I envied that they could live freely, have fun, travel, drink caffeine, and never once think about it.

But looking back now, I can see that it wasn’t really envy. It was sadness.

Sadness for the version of me who felt like everything was a struggle. Sadness for the girl who thought she was missing out on life.

Those were hard times.

The Second Kind of Grief: After Recovery

Then there’s the other kind of grief—the one that can appear later, when you’re finally sleeping again.

This stage often surprises people.

Sleep is mostly back on track, the fear has quieted, and you’re not thinking about insomnia all the time anymore. But something still feels off.

For some, this stage feels smooth. They slip right back into life and never look back. But for others, it’s more complicated. Maybe it’s not the relief they imagined. Maybe they don’t know how to process everything they’ve been through. Or maybe they think, “I should be happy now that I’m sleeping... why don’t I feel that way?”

It can even feel lonely, because people around you can’t fully understand what you’ve just lived through.

My Own Reintegration: Learning to Live Again

I know that feeling well.

After being on disability for five years with Lyme disease—mostly bed-bound or house-bound—stepping back into life was disorienting.

I thought I’d just snap back, like flipping a switch. But that’s not what happened.

I felt like an alien in my own world. People treated me like the old me, but I wasn’t her anymore. It was as if I’d returned from another planet, one where survival had been my whole existence.

And after so many years of that, small talk and daily routines felt strange, even meaningless.

That period was my reintegration phase—learning how to live again.

And alongside the relief of healing, there was also guilt. Many of my friends from that chapter were still sick. I grieved for them, and I grieved for the years that were gone.

The Invisible Battle

I remember thinking, I’ve come out of this terribly difficult thing, spent everything I had searching for help, only to be healed by the backyard bee.

I finally got my health back—but now I had to rebuild everything from scratch?

There was no reward, no celebration, no acknowledgment of what I’d been through.

It felt like I’d been through an invisible battle that no one could see or understand.

And that’s what insomnia can feel like too. It’s invisible. People can’t always see the courage it takes to simply keep going.

Finding the Beauty Within the Grief

What helped me move through that phase was realizing that yes, there was a lot of grief to process—but there was also beauty within it.

You’ve probably heard me talk about the law of polarity, how you can’t have one end of the spectrum without the other. I’ve had plenty of grief in my life, but I’ve also had plenty of love.

And honestly, that’s the kind of life I’ve always wanted. The full enchilada, so to speak.

If you’re processing grief right now, please know it’s completely normal.

We humans love to judge our emotions and tell ourselves we shouldn’t feel what we’re feeling. But if you’re experiencing grief, then you’re experiencing grief. It just means you’re human—and humans feel things.

Integration Is Healing

Give yourself time and grace to move through it.

Your nervous system is integrating a painful chapter of your life, and integration is healing, even if it doesn’t feel like it yet.

In time, grief shifts. It softens. It goes from feeling unbearably heavy to feeling lighter, more bearable—maybe even meaningful.

That’s often when we start to look for an emotional bridge, a way to step into something new, or to hold the past in a way that feels more okay.

For me, that part was powerful. Because the way we hold the past shapes how we create the future.

Letting Go of the Pain, Holding on to the Wisdom

One teaching that has always stayed with me is this: let go of the pain, but hold on to the wisdom.

That idea changed everything. Extracting the wisdom from what I’d been through felt empowering, like turning lead into gold.

Wisdom is, in many ways, the most valuable thing we carry forward.

And maybe that’s the real gift inside of grief—it deepens us. It opens us. It teaches us surrender. And surrender, I think, is the closest thing to true freedom there is.

A Deeper Trust

My suffering was immense during that chapter of life, but it was in that moment of complete surrender that everything shifted.

Would I have reached that level of trust without going that low? Honestly, probably not.

So in many ways, I’m grateful.

Because everything I went through brought me into deeper trust—not just in my body and its innate intelligence, but in life itself.

This work, for me, has always been about going deeper and deeper into that trust. And every experience along the way has made space for more of it.

If You’re in the Middle of Grief Right Now...

Be gentle with yourself.

You’re not broken, and nothing has gone wrong.

You’re simply in the process of integrating a chapter of your story. And with time, understanding, and self-compassion, that heaviness will soften.

Grief may change you, but it can also grow you.

And that, too, is part of healing 🧡

Love, Beth