The Truth About Asomnorexia
For decades I’ve carried a burden that feels unshakable: I don’t deserve any good thing! But Jesus says something different!
Warning: this article discusses self-harm, but ends in mercy and hope.
NB: I am not a medical or psychiatric professional. Please take this article as a suggestion only, and seek professional help for sleep issues or self-harm.
When someone did something nice for my Mom, she’d put her hand over her heart and, intending to express gratitude, exclaim “Oh I don’t deserve to LIVE!” She didn’t mean it literally, but our bodies hear what our mouths say as literal.
So, I internalized that to my utter core: if someone does something nice for me, I don’t deserve to live.
And for decades I’ve carried a burden that feels unshakable: I don’t deserve any good thing, though I must keep striving to achieve good things and give the best I can to others. 24/7. In fact, because I can never do enough to deserve good things (if I get them, I should die), the best I can do is to stumble forward in a kind of exhausted living death, depriving myself of rest as much as I can. My body chose to identify sleep as the weakness keeping me from being good enough.
Trying to identify this disordered thinking, I searched the experts to find a term for my compulsion to put off sleep. I found nothing. It’s not insomnia, caused either by physical malfunction or psychological factors like anxiety which thwarts sleep despite a strong desire for it. It’s not even “somnophobia” — a fear of falling asleep. It is, straight-up, a self-harming behavior of refusing to sleep because it’s a waste of time, and I don’t deserve it. I shouldn’t need it. “Sleep is for the weak.” So I came up with my own term: Asomnorexia.
My disorder is like an infernal translator that turns everything I hear into evidence that the disordered thinking is true: unless I’ve used today as well as possible, I don’t deserve to sleep. For example, my daughter showed me a cute meme that said, “Life is short. Stay up late.” It means, “Don’t worry. Have another s’more.” But what did my asomnorexia hear? “You’re wasting precious time. Be conscious for all of it, feeble loser.”
This applies to hearing scripture, too. I hear “pray without ceasing”, “on your law I meditate day and night”, “be ever watchful”, and my disorder translates God’s loving words into “you should spend every drop of your blood and effort and never, ever rest”, as though the Lord wants to wring me out and toss my used-up carcass on the pile. For his perverse glory.
Risking triggering your infernal translator to twist these words as you read them, I present you a foundational scripture in the fight against asomnorexia:
“It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.” (Psalm 127:2 ESV)
The infernal translator says that this means “My work is pointless, but I’m not one of the good people who deserve to rest. Guess I’ll try to stay awake forever.”
This is a tool of the enemy, as much as self-starving and myriad other self-cruelties, to steal your peace, your wellness and, most importantly, to scream in your ears that God doesn’t love you. Because you don’t deserve his love, he can’t or won’t love you.
Please let me re-translate this verse for you? Try this on: “My Beloved, I formed you to be an Asleep Person for ⅓ or more of your life. Your body is made to pause. I love my sleeping creation.”
Handed this gift, do I respond, “Oh I don’t deserve to LIVE!” Or do I allow my mouth to say what my heart longs to hear: “Blessed are you, Lord God of the Universe, who gives to your beloved sleep. And that’s me. I’m your beloved.”
The truth is that you do deserve to live (if you’ll allow me to use the word “deserve” in the sense of “having a right to something that’s been given to you”). You do deserve sleep. Not because you’ve earned it, but because God gives it to you, and now it is yours. He declares you his beloved child purely because of Jesus’ love. Every child deserves a safe and comfortable place to sleep. And if God says you deserve sleep, then no one can argue with him. Not the devil, not the internet, not even you!
The self-harming habit doesn’t evaporate once your brain knows what’s true. Recovery is the long, practical journey of bringing thoughts, emotions and bodily sensations to receive what’s true: you are the beloved. Signpost Inn exists to help bridge the gap between knowing and living. We have lots of resources to help you heal and deepen your relationship with Jesus.
But for now, dare to go to bed early tonight reciting the 23rd Psalm over and over, asking Jesus if it’s really ok for you to lie down, even if you feel like you don’t deserve it. He gives to his beloved sleep.
p.s. For those who struggle to sleep for other reasons: you are, of course, also beloved, and are enduring real suffering that deprives you of the gift of rest. God bless you for desiring this good gift.
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Provisions for the Road
Psalm 23 - 1 Hour Audio
If you could relate to Liv's article, this is especially for you! Whenever I (Ashley) have trouble sleeping, I love to listen to the Psalms. They always calm my mind, and help to keep anxious or intrusive thoughts at bay.
This video is an audio version of Psalm 23, with soft music in the background, perfect for helping your heart and mind receive the gift of sleep. It loops for an hour, giving you lots of time to relax.
Food for Thought
Things the team found interesting this week, no endorsement implied.
Hello, glass eyes.
by Liv Booth on Substack
“A dragon sees me in a crystal ball.
He rolls it in its fringed socket, speared through with light.
A beam pricks through and out the other side,
A bright stain where a lower lid should be…”
Why we're less broken than we expected | Seen & Unseen
“What would you stop carrying if you stopped expecting the world to be easier than it is?”
The Exorcist and the UFO Files
By Dr. Sean Tobin on Substack
The Strange Agreement Between UFO Believers and Demon Hunters. “The silence overhead... is not proof that no one is there. It is the sound of our own exile.”
