Dr. Alok 'Dr. K' Kanojia

So distracting yourself is one of the worst things that you can do with anxiety.

is um a couple of things like actually a couple of things one is melatonin so there are studies that show let me see if i can find the paper modified circadian rhythm oh yeah there's another thing that we need to talk about so there's another part of our brain that activates when we go to bed and that is the default mode network so the default mode network

Worry about things I can't control, imagine worst-case scenarios, replay conversations.

And if we sort of look at this, I keep busy, I push my thoughts aside,

Every worry comes back.

So I toss and turn bills, relationships, future plans, regrets all flood at once.

So I don't know if this makes sense, but the things that we worry about, oftentimes when we're anxious, relate to ourselves.

Did I mess that up?

So the default mode network activates.

And there's research that shows that when we go to bed at night, the default mode network also increases in activity.

So what's natural to think about when we go to bed?

We think about ourselves.

We think about the day.

We think about tomorrow.

That's also a feature, not a bug.

So we're trying to think about ourselves a little bit, processing, thinking about what we could do differently.

But this is also why if you have anxiety and depression, this is really, really, really bad.

So people with anxiety, depression, people with anxiety and people with depression will both have problems with insomnia.

And when you have both of them together, it's because of the hyperactivity of the default mode network that really triggers both.

So you start thinking about yourself a lot.