Sleep torture: The extreme method that cured a woman’s insomnia

Anna Guthleben went to extreme measures to get a good night’s sleep after suffering from insomnia for years.

After trying everything else she could think of, Ms Guthleben signed up for a sleep retraining trial at Flinders University as a last resort.

“(I had) tried everything, from over-the-counter medication to meditation, doing yoga … I’ve been drinking decaf for years,” she told 3AW’s Dee Dee.

The study Ms Guthleben joined involved a night of sleep torture, with participants being awoken every 20 minutes by a vibrating iPhone attached to their arm.

“By about the forth time I’d managed to get myself to sleep and was woken up in the night I thought ‘oh my god this is going to be hell’,” Ms Guthleben told 3AW’s Dee Dee.

But the night after the study, she noticed an “amazing” change.

“It was absolutely astounding. It was like black and white,” she said.

“On those following nights, and weeks, and months, I put my head on the pillow and it knew it was meant to sleep.”

Press PLAY below to hear more about the sleep study that changed Ms Guthleben’s life.