08/28/2026
She Could Sleep During The Day. But At Night, She Didn't Feel Safe And Desperately Wanted To Know Why.
Ada was in her lower 30s and struggling with som**hing she couldn't explain. She couldn't sleep at night. During the day, she could sleep without a problem. But like most people, she worked during the day and needed to sleep at night.
There was one exception. If her boyfriend stayed over, she slept just fine. When he wasn't there, she struggled.
When I asked Ada what she experienced when she tried to sleep alone, one word stood out: “Safe.” She didn't feel safe sleeping alone at night.
So I started asking about her past. Had som**hing happened at night that might've taught her that sleeping at night wasn't safe? She couldn't think of anything. We explored several other possibilities, but som**hing kept pulling me back to that word and the connection to nighttime.
Eventually, Ada remembered som**hing from childhood. She had been mo**sted by her stepfather.
As a child, she'd discovered som**hing important: if her bedroom light was on and she was awake, he wouldn't come into her room to mo**st her. But if the light was off and she was asleep, sometimes he would.
And suddenly, the problem she'd been experiencing in her 30s made sense. Her circumstances had changed decades ago. Her Trauma Structure hadn't.
Her mind had learned:
Trauma Root: “I'm not safe sleeping at night alone.”
From that belief came a perspective in which nighttime sleep represented vulnerability and staying awake represented safety. During the day, she could sleep. At night with her boyfriend beside her, she could sleep. But alone at night, the old structure continued doing exactly what it had learned to do as a child: Keep her awake to keep her safe.
Her insomnia wasn't random. Within the structure created by her experience, it made perfect sense.
Once we could see that, we had som**hing we could consciously transform. I helped Ada empower the powerlessness connected to that childhood experience with truths that reflected the reality she lived in now.
One of those truths was simple:
“I sleep at night just as easily as everyone else.”
We explored the perspectives that naturally grow from that truth, including feeling safe sleeping alone, and the behavior that follows: simply being able to go to bed at night and sleep.
Using repetitive suggestive statements, I helped reinforce that truth without giving the old Trauma Structure an opportunity to immediately tear it apart using the same logic and reasoning that had protected her as a child.
The change wasn't instantaneous. It took about three nights. Then her mind adopted the new perspective.
Ada could sleep at night. Alone. Whether her boyfriend was there or not. And the problem that had controlled her nights was no longer controlling them.
She was so grateful for what she'd experienced that she later referred four other people to me for help with their own trauma.
This is why I keep saying: Trauma has structure.
Ada wasn't a child anymore. Her stepfather wasn't entering her bedroom anymore. But a structure created during that experience was still influencing her behavior decades later.
Once we uncovered the root, we could stop fighting the symptom and transform what was feeding it.
That's what it means to transform Trauma Roots into the foundation of your Tree of Light.
Sometimes the thing you're struggling with today makes absolutely no sense...
until you discover what taught you to do it in the first place.