I know everyone's experience is different. But I thought I'd share mine. I used to have insomnia really bad. I wanted to die so urgently, it felt like walking around with full bowels needing to take a shit. So much so that it didn't even feel suicidal. They say sleep is the imperfect death, and death the perfect sleep. Me wanting to die was an extension of me wanting to sleep. I didn't see it that way back then. I did manage to get past this stage in my life. Anxiety, sleeplessness, aversion and rumination constantly fed into each other making my inner world a living hell.
One day I ran into a book called the mindfulness way through depression. I found the audiobook and started listening to it at night when I wanted to go to sleep. I basically converted my insomnia time to reading/listening time. Interestingly enough, I learned how I was creating my own condition with my own thoughts. At least how I was making it worse and sustaining it. The book explained how not to do this. I used to laugh at these things. But the book was written as if it was a story about me. The first night I lay down with the audiobook I managed to get through almost 3 hours of it. If I remember correctly it was five hours in total. The next day I could only get through about 45 minutes. Every day I listen to the audiobook, the shorter my listening time got.
By the end of it I was humble enough to try the included guided mindfulness meditation. The meditation lasts about 30 minutes. If I remember correctly I got through it a few days, but even that started to shorten day by day. I found myself not getting through five minutes of it before falling asleep.
A month later I look back on my life and startled inside, as if I was looking down from a tall building. I could perceive the difference between the person I became and the person I was a month ago. It didn't change my condition. I live with extremely intrusive hallucinations. Parts of my brain responsible for processing site are intertwined with other parts of my brain causing Points of light, flashes and blotches to manifest in my vision. Even with eyes closed. It's constant stress. None of this changed, but I changed. This whole process took a lot of weight off of this even though it's still plagues me till today. Like a constant torture.
I lost that feeling of having to take a shit. But I also lost appreciation for life in the process. But I'm not gonna lie, I am glad I didn't do it back then. My life took a turn shortly after that would become some of the most beautiful memories I've ever had. Even though they didn't last. I consider myself extremely fortunate and privileged to have been allowed to experience that short time of bliss. Although I still do have days where I find it hard to fall asleep, insomnia as a condition never came back.