ZZZs Puh-Leezz!

...It's a real eye-opener what some do in pursuit of quality shut-eye
I found this in an article
By Judy Hevrdejs Chicago Tribune staff reporter Published April 3, 2005
The routines and rituals readers use to coax themselves into dreamland are varied, for sure. Teas and tonics, warm milk and watermelon. Purring air purifiers and fans; all-night radio and CDs. That we have created so many routines isn't surprising. Getting a decent night's sleep is a challenge for half of adult Americans, according to the 2005 Sleep in America poll released last week by the non-profit, Washington, D.C.-based National Sleep Foundation. (And that poll, conducted late last year, doesn't even include the 60 slumbering minutes we just lost in the switch to daylight-saving time.) A recent study by mattress-maker Sealy found 67 percent of pet owners let cats and dogs into bed. One reason for our miserable nights may be that we're not chilling out before we hit the sack, a process that sleep experts say could help alleviate some problems. Instead, the Sleep in America poll found that on at least a few nights of the week, nearly 9 out of 10 adults spent the hour before bed watching television. Other activities include fiddling around on the Internet (28 percent), doing work related to their job (18 percent), drinking alcoholic beverages (13 percent) and exercising (11 percent). About half of us read. Just 27 percent say they have sex. And the rest of us? Seems lousy sleep is messing with our relationships. The poll of 1,506 adults found that for partnered adults, sleep problems can be doubly disruptive. If one has a sleep problem--say, snoring--the other can lose, on average, almost an hour of sleep a night. And that, my friends, is not good, for the study also found sleepiness can make one or both partners, well, too sleepy for sex. Analyzing rest Such numbers don't surprise Dr. Phyllis Zee, who has been studying our sleep issues for 15-plus years. What did interest Zee, director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, a professor at Northwestern University and a spokeswoman for the National Sleep Foundation, was the poll's focus on the impact sleep habits have on "interpersonal relationships and quality of life." "We have so much to do and so little time to sleep that we don't realize how sleepy we are and the consequences of being sleepy," she said. Those interpersonal relationships and our family relationships--particularly with our children--can affect family dynamics, she added. "You're sleepy. You're irritable. You're a parent that comes home [to a] child who waited all day to ask you a question about homework or perhaps they had a little problem at school," Zee said, "and, boy, you're irritable, you're tired and you just can't deal with one more little problem and you snap." For the child, she added, "That is totally undeserving." But do we solve the problem by getting the recommended 7 to 9 hours sleep? Nope. In fact, most of us barely get 7. Instead, we drive while drowsy, nod off at work, mess up our moods and strain relationships all because we're not getting a good night's sleep--that mix of deep sleep and rapid eye movement (as in REM or dreaming) sleep. And that's just part of it. Beyond the brain"Until five or six years ago, sleep was thought to be mostly for the brain and not so much for the rest of the body. You needed sleep to be awake and alert the next day and not feel tired," said Eve Van Cauter, a University of Chicago professor of medicine and sleep researcher. "Now we understand that you also need sleep in order to have normal body functions--including cardiovascular, hormonal, metabolic." Added Dr. Sheila Dugan, an assistant professor at Rush University Medical School and spokesperson for the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation: "You need to get into a deep restorative sleep in order to allow your muscles to repair, just like you need your psyche to repair in REM sleep." My patients that are sleep deprived don't heal as well or as quickly. "In fact, because most of our research has been with young, healthy men so far," Van Cauter said, "one of our major efforts right now is to understand better the sleep needs and the implications of too little sleep in middle-age people and in older people and in women." They might want to check with a woman whose bedtime routine is, well, calculating. "I read a book every night," she e-mailed. "But before I turn out the light, I note what page I'm on and what chapter I have finished. Then to put me to sleep, I calculate the percent of the book I have completed in chapters and in pages. I usually calculate the percentage on chapters first. Then determine how many pages I am ahead or behind on average. As I tend to wake often in the middle of the night, I always have an additional calculation to work on."
Some numbers we hope don't put you to sleep
4: The day in April designated National Workplace Napping Day.
16: The day in April designated National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day.
67: Percent of pet owners who bed down with their cat or dog.
10: Hours a night, on average, that people slept before Thomas Edison invented the light bulb.
6.9: Hours a night, on average, that people sleep today.