Friday Feature: Making Sleep Less Elusive

As a woman of a certain age, I've accepted the fact that sleep is not as easy as it once was, that my night owl body clock will never be set to what others consider a respectable bedtime, and that naps at least a few times a week are a way of life. But, tossing and turning on a nightly basis? Do I have to accept that?

Nope. At least not according to The Greater Good Science Center. One of my favorite resources for positive psychology information, this UC Berkeley site has lots of articles that are easy to read and full of great ideas and this one is no exception. Best of all, I don't need to participate in a psychology experiment or even go to a sleep lab to try out the ideas because they're all about ways to calm a busy mind without using drugs or complicated techniques.

Maybe there's hope for my night owl brain after all.

Friday Feature: Can't Sleep?

As new parents, we long for the day our babies will sleep through the night so we can return to full nights of blissful slumber but, as we age, those uninterrupted nights of sleep go the way of our babies' cribs and onesies.

A distant memory.

Whether it's caffeine, worry, or a full bladder that interrupts our sleep, a lot of us aren't getting enough of it. According to a 2016 Consumer Reports survey, nearly one third of us struggle to fall asleep or stay asleep most nights, while more than two thirds of us had trouble sleeping at least once a week.

Can you remember the last time you slept through the night? Perhaps one of these things is the culprit.

With the myriad health benefits associated with a good night's sleep, I hope it's not too long before you're sleeping like a baby.

Friday Feature: A Napping House

When my daughter was little, she had a book called The Napping House. I can still remember the repeated refrain:

"This is a house, a napping house, where everyone is sleeping."

When she was little, she sometimes fought her nap, determined to stay awake so she could play more and miss less. Now, as a college student, she revels in naps, recognizing them for what they are.

A luxury.

Or, perhaps, a way of life.

Our house is, indeed, a napping house. My husband, my daughter and I all recognize the value of a good nap. And we're not alone.

Hilary Thompson has a fun article in Verily that goes beyond justifying the nap and includes not only its health benefits, but its multiple varieties as well.

Perhaps if we, as a society, got more sleep, naps wouldn't be necessary. But, then again, there are plenty of countries that build an afternoon siesta into the fabric of their days.

I'm just happy I don't have to move to one of them in order to indulge my napping habit. Clearly, we've built a successful napping house right here.

P.S. Anyone want to guess one of the reasons I'm posting late today?

To Sleep or Not to Sleep

Pixabay

Last night, I went to bed early. Drained by the end of the semester and its concomitant grading frenzy, I fell asleep on the sofa before 11, a good two hours before I usually wrap things up for the night. I briefly considered just staying where I was, cozy under my blanket, but decided to embrace the mature option and sleep in my own bed.

It was a choice that was both logical and futile. My body was grateful, but my mind was uncooperative, whirring endlessly as I tried to shut it down. On the plus side, I renamed characters and brainstormed blog options, but a lack of actual sleep topped the list of cons.

Certain that I'd slept more than I thought I had, I checked my omniscient FitBit this morning. Sure enough, my little sofa nap had been longer than I thought, but I didn't actually fall asleep in my own bed until I'd tossed and turned for over an hour, and then -- in the interest of full disclosure -- pulled out my iPad and played a few rounds of Words with Friends.

This morning, I started out just as groggy as usual. Though I'm grateful for the ideas that materialized while I was supposed to be sleeping, I feel betrayed by my body. I did what I was supposed to do, but rarely accomplish -- I turned in early -- and then my ungrateful body laughed at me. Loudly and incessantly.

I've decided to pull that know-it-all FitBit in on the plan. After tapping the sleep icon and doing a little investigating, I discovered that I could set sleep preferences, beginning with how much sleep I want to get each night and moving forward from there. It's simple math, coupled with little reminders (which I chose not to activate just yet), but I thought perhaps an external nudge would be a better choice than the mental groan I engage in each night when I realize how late it is and what time I need to set the alarm for.

I'm never going to be an early bird, at least not without some serious retraining. And, since I'm not really interested in changing my sleep set points in an appreciable way, I need to do more than give lip service to the idea of accepting my night owl ways.

Because fighting nature is just exhausting.

Friday Feature: Sleepy?

Morguefile

How'd you sleep last night? Did you fall asleep right away? Wake up in the middle of the night?

If you had trouble falling asleep, or staying asleep, you're not alone. But did you know that what you do before falling asleep and what you do when you wake up in the middle of the night can impact your sleep success?

Read this article from the Wall Street Journal to find out what role television, food and sunglasses could play in a good night's sleep.

Sweet dreams.

Friday Freebie: Tired?

statista.com

Are you tired? A peek at the chart at left will confirm that you're not alone. Lack of sleep is, not surprisingly, the biggest culprit in our perpetual cultural exhaustion, but have you ever thought about what else can make you tired?

Oh, sure, there are the obvious things. Running a marathon. Shoveling snow. Doing spring cleaning or an afternoon of yard work.

But how many of us run marathons every day, or do regular chores with enough intensity to point to them as the culprit every single day?

On the other hand, many of us engage in small habits on a daily basis that contribute to our tiredness.
If you're tired of being tired, check out this article from Next Avenue. Maybe a higher level of energy is closer than you think.

Meanwhile, get some sleep.

To Sleep, Perchance to be Productive

I slept in on Saturday. By the time I got out of bed, it was late enough to be "too late" by post-college grad standards, but not so late as to have become completely embarrassing.

I'm very good at berating myself when I think I've slept too late. So, to put things into perspective, I add eight hours to the time I went to bed to see if I'm as lazy as I fear a I am. It's rare that the time I get up actually exceeds that time frame; most days, it falls woefully short.

But on Saturday, it was a pretty close match. I actually got close to eight hours of sleep.

Once I was up, I kicked into high gear, and you know what? Saturday turned to to be a very productive day. Even without a nap.

Photo: kakisky via Morguefile

I've read a lot about sleep, some of it fact, some of it questionable. I know that sleep is essential to effective functioning, and that most of us who think we're operating at peak capacity have no idea what peak capacity really is. I've read that lack of sleep messes with our endocrine system, and contributes to obesity. I've also read that people who sleep later have higher IQs than those who rise early. That article even cited my default body clock (to bed around 1, up around 8) as common in that group, but I'm pretty sure I read that one on Facebook so I doubt it counts.

But for me, Saturday was verification of the first information tidbit. On several occasions throughout the day, I caught myself thinking, "So this is what enough sleep feels like." The correlation between sleep and productivity -- for me, on this one day, anyway -- was unmistakable.

I wish I could say I learned a life lesson and repeated the drill yesterday, but that's not true. Once again, my body clock and the plans we'd made were on different schedules, leaving me sleep deprived early in the day and leading into a Monday that, even by noon, felt a tad off-kilter.

So much for peak efficiency. Then again, it is Monday.