That's Fit

From herbal remedies to eating tips, AOL Health has over a dozen tips to help you overcome your sleeping problems. I am one of the lucky ones, with very few sleeping troubles, and when I read this article I found out why: I drink a lot of water (that helps!), I exercise before bed (tiring myself to sleep), and I don't keep any electronic distractions in my room. Find out more better sleep tips here. Plus, share your favorite trick that always helps you fall asleep.

What works for you? Share your sleep advice in a comment below.

You know how it feels after a poor night's sleep. Your brain if foggy, it's hard to concentrate, and your reaction time is slowed. It feels like you're walking through mud, and though caffeine can help you wipe a few of the cobwebs away, it can also leave you feeling jittery. Help may be on the horizon.

In animal studies, sniffing a brain chemical known as orexin A helped erase some of the side effects of sleep deprivation. What was interesting was that not only did the animals involved show better cognitive function and more alertness, their brains also appeared to be more awake on PET scans.

Recent studies have put sleep near the top of the list of healthy lifestyle habits, and not getting enough can affect more than your performance. If and when this drug is developed, it won't address the other health issues involved with not getting enough sleep. So although it may help those who need to be alert even when they're tired, it'll never replace a good, solid night's sleep.

Anyone who's ever suffered from insomnia knows the severe effects it can have of your life -- you're moody, emotional, frustrated and far less productive when you're running on little to no sleep. I know -- I've been there. And I know that you'll do almost anything to get to the bottom of the problem and start sleeping normally again.

Everyday Health has a suggestion: Keep a sleep diary. Upon waking, here are things you should note:

• What time you woke up and what time you went to bed at
• How many hours of sleep you think you got last night
• How many times your remember waking up and for how long
• At what time you had caffeine or alcohol the day before, and how much
• What you ate during the day, particularly in the evening.
  
• How you were feeling during the day, and especially how you were feeling when you went to bed
• What medications you took during the day, if any.
  

These might not seem like aspects that would contribute to your sleep deprivation, but over time you'll begin to notice some patterns that will help you solve the sleep problem once and for all.

If you've been through the "new baby" phase with a new baby or a past one, you probably had many (many) sleepless nights. It's part of parenting and it's one that makes many moms stir crazy for a little while.

A new study released in Australia this week concluded that if moms can teach their babies to overcome sleep problems, the resultant benefits for the baby don't stop there: that mom also reaps benefits as well.

Moms who took part in the study felt less depressed when taught how to mitigate sleep problems in their younger children compared with a group that was not given any specific instructions for correcting sleep problems with their young ones.

A couple of days ago, I told you how to sleep more deeply. But why is sleep so important? Here's list of what a lack of sleep can do to you:

• You body has difficulty processing glucose -- meaning you can't metabolize sugar properly, which makes your cells unhealthy ... and the rest of your body too.
  
• You're in a constant state of alertness, because your levels of cortisol, a stress hormone, are spiked. This means you'll be under constant stress and will have trouble resting -- meaning you'll have trouble sleeping
• Your immune system weakens. I know about this all too well. When I was a starving student, pulling all-nighters and working evenings and weekend to make ends meet, I was constantly sick. Now that I get a proper amount of shut-eye, I haven't been sick in ages.
• You're moody.
• You're not mentally sharp
• You crave junk food. And because you're not at you peak performance, you're more likely to give in to those cravings.
  

So remember folks -- make sleep a priority.

If you've experienced sleeplessness, whether it's a result of your own choice or external circumstances, you know just how frustrating it can be. I know from experience -- my brother just reminded me the other day of a family vacation in which I had to share a room with my mother, who snores very loudly. Being perhaps the lightest sleeper in the world, I averaged about 2 hours of sleep a night , and after the better part of a week, I desperately begged him to switch rooms with me, promising that is he didn't, he was going to have to pick me up from a loony bin, where I would be recovering from a nervous breakdown. Dramatic? Yes, but I was very serious. No sleep does that to a person.

Researchers out of the UK have been studying the effect of sleep deprivation on the brain, with some interesting results. According to findings, activity in the brains of sleep deprived people show a dramatic increase when presented with upsetting or sad images. Moreover, the study links sleep deprivation and mental illness -- yikes! To read more of the findings, click here.

So remember to get your sleep however you can. For me, it means never sharing a room with my mother. Ever.

Antisocial behavior in lean or massive form is a mainstay of being a teenager. But, does it have to be? New findings suggest that a teen's preference for sleep during the nighttime or daytime may have a direct impact on the level of antisocial behavior that teen exhibits.

Have a teen who likes to be a night owl? He or she may have more antisocial behavior than one who goes to sleep early and rises early. Does that teen participate in daytime activities? If not, propensity for antisocial behavior ensues.

I wonder if this has any biochemical basis or just marks a teen's outlook on conformity. Sleeping late and all that is generally perceived as "not normal," which could mark a teen's manner towards socially accepted behvavior. Just me two cents.

Do you get enough sleep each night? From the people I speak with regularly, the average is about six hours. Wow -- that's inadequate by a long shot for almost everyone. Eight hours should be a goal, although with a job and kids and social commitments and everything else, that is very hard to come by.

But, a new study purports to link lack of sleep (specifically, in women) with mental declines, so be sure and research how much sleep you need or else you may suffer from memory loss, attention problems, and other mental skills setbacks.

Can you get that eight hours tonight? Try going to bed earlier and setting new guidelines for your household so that everyone gets more sleep.

Each week, Debbie will share her goals, challenges, successes and tips on how to fit in fitness when caring for a rambunctious toddler.

Just when I thought I was home free, the toddler loses his groove. What groove, you ask? The sleeping one, unfortunately.

It is infinitely harder to stick to a fitness plan when you are not getting enough sleep. Ask me how I know. But there has to be a solution out there, right? I cannot be the only sleep-deprived person out there who wants to be fit.

So I Googled "too tired to exercise" and I found about forty billion links that tell me the more energy you expend, the more energy you'll have. Then there were the links who suggested seven to eight hours of sleep every night. OK, trying!

So did I find renewed motivation on the internet? C'mon, you all know you can find everything on the internet. My jump start came when I read the science behind "the more energy you expend, the more energy you'll have." It actually makes sense! In a nutshell, the better our bodies use oxygen, the more fuel our bodies can make. Exercise helps our cardiovascular system make more oxygen. It has to do with the way our bodies metabolize what we eat and turn it into energy. OK, they definitely explain it better in the article I read, but hopefully you get the point.

Now I head back to my weekly fitness routine, not necessarily invigorated, but with a bit more enthusiasm than I had before I understood how my body worked. Stay tuned to see if exercise can counter my sleep deprivation . . .

Tony Wright is trying to break the 43-year-old world sleep deprivation record. To do so, he'll have to stay awake for more than 264 hours (11 days). His experiment began on Monday, May 14, so he's only 1 1/2 days into his quest, but -- believe it or not -- it might be possible for him to succeed.

How will he do it? Firstly, he's been preparing. Wright believes that by eating what he calls "a primate like diet -- one similar to that of our rain forest dwelling ancestors," he'll have what he needs for his brain to "develop its full potential." Other than that, it appears he'll just be hanging out at The Studio Bar in Penzance, Cornwall, playing pool and making conversation with whoever wants to stop by.

Wright thinks that by going without sleep, he'll be able to "access more refined and functional consciousness states." This may seem odd, but people have held this belief for thousands of years, and scientific research has shown that while some parts of the brain function poorly when sleep deprived, others compensate, and are actually more active than they are normally.

Interested? Think he's crazy? You can see for yourself by following his progress on this live webcam.

[via MetaFilter]

There has to be a reason, there just has to be . . .

For what, you ask? How about the way my pants fit? OK, I know I am getting older (closer to 40 than to 30) but something has happened, slowly over the past year or more. It isn't leftover baby weight, as I was actually thinner when my son was an infant than before I got pregnant.

Now, I know being a size six and having five to ten extra pounds may not seem like much to fret about, but it is frustrating when I have been doing so much over the past few months to get back into fitness. Even though I have lost some inches, my pants still don't fit. Another point of frustration is that I have never had to watch what I eat due to an extremely high metabolism, and now when I do, it shows no results.

Can I really blame the extra pounds on age? Fitz says no, and I want to believe her. So what could be the problem, short of a thyroid problem, which I am sure I don't have! Here's my latest "excuse" . . .

Do you get enough sleep? Don't be so sure -- unless you're really putting a solid 8 hours or so into sack time. The joys of long and hard work days and raising a family (while enjoying other areas of life) can severely crimp that all-important sleep time.

Yet, most of us don't even think about the lack of sleep we get affecting our lives -- but it does in many ways.

Why are we all working so hard? For money? We all need to live comfortably, but amassing money at the expense of healthy is a concept that evades me -- I just don't understand it. How about rearing kids? Yep, that's a pretty worthwhile endeavor, but careful planning is needed to make sure your needs (as well as the needs of your kids) are met, right? Set a goal to get the proper amount of sleep. It's up to you.

How much sleep do you get every night? Some will answer six hours, while others stretch for a solid eight hours of sack time each night. Is there a correct answer? According to experts, there sure it.

Although it is hard for many of us to wind down after a long day of work, kids, spouses, chores and everything else, sleeping priorities are a biggie if you plan to function at close to optimum efficiency the next day.

It's been said that sleeplessness is this country's #1 health problem -- yet I rarely hear about it from the media. How is this so? Because it's seemingly boring to most of us -- but it shouldn't be. According to experts, we're sleeping 20% less than our peers did a 100 years ago. In an age where there is more and more thrust upon our daily lives than 100 years ago, that mix seems very dangerous to me. How about you?

What is one of the best weapons an athlete like a runner can have in his or her arsenal to ensure top performance and excellent stamina? Would you believe -- napping?

Now, many an athlete will not be surprised to hear this -- but some will be. A nap can increase alertness, boost creativity, reduce stress and improve perception, stamina, motor skills & accuracy. That nice laundry list of benefits is enough to get any athlete's attention.

A list of who's who from recent history shows that some of the great ones took regular naps: Albert Einstein, Lance Armstrong, JFK, Winston Churchill, Ryan Hall, Thomas Edison, Jim Lehrer, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton are just a few famous advocates of napping.

[Thanks, Ben]

When I became a mother, I quit sleeping. First it was pregnancy, then it was nightly feedings, colds, flu, toddler separation anxiety, pretty soon it just became permanent. It's like there's this switch in my brain that never lets me shut down and rest -- even when I've tucked everyone in and completed my to-do list. Now I lay down each night and try my different tricks -- deep breathing, relaxing each muscle, and counting backwards from 100. I get there eventually, but eight hours of sound, unbroken sleep? That just doesn't exist for me anymore.

I can see its effects in the morning. I have circles under my eyes that concealer won't cover and my face looks puffy. The mid-afternoon slump hits me hard and I know my memory and mood are often affected. According to this interesting article, though, what's happening inside my body may be even more serious. Losing just an hour or two of sleep each night puts people at risk for heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. In fact, in one study, participants were allowed only four hours sleep for two nights in a row. In just that short period of time, their bodies showed a marked increase in ghrelin -- a hormone that causes hunger -- and a significant decrease in leptin, which tells the body it's full. That fact struck home with me, because on nights that I really miss out on sleep, I can feel those changes. I'm constantly reaching for carbs to fill me up and boost my energy.

So I'm going to start making sleep a priority and get it under control. I'm setting a new, earlier bedtime for myself and allowing only relaxing activities an hour before. I'm cutting out caffeine and planning to exercise every morning to boost my energy instead. It's going to mean giving up a lot of my "me" time and probably most of my favorite TV shows, but I think the payoff will be worth it.