Learning the Natural Sleep Habit
Insomniacs will learn ways to naturally fall and stay asleep according to Roger Cole, internationally known sleep researcher and yoga teacher.
“The essential message is that sleeping is a skill and an art you can learn,” said Cole, who is visiting from California. “Under certain circumstances, sleep comes easily. Under other circumstances, it doesn’t.”
Participants will learn about good sleep habits, effects of caffeine, use of light, critical napping skills culled from research on transcontinental pilots, the soporific effects of warm footbaths and iced beverages, yoga postures and more. Cohen’s doctoral dissertation at University of California, San Francisco, focused on the effects of reclining or inverted postures on sleep.
“An inverted posture is simply getting your legs above your heart and/or your head and neck below your heart,” he said. “Inverted is better for a quick nap because it stimulates certain blood pressure receptors that are linked into your arousal system and helps quiet down the brain. In the workshop we’re going to practice these things.”
Sleep is a huge issue for Americans, with as many as 70 million suffering from at least one of 84 known disorders, according to the Sleep Disorder Center of Morristown Memorial Hospital.
Insomnia is one of the most common disorders. The 2005 Sleep in America Poll of the National Sleep Foundation showed 54 percent of respondents had experienced at least one symptom of insomnia at least a few nights a week in the past year. While the vast majority of those polled said they never use sleep aids, 11 percent reported using alcohol, beer or wine; 9 percent, over-the-counter sleep aids; 7 percent, prescription medications; 3 percent, an eye mask or earplugs, and 2 percent, melatonin.
Sleep medications can be a good idea for some, especially people in chronic pain, according to Cole, but mostly he believes people should be weaned off their medications and able to sleep on their own. Insomniacs who learn natural techniques in a four- to eight-week cognitive behavioral therapy program continue to use the sleep skills they learn after the program ends. But those who take medications for four to eight weeks, and then stop, are no better off than when they began.
“Also, the sleep promoted by sleep medication is not quite natural,” Cole explained. “You get more of certain stages and less of other stages. We learn something during the day and during the night, in the various sleep stages, we consolidate the memories. Each stage has its function in that consolidation. If you start disturbing the stages, there’s always a potential for causing if not memory loss, at least modification of how the memory works.”
Dr. Carlos Schenck, author of the new book “Sleep: The Mysteries, the Problems, and the Solutions,” wrote that some 20 million Americans surpass insomnia and experience more extreme sleep disorders called parasomnias, which include sleep terrors, sexsomnia, sleepwalking, sleep paralysis and sleep related-binge eating. In a free talk at Somerville Medical Center Oct. 18, Schenck will discuss the symptoms of and solutions for these and other sleep disorders. (See below.)
What is at stake when sleep disorders go untreated? A lot, said Cole, including longevity, work performance and excess weight:
• Those who sleep seven hours a night live longer than those who sleep six or eight, according to epidemiological studies.
• Inadequate sleep may reduce production of liptin, a hormone that signals to the body that it is full, and so lead to unwanted weight gain.
• Even a sleep debt of 30 minutes a night can affect work quality when cumulated over a week or two.