The Insomnia Blog - Sleep Doctor Michael Breus, PhD

Sleep Less, Die Sooner!

Ever compared notes about sleep with someone? If you need a solid eight or nine hours (which you rarely get), and your buddy says he is perfect going on five hours a night, does that irk you? How about someone who claims she feels “radiant” after just four hours of sleep and seems to get a lot more done during the day (because she’s up before the sun)?

It’s funny how we find little ways to annoy and pester our friends about how much sleep we need or don’t need. But short-sleepers should listen up: If you’re lying about how much sleep you really need, you could be putting your health in jeopardy. The Brits just released a study showing that people who do not get enough sleep are more than twice as likely to die of heart disease.

This came after a seventeen-year study. Although the reasons are unclear, researchers think it’s related to increased blood pressure, which is known to raise the risk of heart attacks and stroke. The researchers were quick to point out that a third of the United Kingdom’s population clocks fewer than five hours a night. And it’s even worse in the U.S. where more than 40 percent of us regularly sleep less than five hours nightly. What’s wrong with us?

Gwen Stefani Can't Sleep, Either

A quick note:  we can now add singer Gwen Stefani to the long list of celebrities who report sleep problems.  According to this article in The Daily Mail, Stefani is having a hard time sleeping while running after her toddler:

"Kingston is walking now and he never sleeps," sighs the singer, who turns 38 on Wednesday. "And if he doesn't sleep, I don't sleep. Last night was insane. By this morning I thought I was going to die from the tiredness."

On the bright side, she says having  a child helps her make the most of her travel experiences while on tour:

"On my days off, I used to sleep in for as long as I could and then do a workout or go shopping. Now I get up early, play with Kingston and go out. For the first time, I'm actually seeing the places I'm visiting."

Snuff Out the Cigarette to Snooze Out

An article I read online relating a study about nicotine in breast milk and how it can affect sleep patterns in a baby really got me thinking: how much do our parents’ habits after we are born affect our internal programming for life?

As a non-smoker, I can’t sympathize with the mother who feels the need to smoke during those critical breast-feeding months. Many are successful at quitting during the pregnancy, but then fall back into the habit of lighting up once the baby is born. The same thing happens when it comes to drinking alcohol.

But the difference is people are more aware of alcohol’s negative effects on breast milk, so new moms continue to ban it from their diets. I was stunned to read what the study’s main author said:

“Because nicotine is not contraindicated during lactation, mothers may believe that smoking while breastfeeding will not harm their child as long as the child is not exposed to passive smoke. However, there has been very little research on either short- or long-term effects of nicotine delivered through breast milk.”

Nicotine is not “contraindicated” when a mother is breast-feeding? Given all that we know about the health consequences of smoking as well as a mother’s passing of nutrients to her infant through breast milk, it surprises me to hear that some would assume smoking wouldn’t also be harmful to a baby. It also would seem obvious (at least to me) that sleep patterns would get disrupted much in the same way smoking can affect an adult’s sleep.

It never ceases to amaze me how people view smoking as a “relaxing” habit. In reality, nicotine is a stimulant that can infringe on getting restful sleep. So when I read that babies whose mothers smoked in the study had a reduction in sleep time of about 37 percent (and that level of sleep disruption was directly related to the dose of nicotine infants received from their mothers’ milk), I wasn’t shocked out of my seat. Not in the least.

Which brings me back to this question: if our sleep patterns as developing babies are routinely disrupted (ahem, while our brains are forming and setting certain things in stone for life), how much does this then affect our sleeping patterns for life? Now that’s a study I’d like to read about!

In the meantime, I encourage all new moms to do as follows: snuff out the cig to snooze out soundly (both you and your baby).