Good News for People with Insomnia

It's one o'clock in the morning and you're exhausted. The alarm will herald a new day in fewer than five hours and you're staring into the dark room (maybe listening to your spouse sleeping soundly). You can't fall sleep. You've done everything you're supposed to do in order to enter dreamland easily, such as relax before bedtime, cast away negative thoughts, and avoid work, caffeine, and stimulating activities like being on the computer. But now you're at your wit's end trying to figure out the problem. Why can't you fall asleep?

Well, insomnia just had a brighter light shined on it.

A new study in the journal Sleep reports that some people have abnormal brain activities that keep them hyperalert. The specific culprit is a neurochemical called GABA (for you science geeks, that's short for gamma-aminobutyric acid), which is reduced by nearly 30 percent in people who have been suffering from insomnia for more than six months.

Mind you, we're talking about primary insomnia, which, as opposed to secondary, means that you're having sleep problems that are not directly associated with any other health condition or problem such as asthma, depression, arthritis, pain, alcohol use, etc. Of the 10 percent of adults who suffer from insomnia, 25 percent of those are considered to have the "primary" variety.

Because this kind of insomnia is also a risk factor for mood and anxiety disorders, the study also raises the possibility that sleep habits could be a factor in people with these health issues and who have GABA deficiencies. It doesn't take a genius to link sleep habits to problems with chronic blue moods and feelings of intense anxiety. The current craziness going on between Wall Street and Main Street has me wondering how many more people are walking around with low GABA activity, and low quality sleep.

So where's the good news in all this? Insomnia may have real physiological reasons behind it, and because many of the hypnotic medications that are most effective in treating insomnia do, in fact, increase activity in the brain at the GABA neurons, there's hope for people who fall into this category.

If you're one of them, it still helps to follow the usual recommendations for getting a good night's rest. But when you have tried everything, this gives you one more thing to consider. It could be all in your head - literally.

This sleep article is also available at Dr. Breus' blog, The Insomnia Blog.

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• WebMD Video: One Woman's Story
• How to Set up a Healthy Sleep Environment

Sleepless Kids Become Fat Adults

I feel like I've written about this topic numerous times before, but the studies just keeping coming and coming and coming... and a new one just confirmed what we've already had a clue about: the more sleep-deprived you are, the greater your risk is for being overweight and obese.

And this is true for both adults and kids. This is believed to be due to the fact proper sleep makes for a proper balance of hormones related to appetite, hunger, metabolism, and even fat retention.

But what this most recent study, which was just reported this week, actually reveals that we haven't learned before is this: a child's risk of being fat in adulthood increases due to poor sleep habits as a kid.

That's right: how well your kids sleep will have long-term effects on them. The relationship between sleep and obesity risk is much more intricate and "time-consuming" than previously thought. To think that a kid's sleep habits relate to his or her chances of being an obese adult is pretty astonishing. It's contrary to conventional wisdom to think that inadequate sleep in childhood has long-lasting consequences

Let me spell out the good news: if you can help your child get a good night's rest, you can help your kid avoid being overweight or worse, obese later in life. I think it's much easier to force a kid to bed earlier than to force him or her to stop eating junk food on a consistent basis. Not that parents shouldn't also help their kids learn to eat well for life, but you know what I mean.

Kids need more sleep than adults do. Those between the ages of 5 and 12 should bank about 11-12 hours each night, while teenagers should get 9 to 10 hours.

How many hours are yours getting? Do you even know?

Things that could be keeping your kids up at night:

• Too much electronic media like cell phones, computers, and video games. Is there a media curfew in the household?


• Not enough physical activity during the day to make them sleepy at night. Do they engage in enough physical activity during the day--at least 30 minutes of cardio?


• Poor time management as our kids find themselves up late finishing homework. Are they overwhelmed with things to do but not enough time to do it all? (Sounds like an adult problem, but our kids can suffer the same when they really shouldn't have to... yet.)


• A natural inclination to go to bed late and get up late due to their young biological rhythms. The problem is they can't sleep in every day due to school obligations so they are forced to cut their sleep short.

No parent wants his or her kid to grow up fat or obese, so I think it is good to know we can help prevent that from happening just by focusing on instilling habits of good sleep hygiene into our kids. It will reinforce good habits in our own lives, too. One would hope...

This article on sleep is also available on Dr. Breus' official blog, The Insomnia Blog.

Related Topics:

• 7 Ways to Combat Kids' Sleep Problems
• WebMD Video: Identifying Sleep Disorders in Kids

Cutting Risk of SIDS Could Be as Easy as Using a Fan

I was fascinated to read about the report that came in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine. New research offers another tool parents can use to reduce their chances of SIDS: a fan.

Unfortunately, we don't know what causes SIDS. What we do know is that it seems to happen more frequently in premature and low-birth-weight babies; in babies whose mothers didn't get medical care during their pregnancy; and in babies whose mothers smoke. There also is a pattern of SIDS among babies who shared the womb with siblings (as in twins or triplets) and whose mothers are younger than 20.

SIDS, while rare, is one of the most common causes of death in babies between 1 and 12 months of age. Most babies who die of SIDS are between the ages of 2 and 4 months. Oddly, more boys than girls die of SIDS, and most cases of SIDS occur in the winter.

Conventional wisdom on avoiding SIDS has alerted parents to place babies on their backs rather than their bellies, where they may not breathe well. Side sleeping has also been deemed a no-no, as babies can roll over onto their bellies and have trouble breathing.

You'd think that if a baby were being suffocated by its position, the body would sense the danger and do something to move. But this doesn't happen in our very young, leading researchers to study the possibility that SIDS may be caused by problems with how well the brain controls breathing and/or temperature during the first few months of life.

So, how can something as simple as a fan help? The theory works like this: babies who re-breathe carbon dioxide (presumably from their own exhalations) are at a higher risk for SIDS. If the pooling of carbon dioxide around an infant's nose and mouth during sleep increases the risk, anything to move that gas away cuts that risk. Hence the benefits of having a fan nearby to circulate air. This can be especially helpful in warm rooms with no windows.

SIDS, like so many other illnesses, may never have a "cure." The best we can do is learn how to reduce its risk and take those precautions every single day. Adding a fan to your baby's room is an inexpensive and easy thing to do.

This sleep article is cross-posted at Dr. Breus' official blog, The Insomnia Blog.

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• WebMD Video: Understanding SIDS
• Fan in Baby's Room May Lower SIDS Risk

Don't Take the Election TOO Seriously

Highly emotional moments can be stressful... and deadly. I think we all know someone who has been taking the election so seriously that thoughts of their party losing has them contemplating a move to another country.

But too much can be, well, too much. Take Terence Tolbert as an example. Working tirelessly for Obama as his campaign director in Nevada, he died of a massive heart attack Sunday night while driving alone near the offices in North Las Vegas. He was a young 44.

While I cannot speculate that the campaign had anything to do with his death--for all we know he could have had a congenital defect in his heart or some such and would have died even under the least stressful situations--I think it's fair to point out that when someone young dies suddenly under a very stressful job situation or environment, you have to wonder.

Within days before E-Day (the actual election), McCain and Obama crisscrossed the country with very little sleep to capture last-minute votes. McCain even held a rally in his home state long after midnight. What does that do to a septuagenarian? Obama was caught yesterday giving a talk in Florida thinking he was in Ohio. The sleep deprivation is definitely taking its toll and spotting his memory.

We were all blessed (except for the candidates, no doubt) with an extra hour of sleep the other night, and it could have meant more than you think it did. The end of daylight savings could not have come at a better time this year, as a new study shows the impact that one extra hour can actually have on you.

And you can thank the Swedes for finding this: the extra hour of sleep we gain from turning back the clock may protect us from a heart attack. We've long known that Mondays tend to be "heart attack days." Because they are usually considered the worst day of the week for many, there's a pattern of higher heart attacks on Monday morning as people dread the new work week, stressful thoughts rush in, and there's an uptick in activity following the restful weekend.

After poring over 20 years of records, Swedish researchers discovered something else is actually going on. Time shifts negatively affect our biological rhythms, but when those shifts offer more sleep, there's a 5 percent drop in Monday Blues heart attacks. Pretty amazing, don't you think? Yet another example of how sleep really has an impact on our stress level and ability to cope. In the spring, when we "spring forward," there's an increase in heart attacks after that one-hour loss of sleep.

So what's my point here? Well, today is a very stressful, exciting, and activity-filled day for millions of Americans. If there is no clear winner by suppertime, how many will stay up late watching the coverage on television? How many hearts will sink--or race like a rabbit--when their candidate loses or wins?

Take heart: this is an historic election. Experience it in stride. Whatever the outcome, great reform and change is likely on the way. Just don't take is so seriously that it ruins your health. Or you may not be around to watch this next president in action. (And if you've been emotionally involved in this election for the past 18 months, then think about all that accumulated stress. You, more than anyone, need a good night's sleep.)

Vote early. And get to bed early!

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• WebMD Video: Heart Disease Detection: A New Era in Diagnosis
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This article about sleep is cross-posted at The Insomnia Blog.