Huffington bed post: Ariana’s musings on snoozing

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Why has nobody brought this to my attention?

I can’t believe I’ve been writing for a sleep site for this long sans swinging the spotlight onto America’s queen of GTF-to-sleep-ery. Ariana Effing Huffington. For those of you who have zero point zero idea what I’m talking about, Ari (that’s my nickname for her; I feel like she’d like me enough of she met me that she’d let me call her that straight away) is an author, columnist, and actress. (And, obvi, the EIC of The Huff Post.)

And, juggling a ton’ve different roles like she does, it was easy to start following the whole “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” mentality. However, homegirl had a Zzz-piphany about this one day. A workaholic’s moment of clarity, if you will. As per usual, she was running on fumes when it suddenly hit her. “It” being a desk – which she nailed her face on and shattered her zygomatic after collapsing from exhaustion. Proof that no matter how bad azz you are, you’re not impervious to the effects of sleep deprivation. Thus, sleeplessness puffed and huffed and blew Huffington down. And that , I suppose, was her wake up (er… lay down?) call. Since then, not only has she been doing better at prioritizing bedtime, but encouraging the rest’ve us to fall in line by falling asleep more too.

She’s even written this whole book, called “The Sleep Revolution” on it.

But, seeing as I haven’t read it (yet), some of her slumber SparkNotes on the subject’ll just hafta do for now.

And here they go:

First fact?

1.) More laying down = more getting laid

Kinda. If you’re a chick.

’cause, according to a University of Michigan study, you’re “14 percent more likely to have sex” the day after a good night’s rest. To be fair, though, they only did this study on women. And most women are 100% more likely to get laid upon request than most men who do the same (per life experiential observations noted at the Author-of-this-article University). What the study should conclude is that women’ll feel more frisky the day after, 15% will act on that urge, .5% will take care of it themselves, and .5% will get rejected. Either way, I’d rather feel randy than tapped tomorrow morning. Plus, a dose of desire can put a pep in your step – whether addressed or left un-quenched.

2.) Then there’s the cognitive laundry aspect…

We’ve mentioned before how sleep’s the time for doing a bit of brain defragging.

You store memories, clear out daily toxins, and even (possibly) undergo a process that prevents Alzheimer’s plaques from forming. Don’t do this and your days are spent with a head full’ve files wandering aimlessly around.

But it probably just looks a bit like this to the rest’ve the world:

3.) Insomnia intoxication

Did you know a day sans sleep is tantamount to a blood alcohol level of 0.1 %? Neither did I. (Though I thought I remember someone making a comparison before.) Technically, that means you’re past the legal drunkery limit when you forego a night’ve shut eye.

4.) Nap yourself savvy

I hate naps – but only because it throws a monkey wrench in my day’s momentum. (That, and I get so excited about sleeping that I’m awake all over again by the time I lay down.) However, it might just be worth the break if I can just force myself to do it. Especially since science is telling me that the rest’ve my day’s tasks may be completed with a higher level of quality. In a German study, they had subjects assimilate word pairs. Then, half of ’em sat around drooling over a DVD, while the others snoozed. As you may’ve guessed, the snooze group had a better recall. While I feel like this study could’ve been better performed via comparing naps to other alternative activities (like – how would a group who reads, meditates, has an animated convo, or yogas – which I’m now making a verb – do compared to dozers?) Either way, I do champion the nap over T.V. or interwebz scrolling. Both generate a kind’ve mental fatigue that can potentially make you only more tired.

5.) I dream of Genius

Well, this one’s new to me – but the dude who sired the sewing machine idea, the papa of the periodic table, and Google’s co-daddy all got their inspo… from a dream they had. Not a MLK “I have a dream”, either. A literal, actual dream. That’s why I suppose Mr. Page says, “When a great dream shows up, grab it!” Pssh. I say, grab a pen and notepad too. ’cause you know you’re gonna forget that shiz come morning.


(Example of the extent of *my* REM born innovation.)

6.) Don’t fight the night

A final point Ariana makes is that sometimes sleeplessness comes from a self fulfilling pro-fear-cy.

You’re so afraid of not falling asleep, that ya don’t.

And how’s she get over that sleeplessness fear? By mentally reciting this one Emerson quote (coincidentally the same dude whose works serve as a soporific to me too) And that’s this: “Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could.” Yes. An excellent suggestion to avoid nocturnal rumination as you reverse the day’s tape in your brain. The yes-and I’d add to this quote? Regarding the future tripping we all do worrying about not just today, but the next day’s to do’s?

I’m sure you’ll all find it equally Emerson level eloquent:

“Start tomorrow tomorrow. Not tonight. Because, duh. You can’t. Now…

…”

Deep sleep and senility: does dozing too little lead to dementia?

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The list of sleep induced maladies is a long’ne.

There’s the autopilot eating. The temper benders. The spontaneously not knowing how to English.

Or body.

Or car.

Yes, these’re immediate ramifications awaiting too many nights of non-sleepery. And it’s so easy to fall prey to it. You’re busy. You’ve got a million to do’s to do by day. And by night, they’re still reverberating in your cranium. Once you’re finally in bed, the gears are still going full throttle and an orchestra of fragmented facets of the day resonates loudly. Pieces of an earlier conversation. Tomorrow’s errands. An unpaid bill. And, right around the time you finally enter delta wave heaven, that blasted alarm’s jarring you awake again. What you may know is that if you let those restless nights turn into weeks, then the likes of diabetes and obesity may await you. What you may not know, however, is that according to newer findings – it could also lead to more serious probs later on down the road.

The road, that is, which you’re wandering lost on in the middle of the night.

Sans your pants.

Because… dementia.

Indeed, some recent research – still in the early stages – is observing a possible link between Alzheimer’s patients and peeps who don’t get enough deep sleep. See, deep sleep’s a specific stage in our 90 minute slumber cycle. And the reason it’s such a BFD? Because that’s when all the crucial recovery ensues in our cogitation organ. It’s like it’s doing damage control for all the shiz we’ve been putting it through by day. But along with the memory filing and miscellaneous housekeeping, another vital antivirus program’s running on our cerebral supercomputer: the one that prevents Alzheimer’s.

How?

Well, with Alzheimer’s you get these things (called sticky amyloid plaques) that build up between your nerve cells. That’s bad because the area between nerves is basically their Wi-fi signal. It’s how they chat. Plaques shut down that connection, the filthy talk-blockers. And since functional, communicating nerves’re responsible for what makes you different from a babbling stalk of broccoli, that’s no bueno. So, science tried to find out why that’s happening. And when they did studies on sleep deprived mice, they noticed these plaques were significantly more pronounced in the restless rodents. (Though, you’ve gotta wonder what they did to keep the mice up so late.)


“Can I get another slice of speed brie, please? I appear to be coming down.”

Then, they did this other study about three years ago. (Or, specifically 2013, if you’re nostalgically reading this from the future when you have a terminal case of forgotfulness and are fondly recalling the days when computers were something external and separate from our skulls.) And in that study, they learned why plaques and bad sleeping happen tandem to eachother. See, normally, during the intense section of your siesta cycle, this amazing cleanup transpires. According to the dude, Iliff, who ran the study, “the fluid that’s normally on the outside of the brain, cerebrospinal fluid — it’s a clean, clear fluid — it actually begins to recirculate back into and through the brain along the outsides of blood vessels.” And who cares about what your disgusting body juices are doing when you’re zonked out? You, hopefully. ’cause that process (which happens through this thing called the glymphatic system) lets that wad of thought meat in your body’s attic expel a lotta toxins… including the ones that induce all’a that aforementioned plaquery.

While science is still on the verge of proving this link between docking deep sleep and catching a case’ve Alzheimer’s (because: correlation’s not causation), there does seem to be a fascinating connection thus far. So what’s the takeaway? To err on the side of caution, obvi. Regardless of whether they prove this theory, deep sleep’s a much needed cleanup time. And, aside from the short term side effects you obviously won’t hafta suffer, there’s also potentially this whole dementia prevention system going on as it jettisons other junk from you too, too. And if there’s even a “maybe” chance of spending my golden years giving myself golden showers all day long (’cause in reality it’s less like “The Notebook” and more like “The Visit”), then I’d rather take the best measure possible. Which everyone tells you to do anyway. Get to bed early, and get enough hours in. Which we didn’t need our lab mice friends to tell us.

So, loves, don’t “forget” to get a punctual slumber tonight.

Followed by a long, quality sleep.

Future-you (without a goldfish memory and who’s not eating bleach) will thank now-you.

Slumber by numbers: This 4-7-8 trick’s easy as 1, 2, 3.

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In the world of sleep inducing self calming mechanisms, there’s a lotta wise advice.

The thing is most of it centers on stuff like yoga or meditation – which is absolutely fantastic. However, the former may take up a bit more time than you’d like to, while the latter may seem a daunting task. (Since most have the misconception that it’s about sitting in miserable silence while actively avoiding thoughts.) Either way, late at night when you can’t remember which asana causes sleep or what a good mantra to chant might be, you’re craving a simple fix. And quick.


“Is it Om namo? Or gnome no mo’? Or… mon amor?”

Lucky for you ‘n me both, science has come up with an easy system to assuage your nervous system.

One with an easy name too:

“4 – 7 – 8”

As far as breathing exercises go, this 4-7-8 thing couldn’t spell it out for you any simpler: First, you suck in oxygen through your nostrils – for four seconds. (Note that’s meant to be performed in regular “One Mississippi” seconds, not “Time is Money” seconds.) Then, after you’re good ‘n full of revitalizing life gas, you hold it in the breathing balloons residing under your ribs. How long? You guessed it. Seven seconds. Then, after that prolonged pause, you’re gonna dismiss the respiratory mist from your body in one, eight second long exhalation. However, whereas the inhalation bit was processed by your proboscis, your pie hole’s doing the push out this time. And that’s it. Within under a couple minutes, you’re out like an Asian try’na outdrink an Irishman. (Which I can totally say. ’cause I’m part Asian.) In fact, the dudes who came up with this method’ll tell you it may not even take so long. Within roughly four cycles, your bod’s already calming down.


(Morphing yourself into Nintendo Luigi’s hippie cousin with a mullet totally optional.)

And that’s actually the whole point of this exercise. Dr Andrew Weil (an American sleep expert) states that the technique works because it gives us both a muscular and cognitive cuddle, acting like a natural Skalaxin and serenity inducer. This’s why Weil suggests employing it at least a couple times a day. (The less stress you’re bringing with you into nighttime, the easier you’ll sleep. Also: who wants to stay in a state of cray all day anyway? When there’s a simple fix like this?) Per the doc himself:

“You breathe in through your nose quietly and blow air out forcefully through your mouth making a whoosh sound. It takes all of about 30 seconds so there is no excuse for not doing it. It produces a very pleasant altered state of consciousness. You may not get that the first time you do it but it’s one of the benefits of practicing.”

I’ll be honest – when I first heard about this, I thought, “this’s really just a rip off on deep, yogic breathing. Y’ain’t saying anything special.” But then, something happened. First, my computer shut down (because of those dumb and inconvenient updates it intermittently subjects me to.) Second, a coven of vexing women having the “breastfeeding in public” convo began a “who can be obnoxious the loudest” competish. (They all won, IMHO.) Then, my laptop proceeded to reboot – commencing the process of taking twelve eons to finish its inconvenient updatery, and making me hafta resort to generating my literary magic on my iphone. This was ridiculous. As I pulled up my “notes” app, I realized I couldn’t hear my own thoughts over the angst induced grinding of my enamel. I was too pizzed to write anything of worth.

I needed to change my brain channel.

“Perfect opportunity”, I thought, “to do some investigative research.”


“These circles represent the number of effs I give about anything right now.”

It took me a few goes.

But, instead of marinating in madness, I stayed the course – and initiated the 4-7-8 (minus the whole wooshing noise – though it would’ve been funny to witness the feminazis beside me’s reactions) The result? Worlds more effective than I’d mentally estimated it’d be. More effective, for that matter, than the breathing exercises I’ve been doing up til now. But why? Seeing as I had another five minutes before I could log back online, I used my newly oxygenated think meat to cogitate about this question. And I came up with this: I, much like most’ve the people I know, have fallen into the bad habit of insisting “I am breathing deeply!” (or slowly, or long) when I’m actually not. The thing is – when you just tell someone to calm themselves or breathe deeply while they do yoga or meditate or lay in a bed counting imaginary, hairy, woolen animals – the directions lack specificity. There’s too much room for you to mistakenly breathe “your way”. (And let’s face it – if your way worked, you wouldn’t be resorting to someone else’s advice in the first place. You’d be asleep right now.) I think “breathe deeply” is a direction that fails so badly because it automatically makes the student self-conscious. “OMG, I’m not breathing right. The simplest thing we do to stay alive. Which means I’m stupid. Let me go ahead and respond by panicking, judging myself, getting more anxious, and shallowly breathing all the while. That should fix it.”

Counter-intuitive though it may sound, I’ve seen this with a ton of patients I’ve worked with – and do it myself as well. (And often.) That’s when it hit me like a Greyhound on a jaywalker. The 4-7-8 method works because its very moniker’s a reminder to aid in avoiding your usual brand of doing-it-wrongery. By titling it with the second counts, you’re not thinking about whether you’re doing it right. You’re simply following by-the-number instructions that’ll lead you to a peaceful sleep.

So, remember – try the 4-7-8 for 78 seconds (or less)…

And you’ll be dozing in no time.

Men are from Mars, women are from Zzzzz-ness?

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I’m not gonna sugarcoat it.

I can be a real snooze shrew some mornings.

“Did I even sleep last night? Or take part in a nocturnal marathon?” I’m asking myself this as my dude’s alarm sounds off with some rock song I’ve come to hate via negative association. It’s been this way since I hit womanhood, pretty much. But unlike ages ago, these days, I know what I need to do to balance it out. I have a routine. When I follow it, I’m golden. When I don’t, I have morning’s like these. Still, I find myself feeling suddenly envious – wondering a whole new question: why isn’t he – with all his aches and pains and late nights – bitching as bad as I am, rolling back over, and snoring through every hole in his face? He makes waking up seem so easy. Am I just being a big vagina here? Or do women genuinely need more sleep?

Well, according to a British sleep science study, yeah.

We do need more rest.

But, per logic, we are also being big beavers. Let’s hear about the research bit first, though.

Per Dr. Horne director of the Sleep Research Center at Loughborough University:

“The more of your brain you use during the day, the more of it that needs to recover and, consequently, the more sleep you need. Women tend to multi-task … and so, they use more of their actual brain than men do. Because of that, their sleep need is greater.”


“So, that means we’re smarter (herpderp), right? ’cause we use more brains ‘n stuff?”

Wrong.

It means we’re built in such a way where our brain’s’re thought barraging us all day to exhaustion.

So, we hafta counteract that. As Horne ‘xplains:

“This is because women’s brains are wired differently from men’s and are more complex, so their sleep need will be slightly greater. The average is 20 minutes more, but some women may need slightly more or less than this.”

(To be fair, though, there is a host of other reasons for us needing more sleep: including hormonally related wakeups, getting karate chopped in the mug by a massive forearm at four A.M., and being shaken awake for penetrative purposes. But I digress.)

Now, I get that this is kindofa generalization. Which is why the pros also concede that dudes tasked with lots of decision making all day long will suffer the same plight: overtaxing their domes. And that, as a result they too may need to nab a snooze surplus in the A.M. as well. “Though probably still not as much as a woman,” says Horne. While I appreciate the sentiment and empathy for the fairer sex of which I’m reluctantly a member, don’t carry me over a slumber puddle just yet. ’cause I don’t feel like it’s this cut and dry. Sure, facts are facts, and I’m not gonna deny ’em. Sure, we’re wired differently. I’ve even made the analogy before: a dude’s brain is like having one interweb window open at a time. My chick brain is like a Chrome browser with a katrillion tabs open at once, til I hafta CTRL+ALT+DEL, shut down the whole shiz, and start over. (Especially when I’m floating between patients at the clinic or playing diction designer here on Tyrd for your eyes and brain to wear.) It takes a lot of multi-tasking. And by the end, yeah, my brain’s a bit spent. But if more sleep were the answer, then why do I accomplish less on the days I sleep more? Riddle me this: How do I wake up at 4 A.M., meditate, do yoga, write an article, go for a run, go off to work for 9 hours, come home, and run again before going to bed? How am I doing more on an average diet of dozing?

It’s that overlooked thing I’m usually doing in between.

This is where that acting like a pussy thing comes into play. Yes, we may need more “rest”, but how we get it is subjective and totally up to us. I’ve come to learn, through trial and error, that giving my brain a break doesn’t have to mean sleeping. Thank god, too, ’cause it’s kinda a time eater. (I gotta take out my contacts before, fix my makeup and hair after, and time my alarm just right so I don’t end up with snooze button zombie syndrome for the rest’ve the day.) Given that I don’t have any more hours in the day than anyone else, I’ve tried to find the most efficient way to maximize those hours. (It was hard, because it meant habit changing. #butdidIdie?) After trying to convince myself and everyone around me I “didn’t have the time”, I finally had an epiphany about my own bullshiz and started making time. Time for yoga. For meditation. Even those tranquil nature jogs. By doing all that, I realized I was literally giving my brain a break. Technically, all these things are forms of meditation. And meditation allows time for the brain to repair itself in almost a better, more efficient way than sleep does. Why? ’cause you don’t have to worry about interrupting yourself mid-cycle, and waking up all groggy. It’s like sending your mental Aladdin in to grab the magic lamp instead of going yourself and getting stuck inside. Repelling your inner Scientologist into the vault, and retracting him when the job’s done. Making your partner remove his missile when know he’s about to-…

Come to think of it, though, since you’re conscious during meditative activities, you end up strengthening healthy connections while retaining a state of awareness and lowering stress levels. This has been shown in many an MRI scan of monks and nuns Om’ing out for a while. And what’s this do? Well, it leads to a better sense of well being throughout the day. (Which I def don’t get after hitting snooze a twelfth time and still waking all achey.) Thus, while I accept and acknowledge the susceptibilities of my woman brain, I also use my woman brain enough to know about the power of limiting belief systems. And that there are workarounds… if you make time, not excuses.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I hafta make like a Hindu god and complete my entire to-do list in a nano moment.

That way I’ll have time to Zen the stress away straight after.

Why being hooked on phone-ics isn’t working for you.

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“He didn’t reply. But I got a “Read” receipt five minutes ago… I should check again.”

“Oh, good. I got a like on my thigh-gap-stagram.”

“Did I seriously just watch a monkey chug his own pee for five minutes straight?”

Whether it’s narcissism, FOMO (fear of missing out), FOBO (fear of being offline), or any other number of compulsion driven needs to embed your phone’s updates into your brain, experts suggest it could all be harmful. How? In the same ways addiction or obsession of any other kind can be. They can keep us from connection, interrupt the flow of daily life, and even hamper cognitive processes (AKA make you dumber).

While obsession and addiction are often defined as being different things (the former working to reduce anxiety; the latter working to induce pleasure), I tend to think of them as being equally no bueno inasmuch as they both bloom from a place of some sort’ve anxiety. Obsessions just reduce the stress while addictions drive us straight into that reward system in our brain. Either way, you end up compulsively seeking some external (in this case, all the digital pals living in your phone) to redress the discomfort of whatever’s going on back here in reality. If what was happening around you IRL was comfortable or engaging enough, you wouldn’t need the adult version of a binkie to mitigate it. So, there’s no need to get hung up on the semantics of the issue. If it’s interfering with actuality, then it’s a fixation and a problem. If you’re standing in line, using your plastic brick as a way to avoid human interaction, then you’re using it as a palliative against the irrational fear called social anxiety. If you’ve had an accident ’cause you were on it while driving, then that’s def a call (pardon the pun but only partially ’cause who actually “calls” anyone on their phones?) for concern. But, even more than that – the decision fatigue you can generate from overstimulation and anxiety induced stupidity is astounding. Per research on mental testing posted in Social Psychology:

“Results indicated that the “mere presence” of the experimenter’s cell phone compared to the similar size notebook resulted in decreased performance but only on the more difficult tasks. The study was replicated using two classrooms, one where students had to turn off their phones and put them away out of sight and a second where students were asked to place their own phone on the desk in front of them on silent. The same results were found: in the presence of their own phone students performed more poorly on a test of what they learned.”

Imagine that. The mere sight of it makes brains flatline.

Just like a dry drunk in the middle of a wine tasting.

Or as Sarah Granger’s “Digital Mystique” findings demonstrate with brain scans:

“MRI brain scans of Internet addicts in China have revealed a disruption to connections in nerve fibers linking brain areas involved in emotions, decision making, and self control. In America, they’re thinking of adding ‘Internet-use Disorder’ to the Diagnostics and Statistics Manual of Mental Disorders.”

But, since smartphones bring in money to corporations, and corporations have un-ending reach and no qualms about funding false research, you may have been seeing more article titles that say things like, “Being separated from your cell phone makes you dumb (says science)” or “Your ringing phone activates love and compassion in your brain (says brain scan)”. For those not prone to phone addiction, mayhaps. But I have trouble – just glancing about at the majority of folk mean mugging around me, nearly getting hit with cars for tweeting in the street, and being overall emotionally flat after finally looking up from their phones after a fifteen minute lunch break – I have trouble believing that that’s generating compassion on any real, in the flesh, level. They don’t look happy or compassionate. The look anxious. Withdrawn. Diffident. Like a cornered or ill animal, ready to attack.

The solution?

Well, some of the brain hacking authorities will advise keeping a journal of your phone probing habits. Next time you reach for it, ask and answer for yourself things like: how frequently you check it, for how long, how you feel during, and how you feel after. Then, mayhaps add in just how much it might honestly (that’s the hard part; but don’t worry this is just you judging you) be interfering with your life. Dig deep and cite some examples. Were you chastised by a boss at work for effing around on the clock? Look up from your screen to address your date last week – only to realize she’d left half an hour ago?



(“If you can’t beat ’em…”)

Sometimes it doesn’t even have to be that easy to identify.

As the study above demonstrates, over-stimulation can drive us to a state of mental tiredness.

You may not even notice the two are interconnected. One too many “twerking gone wrong” videos, face swaps of pugs and people, and preoccupations with who’s not returning whose texts can leave one a bit bewildered upon returning to the real world. (Which potentially makes other mental tasks that’re crucial to the business of living markedly harder). So make note of your pre and post internal situation there, too. And if you don’t like the feedback you’re giving yourself? No need to hit the internal dislike button on your own shameful stats. That just leads to denial. Best to A.) accept it, and B.) seek assistance. (Which can be of the DIY variety or one of those behavior makover-ists with a comfy couch. Totally up to you.) If you can’t be sure your phone’s the culprit behind why you’re frazzled, commit to a few day challenge – where you only check your phone abstemiously, during designated times of the day. Knowing that it’s not forever – just for the next 72 hours – will be helpful in getting you through it.

And if you feel better by the end? Then maybe you know a bit of lifestyle alteration’s in order.


(Phone stack’s a popular restaurant game to start with: you pick it up first, you pick up the tab.)

The thing is – much like binging or hoarding, obsessions or addictions of the iphone variety aren’t illegal. In fact, you’ll have a shiz ton of paid media trying to convince you to stay good and hooked. In a way, you’ve got subliminal enablers constantly bombarding you. And that should make you feel a bit less shameful for falling prey to it for so long. But now that you know better, you’re charged with the business of fixing it. Just like any fixation – chemical or not – it can be extremely detrimental if left unaddressed. But if you’re here reading this, chances are you’re already well aware of that.

So just consider this a friendly reminder to keep your compulsion in check next time you check your cell.

Detox through your toes to doze better?

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I’ve long heard these detox foot pads can make for a better night’s sleep:

But is it truly possible to evict toxins through your roots?

Some speculate… not so much. Not only do they say these pads make ’em wake up smelling like bacon, but the debris left on the strip isn’t necessarily even evidence of pulled pollutants. Plop a water droplet on there, and you’ll get the same color change, they claim. Then again, there are others – lifelong complainers – who swear by the stuff. It’s been said to relieve everything from TMJ pain to overall cognitive fog. All malevolent aspects of daily living that can serve as behemoth slumber barriers. In fact, a patient came into my P.T. clinic the other day and (seeing as she was being seen for foot pain, and seeing as we’re both womenfolk) we got on the topic of fleshy flippers and pedicuring them. That was when she told me about a place down the way that does foot detoxes between making your cuticles cuter. The whole mood of her visit was typical for someone suffering from a chronic pain condition. She’d just had a long day, was in a bad mood, and was hurting somethingawful. Her countenance was grim at best. The moment I got her talking about sucking sludge out her southerly appendages, though, she lit up like a schoolgirl on a snow day. I asked, “So did it work?” For the first time ever, I saw her smile with relief. I was legit afraid she was gonna pull a face muscle from the foreign expression of joy she was employing, when she told me:

“I’ve never slept better.”

So, I was intrigued.

I mean, I’d heard about it – but never did much research before. So, I tried looking it up. The idea dates back to this ancient Eastern concept. And what it does is work on your meridians (thos’re like “energy highways” in your body – unconfirmed by Western science) through the reflexology points on your feet. In a way, it’s meant to be like a remote Drain-o – unclogging toxins affecting your different organ systems from afar, and then sending said pollutants out through your lower limbs. How? Probably from those stinky ingredients the naysayers describe. Some function using this stuff called “wood vinegar” – which is like a holistic magic bullet – seeing as it not only detoxes, but is also notorious for smiting digestion, swelling, and pain problems. Some use others. Either way, more often than not, I’m hearing about how well the effects are in application.

Now, this is the part where the scientist in me wants an explanache.

Because nothing on our side’ve the world seems capable of confirming that you can vacuum out daily ingested venom via your feet. So, I thought, maybe what’s happening isn’t removal but absorption. If these pads’ve got some good hippie medicine in ’em, then maybe we’re drinking it in like a tree. Or – mayhaps its placebo effect. But, then, why were even the skeptical, pessimistic d-bags of the world feeling the effects? When I couldn’t find any good scientific evidence to either prove or disprove that the feet are any better at absorption than anywhere else on our bodies, I remembered that thing I mentioned above: reflexology.

See, those reflexology points I touched on above are a biggie out East. By hitting on certain points of your plantar fascia, through some sorcery, you can effect everything from mental clarity to when you’ll drop your next deuce to – of course – how well you’ll sleep. And you know what? Though this practice’s proven itself in a significant amount of studies on sufferers of insomnia and miscellaneous other maladies, no Western science can seem to explain why. No one’s certain about the biological details, but even the Mayo clinic can confirm it works. And as much as I loathe not knowing why, you wanna know what that tells me? That – much like a lotta life mysteries out there -there’s a whole helluva lot about the bottom of our stems that we straight up dunno about. And when that happens with anything, we’ve got a couple choices. We can either be afraid of fixes we can’t dissect to understand (and carry on suffering). Or we can accept, try, an benefit from the tools that’ve been safely working for ages in other cultures.

Which is why I say, don’t let lack of lab evidence deter you from detoxing.

Especially if you’ve seemingly tried everything else already.

’cause when things work and we aren’t sure why – it’s usually just science that hasn’t been proven yet.

Worry keeping you awake? That’s okay. Just give into it.

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Awake and anxious yet again?

The funny thing about generalized anxiety is how unspecific it can be. Espesh at the day’s end. Sure, were you to sit down with a scalpel and slice apart each concern one by one, you’d know what they were. But by nighttime, it’s just depressing, compressed, packaged up panic. The kind that raises your heart rate and has you throwing elbows at your partner in your sleep. And by the time you lay down, it’s not even about your kid’s tuition fees or what bills you have to pay when anymore. See, your brain knows it can’t fix those things right now. And that’s smart. But it still doesn’t keep you from feeling that nervous lack of resolution. Why? Because you’re trying to tell yourself not to worry about it – and that feels like a denial of reality in the bit of your brain that “knows better”. The mind chronically desires resolution when issues arise. The same way you can’t stand seeing half a flick or Tosh clip without knowing who dies, falls in love, or faceplants from a roof jumping stunt, you also can’t stand knowing there’s a problem and not knowing how it’s gonna get resolved. Thus, you can’t sleep. ’cause half of you’s still working on a resolution while the other half’s trying it’s hardest to counter that part with don’t-care-liness.

But deep down you really do want all those ducks in a row.

Enter: The Worry List.

A list of everything you need to worry about… later.

It may seem counter-intuitive, especially since creativity before bed can potentially wake you right back up. But this isn’t so much about morphing into Rembrandt or Emerson before bed. It’s about closure. You see, all of the individual things you’ve been worrying about (and subsequently telling yourself not to worry about so that you can focus on what you need to – which right now’s sleep) can’t be put off forever. Sure, you can’t fix them now. But they need to be addressed eventually. And your noggin knows that. By denying and ignoring those feelings, it causes a kinda dissonance. The issues sit under the surface, causing ripples in your tranquility (and thus sleep). It’s like serenity cellulite. You can’t see what’s happening under there until you stop and look really closely, but you know that it’s hideous and insidious and insomnia inducing. By creating a worry list, you can acknowledge all those little things. And what you intend to do about them. And when. And that all serves as mental assurance ’cause your actions are saying, “I accept that this is a thing to be handled. And I will address it at the appropriate time. I’m not putting it off. Or ignoring it. I have every intention of handling it on X-turday and Y O’clock in the morning.”


1.) See specialist about finger biting habit on Thursday at lunch.
2.) Especially since I’ve apparently already broken the middle and ring fingers of my right hand doing it.

Protip: you may wanna put it in your phone – where you’re sure to actually see it.

By penning it into your mental agenda, you don’t have it calling up and disturbing your calm every night, asking when the meeting’s gonna be. You’ve set a date and time – so it doesn’t hafta be right now. And that means you can go to sleep knowing a fix for all these issues is forthcoming. You’ve committed to giving it its rightful place in reality by putting it on paper. (Or in your iphone, if you’re like me.) And that way, you can also know your subconscious isn’t going to sabotage you by ignoring it for another extensive stretch of time. Thus, the next time worry’s keeping you awake, you don’t have to ignore it. You can give into it. Take five minutes to give your panic a place in the future – and note how that melodramatic panic turns into a fun puzzle you’re confident you can master in a timely fashion.

If you put your ducks in a row, your crazed brain won’t hafta duck Z’s.

Anxiety induced insomnia: is this gadget the answer?

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When it comes to anxiety induced insomnia, we all “get” that the body and mind are connected.

Trying to doze with your mind in attack mode’s nearly impossible.


“Why am I wearing makeup to bed?
Why am I wearing makeup to bed on white sheets?
Why’s a stranger in my room? Why’s a stranger in my room taking my picture?”

Studies have proven it repeatedly.

When we can calm our batshiz breathing down and stimulate our vagus nerve, calm will come about. And so will relaxation. And sleep. But our respective tension twisters have a tough time stopping just because we will them to. Doesn’t exactly work that way, does it? All it takes is your brain tugging on one negative thought thread, and the whole psychosis sweater comes undone. Voila. You’re left with hummingbird heartbeat syndrome anew, as you ruminate for another half hour about stuff you can’t do anything about right now. And you know what makes that so much harder to control? Or change? The fact that you’ve been in that rhythm of shallow breathing, fight or flight mode all day long. (’cause you spent it half working/half waiting for the next call you’re gonna get from the pre-school about your toddler shanking a kid at naptime for his snack pack.) That’s challenging to simply toggle off. You’ve been practicing that anxiety habit all day. And whatever we practice, (whether we mean to or not), starts to come more naturally to us. (Whether we want it or not.) That’s why each time you start to focus on your breathing, it typically culminates in with cerebral sabotage: (“Inhale, two, three.. Exhale, two, thr-…Hey, remember how bad your boss humiliated you at work today? Let’s think about that for the next twenty minutes while I make your neck and chest tenser than a Michael Crichton novel.”)

This is a common experience. (Hence the douchebag brain meme.)

So, first things first: you should feel okay knowing that’s totally normal.

Important: note that I say “should”, not “can” – because judging yourself for not being able to calm down is like pouring Tabasco sauce on your already festering insomnia laceration. And now that you know there’s nada wrong with you and that self-ridicule’s opposite of helpful, we can solution search. What can help click your nightly radio over to a sleep frequency? What can calm your breathing?

I was wondering this myself one day when I came across this device called the NightWave Sleep Assistant.

What it is, basically, is the blue eyed version of Hal from Space Odyssey. Except, instead’ve backtalking and trying to murder you, it fills your lair with a blanket of cool light – oscillating in intensity, with the aim of synchronizing your air sipping rhythm to it so you can doze off. So, I went to Youtube to check the demo. Again, the visual confirmed what I wanted to believe. I could see how that pulsing glow might just induce a proper puffing rhythm to pave the way for slumber. Indeed, it both sounded (and looked, from the video) really good in theory. And I was thisclose to next day’ing one to myself via Amazon, when the trusty customers from said site unknowingly stepped in with a testimonial intervention. Unfortunately, looking at reviews, people seem to deem it no more than a forty-five dollar, plastic POS.

While the main complaint I kept hearing was how small it was, that wasn’t what convinced me. Lots of badazzery comes from small gadgetry. (Just look at Zoolander’s phone.) Rather, what got to me was the fact that everyone also seemed to agree that the waves of light came on a bit jerkily, making it tough to synch breathing up with. Everyone’s calm, oxygen sucking patterns vary; they don’t match perfectly. So I dunno how the limited settings of this machine could possibly accommodate each sleeper uniquely. Also, I have to wonder – why do they use blue instead of amber light? Isn’t blue light at night no bueno for melatonin production? Yeah… I think this thing’s got potential, but I wouldn’t buy it yet. Maybe after they add an amber light feature and let it gauge your heart rate for catered settings.

In the meantime, if you’re looking for a respiratory whisperer and don’t wanna waste money, try this guy:

I came across his videos a while back when I was going through prescription-withdrawal induced insomnia.

And homeboy’s pretty legit. Aside from the fact that I want to make a coat out of his voice and dance to “Goodbye Horses” in the mirror with it, his hypnoses are entirely calming. Especially this one I stumbled upon more recently. What it does is calm your noggin by steadying your breath. Whereas a light leaves too much room for frenzied thinking to creep in and cause erratic respiration, you’re getting direct instructions here. And it’s done in a calming way. The result? You get sent into deep sleep in under half an hour. And the cost? Complimentary. (Because: Youtube.) And that’s the major selling point for me – there is no sale and it takes very little of my time before I’m primed for rest. The whole hypnosis is all of 22 minutes and 0 dollars.


(The best sleeps in life are on the house.)

’cause when you know you’re saving time, money, and avoiding a groggy tomorrow?

Well… that’s just three fewer things to keep you up, anxiously breathing each night.

There’s nothing broken about your broken sleep, science says.

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I’ve long held the belief that a punctuated slumber’s no good.

Like a comma splice in an otherwise serene sentence of endless Z’s.

But newer research is calling that logic into question. And asking a question of its own: is a fragmented sleep so bad? Or is it simply segmented because it’s mean to be? Indeed, the uncovering of historical data is showing that mayhaps waking at the witching hour’s not so abnormal. In fact, what’s making us miserable isn’t the fact that we can’t get back to sleep – but that we’re trying to.


“In all fairness, maybe if I took this clock out of my hair I’d sleep a bit better…”

See, this dude Roger Ekirch (a historian) studied some records dating from ancient times up through the pre-industrial era. And he learned this: Folks closer to the roots of our genealogical trees didn’t sleep straight through the eves back before iphones and episodes of “The Bachelor” could keep them up. Instead, they’d do a sleep sammich. After heading to bed somewhere around sunset, they’d doze for a few hours, wake up for a few, and then go back to bed again for another few. Thing is – when our ancestors woke up at midnight or whenever, they wouldn’t toss and turn and damn the sandman for fragmenting their sleep. They’d get their azzes up do something productive – like pray, screw, or socialize with the neighbors.

Or get to all that artsy shiz you “don’t have time for” by day:


“♪I wonder if Staaarbucks is opeeeen…♪”

Protip Avoid caffeine. (Because: duh – you’re going back to bed in a few.)

And blue light activities. (Because: melatonin disruption.)

When we do that former thing, fitfully pinwheeling on the mattress, it’s no better than those mornings you spend languishing in bed ’cause you’re dreading something you have to do. Where your mental energy goes sets the tone for whatever comes next. Whether that’s sleep or meeting. Argument? The fact that most people report feeling bright eyed and bushy tailed on mornings they’ve got something they either look forward to – or know they need to bring their A game for. It’s all about the anticipation. And, in a way, anxiety and anticipation aren’t that distant of cousins. If we can just 180 that negativity part of stress (presumably about falling back asleep), then what’s it turn into? Excitement. That’s when you wake up to draw or write or polish off a project for a few hours, and then hop back in the sack, basking in that feeling you get after any day that’s ended fulfillingly.

And this doesn’t necessarily counter what every other study’s had to say about sleep.

First off, they do say that the brain works harder when we’re asleep than when we’re awake. It’s organizing the day’s data and sorting memories and all that. So, maybe, this spontaneous rise ‘n shine rooster sounding off in your skull’s accounting for that. I mean, if your think meat’s working so hard, it could just be that this wake up call’s nor more than your brain blowing the factory lunch break whistle.

The message is: wake up, do something humans do, and then let’s reconvene at 3-ish.

Then, there’s the “90 minute” rule, too – which still applies here.

See, there’s this belief that it takes an hour and a half to get through a full cycle of snoozery – and that we thus must make wake up O’ clock be some factor of exactly 90 minutes. To catch shut eye for two’a those cycles, wake up, rinse, and repeat would be following this logic exactly. You’re just not knocking all those hours out in a row – which science says is fine. What’s not fine? Getting frenzied over the fact that you’re not adhering to what you’ve heard is the right thing to do. (Like, how to sleep.) And I think most’ve us are at fault for doing this. We don’t tune into our somatic radio signals enough. We’re ready to heed whatever advice some stranger has to say about health and well being. (Case in point: you, here, now – reading what I hafta say.) And then, when it doesn’t jibe with us, we judge ourselves about it and get mad at our bodies for not complying with our minds’ will. This leads to stress. Which is not only completely counterproductive to relaxing enough to zonk out, but a negative tone-setter for the day ahead. And, ultimately, our lives. How many times have you lamented this fissure in your drift-off hours? Or let it put you in a downcast mood the next day? What if you started putting it to use – and telling everyone how much awesomery you accomplished while they were drooling into their linens? In a way, you’re not the one missing out on anything. Everyone else is missing out on all those hobbies they don’t get to do ’cause they spend a consecutive stretch of seven hours each day being comforter wrapped conformists. You’re not at a loss. You’ve got it all. You both work and cultivate your artistic passions. Pshhh. This isn’t a sickness. This is a gift.

Thus, in the end, perhaps segmented sleep’s less like a comma splice.

And more like a productivity semicolon interjected to afford you a few extra hours in your day.

I suppose it all depends on which way you’re looking at the rest of your story.

Would you spray this in your face for a better sleep?

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Marilyn Monroe was famed for spritzing on nada but Chanel No. 5 before bed.

But what if there was a spray that could help you actually make you go to sleep?

Alright. Calm down, Cos.

No, it’s not a roofie. Or a perfume for that matter. (Though I’ve found much success with aromatherapy.) What it is, is a bottle of stuff put out by a company called Marz, which you spritz into your kisser like a breath spray at bedtime. The upsides? Well, there’s no sugar, no gluten (if that’s a thing for you) and it’s not like there’s some benzo potion inside knocking you out and secretly getting you hooked on mystery narcos. It’s au natch: melatonin, valerian root, and gaba. All stuff you can pick up sans a script from your local pharmacy aisle. Couple that with the fact that the route is oral, and you get a nice rapid absorption. No gagging on parade float sized pills, waiting patiently for them digest only to learn that they don’t, and subsequently wishing you could spit them back out like ammo at the sheep you’ve been counting for the past three hours. So all’ve that’s good.

But there are a couple of things to be wary of when it comes to the ingredients.

As I sifted through the reviews, I did hear great feedback about how well the Marz product works. However, what I also read was that there’s one potentially inimical ingredient that’s also in there along with the liquified hippie herbs: propolyne glycol. The alcohol they use as a solvent… in antifreeze. And plastics. And perfumes. And… food? That’s right. Toxic or not, for some reason this stuff’s given the green light for your mouth in certain amounts. Even though there are studies linking its exposure to allergic reactions. And cell mutation. And the MSDS sheets themselves dub it a “hazardous material”, while citing that skin, liver and kidney damage can happen after exposure to the stuff.

But even if the Marzians whipped up an extra special batch of the stuff that’s not gonna transmogrify me into some ghastly creature eligible for X-men auditions, I’d still politely decline. Why? Because, when you think about it, this’s just another pill in mist form. It’s the same damn thing, just entering your system faster. And just because it’s natural doesn’t mean it won’t eff up your flow.

That goes for the whole collection.


(Gotta love that second to the last one of sprayable V8 for your spawn…)

Not long ago, I did a bit of research on melatonin, only to learn that it’s not necessarily something you wanna rely on for sleep. Sure, it might cure your probs with nodding off. But when you feed your body an extra dose of this hormone, it sets off a cascade of other internal reactions that catch up with you later. Body processes don’t happen in a vacuum. In the long run, you end up groggier and suffering “cognitive fog”. (What’s the point in sleeping if you aren’t refreshed enough to face the day after?) And what’s the solution to sneezing sleep ingredients and toxins into your oral cavity? Getting some sunlight exposure during the day (or mayhaps one’a those seasonal sun lamps that make your brain think it’s getting day rays). And avoiding blue light at night. Exposure to photons in the early A.M. helps balance our your melatonin levels, while poring over a phone in the P.M. effs ’em up. People (including me, a lot of the time) hate that this is the answer because it means having to habit change. But as someone who gets it wrong most of the time myself, I’ll be first to admit that the few times I get this balance right, I sleep far better.

In sum, sorry bout it, but I don’t think this aerosol will aerosolve your sleep problems.

Sounds more like “outta the tired frying and into the fatigue fire” to me.