Everyday Mom

I read an interesting statistic today from the NHSA (National Highway Safety Administration).  They indicate that falling asleep while driving is responsible for at least 100,000 vehicle crashes, 71,000 injuries, and 1,550 deaths each year.  Further, they indicate that young people in their teens and twenties are more susceptible to the effects of sleep deprivation and therefore are involved in more that half of those fall-asleep incidents.  That was staggering to me.  I’ve been tired while driving before, but I would never consider it possible to fall asleep.  Unfortunately, we tend to deny our bodies the required and much needed sleep they need and lose control of things like proper brain function allowing us to do something that we would normally consider impossible like falling asleep at the wheel. 

Without proper sleep we tend to be less efficient at work, our memory fails, we become grumpy, and we have difficulty making good decisions.  A prolonged lack of quality sleep can even begin to affect our overall health.  Now, I love to sleep!  When I get a chance to sleep in on a Saturday, I take it.  If the opportunity to nap on Sunday afternoons is available, I’m the first to take advantage.  However, even knowing that sleep is important to me, I still live day to day with as little sleep as I can get by with staying up late at night and being forced to start my day all too early for children, work, appointments, and everything else I fill my life with. 

So, knowing how important sleep is and how potentially dangerous it is when we don’t get enough, how do we get better at monitoring our need for sleep?  Here are the most common guidelines.  Are you doing your best to get a good night’s sleep?

• Get on a schedule.  Wake at the same time everyday and go to bed at the same time each evening.
• Minimize your caffeine intake especially four to six hours before bedtime.
• Get regular exercise.
• Don’t eat a heavy meal before going to bed.
• Stop Smoking!
• Minimize noise and light during sleep.  Don’t sleep with a radio or TV on.
• Make sure you have a quality bed!

I will have to work on correcting several things on that list in my own life.  We just got a new bed not too long ago, and quite frankly I’m not all that thrilled with it.  I’m going to be in the market again soon!  My husband and I have looked at the Sleep Number Beds–they were very nice.  We have also thought about Tempurpedic.  In considering my choices for a new bed, I ran across some free information for the Tempurpedic.  You can get a free brochure and DVD.   I think it is worth a look if you want to make sure that your bed is doing its job for you.  As I get older, I am ever more aware of how important it is to care for my body.  I’m going to add sleep to my list of new GOOD habits to work on.  Yawn!  I think I’ll go to bed early tonight!