Sleep For Weight Reduction

December 14, 2008

Aids To Sleep

U.S. Airmen unload pallets of Meals, Ready to Eat, sleeping bags and cots on a flightline in Tbilisi, Georgia

Aids To Sleep

Airmen assigned to the 720th Air Expeditionary Squadron unload pallets of Meals, Ready to Eat, sleeping bags and cots Aug. 23 on a flightline in Tbilisi, Georgia. The joint humanitarian assistance assessment team with U.S. European Command is working with the federal government, international governments, aid agencies and the Republic of Georgia to assist Georgians affected by the recent conflicts. (U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Ricky A. Bloom)
080823-F-2902B-017

Sleep For Weight Loss

Sounds pretty simple doesn’t it? Then why do so many of us view regular sleep as something that is really not all that important? I’ll just make up the sleep on the weekend, or on my next vacation, we say. Well, unfortunately studies are showing it just does not work like that when it comes to sleep. A sleep deficit cannot be made up by getting an occasional complete night sleep. Sleep must come in a regular and consistent pattern to achieve the desired results. We spend millions of dollars on diets, vitamins, medicine, and on doctors for our health. But, we ignore the most important and most simple thing. Good Sleep.

Our modern world in is a very sleep deprived society, and a very obese society. The average night’s sleep has decreased from about nine hours in 1910 to about 7.5 hours in 1975, a trend that continues. More than half of people over 50 complain about not getting enough quality sleep. If things are busy at work the first thing that we often sacrifice is our sleep time. Meanwhile our population just keeps getting fatter.

How does this relate to weight loss? All of the body and brains ability to heal, rebuild, and recover are done during sleep. With a lack of sleep all of our bodily functions start to slow down dramatically including your metabolism. Your metabolism is responsible for speeding up the digestion of food out of your system. The slower your metabolic rate the more your body hangs on to unneeded calories and fat. There are hundreds of products on the market designed to help with speeding up our metabolism, but the easiest and healthiest thing we can do burn more calories is to get serious about getting our sleep patterns normal.

So, what is the best solution? First and foremost is allocating the necessary time to sleep. Second is the ability to get good sleep during this period. If that is not a problem for you than consider yourself lucky. Millions of us would like to sleep better at night but just cannot seem to turn our brains off. What is the best insomnia cure? Doctors will prescribe pharmaceutical sleeping pills, but do we really want to be on prescription sleeping drugs the rest of our lives? I know I don’t. The best and safest solution is to find a really good natural sleep aid that works for you. Some sleep aids these days will offer money back guarantees, so you can try them without financial risk. A safe and effective natural sleeping pill will usually contain nutrients like melatonin, valerian root, hops, and other natural sleeping aids. There are several very good guaranteed sleep aids available online. With all we do to try to lose weight these days don’t overlook the importance and effectiveness of a good nights sleep.


Kid’Sleep Classic, Blue

Aids To Sleep – click on the image below for more information.

  • The Kid’Sleep Classic combines a night light, wake-up indicator for young children and an alarm clock for older children
  • The Kid’Sleep helps young children have an understanding of when it is time to get out of bed and when it is not; It is a great tool for nighttime self regulation
  • Kids and parents get more sleep
  • Children naturally relate to the sleeping and awake character; Color recognition is not required

Aids To Sleep

The Kid’Sleep has many benefits, as a night light, wake-up indicator for young children and an alarm clock for older children. It helps young children have an understanding of when it is time to get out of bed and when it is not. It is a great tool for nighttime self regulation, and the result is that both parents and children get more sleep. The Kid’Sleep Classic helps kids stay in bed until it is time to get up. If the sleeping bunny’s picture is lit, kids know to stay in bed. When the awake b


Kid’Sleep Classic, Blue

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Natural Sleep Aid: Melatonin??

A wee dram before bedtime 'can spoil your sleep'
Aids To Sleep
US colleague Dr Seiji Nishino added: "It is generally believed a nightcap may aid sleep, especially sleep initiation. This may be true for some who have small amounts of alcohol. However, large amounts interfere with sleep quality and the restorative

Aids To Sleep question by Bean: What is it in milk that aids sleep?
That relaxes and aids sleep when warmed and drunk before bed? Is it melatonin?

Didn’t know where else to put this question- may post this in food and drink too.

Aids To Sleep best answer:

Answer by Aibi
Milk contains tryptophan which is the precursor for the hormones melatonin and serotonin. Both of these hormones aid in sleep.

During daylight, the pineal gland produces serotonin, a neurotransmitter that aids in sleep and regulates our mood. At night, the pineal gland stops making serotonin and instead produces melatonin. Melatonin release helps trigger sleep.

Aids To Sleep

Uncultured Project – Aid to Bagarat

Aids To Sleep

Funding 100% by my family – 70 blankets going to Bagarat to help the needy. Things are so bad there there is no electricity and winter is coming. Many families have only one bed and all sleep together. These blankets are large enough for a family of 3 or 4. That’s 200 to 280 people kept warm for 0 USD. Thats a buck a person – can money be any better spent?

Find out more at my uncultured.com.

How to Make Your Sleeping Pill Keep Working

Sounds pretty simple doesn’t it? Then why do so many of us view regular sleep as something that is really not all that important? I’ll just make up the sleep on the weekend, or on my next vacation, we say. Well, unfortunately studies are showing it just does not work like that when it comes to sleep. A sleep deficit cannot be made up by getting an occasional complete night sleep. Sleep must come in a regular and consistent pattern to achieve the desired results. We spend millions of dollars on diets, vitamins, medicine, and on doctors for our health. But, we ignore the most important and most simple thing. Good Sleep.

Our modern world in is a very sleep deprived society, and a very obese society. The average night’s sleep has decreased from about nine hours in 1910 to about 7.5 hours in 1975, a trend that continues. More than half of people over 50 complain about not getting enough quality sleep. If things are busy at work the first thing that we often sacrifice is our sleep time. Meanwhile our population just keeps getting fatter.

How does this relate to weight loss? All of the body and brains ability to heal, rebuild, and recover are done during sleep. With a lack of sleep all of our bodily functions start to slow down dramatically including your metabolism. Your metabolism is responsible for speeding up the digestion of food out of your system. The slower your metabolic rate the more your body hangs on to unneeded calories and fat. There are hundreds of products on the market designed to help with speeding up our metabolism, but the easiest and healthiest thing we can do burn more calories is to get serious about getting our sleep patterns normal.

So, what is the best solution? First and foremost is allocating the necessary time to sleep. Second is the ability to get good sleep during this period. If that is not a problem for you than consider yourself lucky. Millions of us would like to sleep better at night but just cannot seem to turn our brains off. What is the best insomnia cure? Doctors will prescribe pharmaceutical sleeping pills, but do we really want to be on prescription sleeping drugs the rest of our lives? I know I don’t. The best and safest solution is to find a really good natural sleep aid that works for you. Some sleep aids these days will offer money back guarantees, so you can try them without financial risk. A safe and effective natural sleeping pill will usually contain nutrients like melatonin, valerian root, hops, and other natural sleeping aids. There are several very good guaranteed sleep aids available online. With all we do to try to lose weight these days don’t overlook the importance and effectiveness of a good nights sleep.

Prescription sleep aides are among the most commonly administered of medications, and they can be a Godsend for many patients. Although once only approved by the FDA for brief trials, recently the FDA approved Ambien for long-term use. In actuality, any prescription sleeping pill can be used safely and reliably on a chronic (i.e., nightly) basis, with favorable results. The problem over time, however, is that a person develops tolerance to the sedative effect of these medications and requires ever-increasing dosages to reap the same benefit as when s/he first began taking them, which in many cases leads to drug dependence, withdrawal effects, and even in some cases addiction and/or overdose. This article addresses how to avoid the problem of escalating the dosage of a sleep aide, while maintaining considerable benefit from the prescribed medication.

When you have chronic insomnia that requires nightly dosing with a medication that cannot be increased indefinitely without risking serious side effects (to say nothing of the fact that, sooner rather than later, the higher dose itself will fail to work as expected), here’s what you may be doing wrong, along with some secrets to preserving the efficacy of any sleeping preparation:

Begin with the lowest effective dose of the medication and do not increase it unless or until absolutely necessary. This will conserve those higher doses for when you really need them. The sooner and faster you up the dosage, the more rapidly you will develop tolerance to the sedative effect of the drug, and the sooner you will become frustrated by the fact that the medication is apparently no longer working for you.

Once you have increased the dosage once or twice, feel free to back down on those subsequent nights when you already feel especially tired, or think that you might not have particular difficulty getting to sleep; better yet, skip the medication entirely whenever you can. This will preserve efficacy over time, because tolerance is always reversible.

Take the full dose of the medication on an empty stomach, with plenty of water. This will speed the rate of absorption, which will maximize the medication’s potency. With a sleeping pill, you want to absorb it rapidly and completely, so that you get to sleep in the same manner: quickly and fully. If you take the medication on a full stomach, this will result in its being absorbed more gradually over time, as it dissolves into the food present in your stomach; the food itself presents a physical barrier to absorption. This in turn results in a gradual relaxation that, if too gradual, may not tip you over into desired sleep. For example, 10mg of Ambien will have a much more impressive effect if you absorb it over a period of, say, 15-20 minutes than that same dosage will have if it takes an hour and a half to enter the bloodstream, and thus, reach the brain. This is true regardless of your body weight, liver function, or level of tolerance.

Along the same lines, take the full dose all at once. If you know you will need more than 5mg of Ambien to get to sleep, don’t take 5mg an hour before bedtime and then wait to take another 5mg when you actually get in bed; you may find with this strategy that you are tempted to take yet another 5mg at 3 a.m., and still not get to sleep. This wastes the potency of the dosage you are needing. Take all 10mg or 15mg at once, preferably on an empty stomach, 10-20 minutes before lights out.

This is not to say that taking another 5 or 10mg later, if absolutely necessary (and okayed by your doctor), won’t work: often extra doses do help, but it’s a bad habit to get into, splitting the dosage of a sleeping pill. Take what you need when you need it and be done with it. Taking extra doses of a sleeping medication while under the influence of that medication is particularly unadvisable because this can lead to unintentionally taking more of the medication than is needed or safe, and exceeding your doctor’s recommendation. This is because you will begin experiencing cognitive dysfunction after the first dose; even if you don’t feel sleepy, you WILL be impaired, and that includes memory and judgment. You don’t want to be titrating your dose of sleeping medication once you become confused and forgetful. People have accidentally overdosed because they take extra doses of medication after they’ve taken doses they’ve forgotten they’ve taken!

Take “drug holidays” when feasible. As previously stated, if you are already tired and feel like sleeping without it, or if it’s the weekend and it’s not absolutely necessary to be asleep before midnight, skip the medication entirely that night. This will delay and even reverse the tolerance you have built up for the drug up to that point, likewise preserving the efficacy of the medication over the long-term.

The more regularly you take a sleeping pill, the more surely you will develop some immunity to its sleep-inducing effect, but the more nights in a row that you go without the medication each time you take a “holiday” from the drug, the more you reverse any tolerance you have acquired up to that point. Frequent drug holidays can prevent the development of tolerance in the first place, which is ideal.

One way to take more drug holidays is to make sure you have good “sleep hygiene.” Just follow the rules for maintaining good sleep that are well-known (see my article on How To Maintain Good Sleep Hygiene).

Avoid consuming alcohol, because you will develop cross-tolerance to many prescription sleep aides if you regularly drink (especially the benzodiazepine class of medications, whose names end in “-pam,” such as Valium, ****, Klonopin, Ativan and others, as well as Ambien, Sonata, Lunesta and most other, newer and commonly prescribed agents). While drinking alcohol and then taking sleeping pills can lead to a synergistic effect (which can actually be quite dangerous and is responsible for the majority of deaths due to accidental overdose), drinking alcohol in the early evening several hours before bedtime can lead to a direct state of rebound wakefulness as the effects of the alcohol diminish. This can lead to insomnia all on its own. In the context of treatment with a sleep aide, there is no longer an additive effect when a person takes the sleeping pill, but because of cross-tolerance due to alcohol consumption, the brain resists the sleepy effect of the medication. Cross-tolerance of sleeping pills with alcohol is more of a long-term effect, but drinking alcohol in the early evening can diminish the effects of a sleeping pill that night by this mechanism.

People who drink regularly and/or heavily often notice that they have a “built-in” resistance to sleeping medications from the start; that is, at the starting doses that are prescribed by doctors. This existing tolerance can be reversed, however, by laying off the alcohol in much the same way that any level of drug tolerance can be reversed by weaning off of the habit-forming substance and avoiding it as much as possible in the future.

People who take certain anti-anxiety medications during the day (for panic attacks, for example) will encounter the same phenomenon of not being as sensitive to the sedative effects of a given dosage of sleeping medication, if that medication is also a benzodiazepine or a medication like Ambien that is cross-tolerant with benzos.

If you have chronic insomnia that requires nightly dosing with a medication that cannot be increased in dosage indefinitely (that would be all of them!), here’s what you should realize:

When you first take a medication for sleep, the medication works powerfully to shut down your brain, assuming that your body hasn’t already built up some immunity to it due to cross-tolerance with alcohol or other sedating substances. In that case, after you first take the medication and begin absorbing it, the drowsiness that comes upon you basically forces you to sleep. If you are already tucked in, that makes it easy to drift into unconsciousness. If you are still up and about, you will stop whatever it is you are doing and find your bed, because it’s that, or fall on the floor.

However, once you have developed a tolerance to the medication, it will no longer “force” you unconscious; it will no longer compel you to find your bed whatever you may be doing. It will still help considerably in gently encouraging you–allowing you, as it were–to fall asleep…if you are comfortably in bed, in the right position, with the lights out, trying to relax and clear your mind. The medication that once put you to sleep now merely assists you in drifting off, and while this effect can also wane over time with tolerance, it rarely disappears completely. That is to say, you will definitely develop tolerance to being “knocked out” by a given dosage of a sleep medication, but that dosage or perhaps a slightly higher one will always significantly relax your mind and your muscles and it will always promote sleepiness to some degree. But in order to take advantage of that sleep assistance, you have to be sure that your mind and body are not working against you.

What happens is that, depending on how quickly and fully you absorb the medication, there will be a window of time during which your blood concentration of the medication will be peaking. It is during this window of opportunity that you should be in bed, ready to drift off. If you miss it–if you’re emptying the trash or brushing your teeth or talking on the phone or yelling at the kids–when you do finally get in bed and turn the lights out, your blood levels may already be dropping and you may have missed your chance to take full advantage of the medication’s soporific effect.

This is a very common mistake people make: they take their pill before they are ready to commit to sleepytime, and while they are “waiting for it to kick in,” they’re paying bills, surfing the internet, reading, or seeing what’s on TV.

This is a huge mistake. Take your medication and then GO TO BED. Don’t take it and do other nighttime stuff, waiting to pass out. I once had a patient who admitted to me that she took her sleeping pill, then drove to the convenience store for a carton of milk! Besides being dangerous, she was obviously not ready for sleep. It’s no wonder the medication didn’t help her find sleep: she wasn’t looking for it. And thank goodness she didn’t find it on the way–or rather, that it didn’t find her! (Even had she walked to the store it would not have been a good idea.)

The thing to understand here is that, very soon after regularly taking a sleeping medication, it induces sleep more gently than it did the first few times, because your brain develops natural immunity to the sedative effect. The medication has to work harder to put your adapted brain to sleep, which means you either have to take more milligrams or you have to make it easier on your body to succumb to the medication’s attenuated effect. Since it is neither feasible nor safe to continue escalating the dose of a sedating medication (or any medication, for that matter), if you want your sleeping pill to keep working you have to do everything you can to let it work, which means don’t fight it with an alert mind and an active body. Take the medicine, lie down, close your eyes, clear your mind and relax into it.
The other thing to remember is that, if you take a drug holiday, and you wait long enough, the medication will work like new the next time you take it. You should still follow the rules outlined in this article, but you will find that the medication works better–and at a significantly lower dosage–than it had been before you took the break.


Irwin Naturals Power to Sleep PM Soft-Gels, 60-Count Bottle

Aids To Sleep – click on the image below for more information.

  • Promotes Relaxation, Stimulates Sleep, Restores Nutrients:
  • Wake Up Refreshed
  • Promotes Restful Sleep And A Healthy Sleep Cycle
  • Non-addictive, natural and safe

Aids To Sleep

Attaining restful and sustained sleep is fundamental to health and wellbeing. Irwin Naturals Power to Sleep PM utilizes natural ingredients formulated to gently encourage a state of relaxation, replenish nutrients that help the body cope with stress and improve essential mineral stores. These ingredients work together to help you relax before bed, sleep soundly during the night and wake-up feeling refreshed in the morning. Contains Valerian, an herb traditionally used by warring tribes during ne


Irwin Naturals Power to Sleep PM Soft-Gels, 60-Count Bottle

Click on the button for more Aids To Sleep information and reviews.

Natural Sleep Aids – Foods That Help You Sleep

New Online Test: SleepTest.com Aids in the Diagnosis of OSA
Aids To Sleep
According to the World Health Organization approximately 100 million people worldwide have OSA (obstructive sleep apnea). With OSA affecting the masses, you'd think a sleep test would be part of each physical exam and doctor visit.

Aids To Sleep question by Jason: What are some over the counter sleep aids I could use to help me fall asleep at night?
For the last few months I have been having extreme difficulty falling asleep. I just don’t get tired until nearly 7 in the morning. I have no trouble sleeping once I get to sleep; It’s getting to sleep that’s the problem. I am looking for any over the counter sleep aids that can help me simply become much more tired much earlier in the night. Does anyone have any suggestions?

What would need to be done to get prescription sleep aids?

Any information would be appreciated.

Aids To Sleep best answer:

Answer by Dr. Patrick V. Suglia
If you are looking for something natural, try 5-htp or melatonin. Otherwise, the best thing I ever used for myself wan’t even a “sleep aid” at all. It was regular Benadryl.

6 Comments

  • SC says:
    20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
    4.0 out of 5 stars
    Works well once it’s set up., December 25, 2010
    By 
    SC
    This review is from: Kid’Sleep Classic, Blue (Baby Product)

    We’ve been using “the bunny”, as we call it, for 3 months. Initially I was very frustrated and disappointed when it arrived, but am very happy with it over the long term. I just wish it had batteries. If I were to buy again, I’d get the sheep version.

    Pros: very effective as an indicator of sleep/wake time. My 2-year old had no trouble understanding the idea.

    Cons: no battery. all settings reset when the bunny us unplugged

    Initial setup does take some time. About 20 minutes. Not because the instructions are hard to understand, but the settings take a bit of time to get right.

    The first thing my son did was run over and press the buttons, and then pull it to take it with him and unplug it from the wall. So initially it looked like this might not work for a child that loves buttons. This only lasted a short time however. The buttons don’t result in any interactivity, so my son now ignores them and knows to leave the bunny on the table.

    The success of the bunny as an indicator of when to wake up will depend on how consistent the parents are with allowing the child to get out of bed when the bunny is still asleep. We had some time when our son was sick and we stopped paying attention to this, and over the next few weeks he again started to wake up early. Since then we’ve started over… the first time, I went into his room and stayed with him in bed until we watched the bunny change, and then we got up. The next day when he called me I reminded him about the bunny a couple of times. On the fourth day our son called me exactly at the set time, from which I gather that he’d been watching it quietly.

    The best things about this model:
    – you don’t have to manually turn on the “sleep” mode. I like that the bunny sleeps/wakes automatically at the set times.
    – it’s silent
    – it’s an extra night light

    Problems:
    – no battery, so if you need to move it, you set all the settings again.
    – not bright enough for nap-time use. It’s almost impossible to tell whether the bunny is sleeping or awake if the room is relatively bright. This might also come up as a problem for summer mornings, we haven’t gotten there yet.

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  • Heather Schuller says:
    13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Great product!, November 16, 2010
    By 
    This review is from: Kid’Sleep Classic, Blue (Baby Product)

    This “clock” works like a charm for our daughter. We bought it for her when she was 2 1/2 years old. She understood the concept right away. She is now 4 1/2 and still uses it. When she wakes up before her “bunny is running”, she just lays in her bed until her bunny wakes up. Most of the time now she sleeps until after her bunny wakes up anyway. I love that the transition from night to day is silent, so it doesn’t wake her. We used to use a nightlight on a timer to tell her when it was day, but that made a clicking noise when it went off that would wake her up if she happened to still be sleeping then. This clock has been great for us. Her little sister, who is 22 months old, is asking for her own clock now. We will be buying a second one. The programming is not difficult, as the other reviewers claim. Yes, you have to reset it when the power goes out or you unplug it, but that takes all of 1 minute. GREAT PRODUCT!

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  • Ralitsa Georgieva "Ralka" says:
    6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Simple to set and works perfect!, January 27, 2011
    By 
    Ralitsa Georgieva “Ralka” (San Francisco) –
    (REAL NAME)
      

    Amazon Verified Purchase(What’s this?)
    This review is from: Kid’Sleep Classic, Blue (Baby Product)

    I am really amused by the fact that so many people share difficulty to program this clock!!! I was prepared for a big struggle after reading the reviews, but for my dismay it is actually extremely easy!!! People, please read the “vague” directions – they are more than you will ever need! To the reviewer who cannot figure out how to put bunny to sleep. You can program 2 times for the bunny to wake up – one for a nap and one for the morning. When you want the bunny to go back to sleep you have to just turn the button which switches between the functions all the way to the left /position zero/ and then bring it back to the position where there is a little sun and a little moon, when you want to use it again.
    In my opinion the kid’s sleep classic works like a charm and is very cute! I highly recommend it!

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  • Hanh M. Nguyen "hanhster" says:
    5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Highly Recommend, September 14, 2010
    By 
    Hanh M. Nguyen “hanhster” (Orange, CA) –
    (REAL NAME)
      

    This review is from: Irwin Naturals Power to Sleep PM Soft-Gels, 60-Count Bottle (Health and Beauty)

    I had a lot going on at work and just couldn’t stop my mind from being active at nights. Was getting like 5 hrs sleep and not good sleep at that which is no good. I tried advil PM and it works but I didn’t like having to take synthetic drugs to get a good night’s sleep. Tried Power to Sleep PM and it totally works so I highly recommend it because it is made of natural supplements. It knocks me out too so none of this waking up occassionally either. It is a bit expensive which is the downside.

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  • A. Alden says:
    2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
    5.0 out of 5 stars
    Does the job, December 1, 2010
    By 
    A. Alden (Seattle, WA) –
    (REAL NAME)
      

    Amazon Verified Purchase(What’s this?)
    This review is from: Irwin Naturals Power to Sleep PM Soft-Gels, 60-Count Bottle (Health and Beauty)

    I was taking benadryl to help me sleep for years. Not a good, long term idea. Don’t want to take any other pharmaceutical. This formula has helped me sleep. The first couple of weeks I still woke up for an hour or two in the middle of the night, but now I mostly sleep straight through the night. No morning grogginess. I buy it through Amazon’s subscription plan, which is a great idea – money saved – and very helpful – never run out.

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