Many of us still believe that in order to be healthy we must have eight hours of sleep a night; or that if we sleep poorly over a period of time, we’ll get lines in our faces, bags under our eyes, a worn look, and worst of all, be unable to perform our daily tasks effectively.
“Untrue,” says Dr. Alice Kuhn Schwartz, psychologist and co-author of Somniquest. “You may look awful to yourself, but except for the first hour or so in the morning when you probably will be puffy-eyed due to depletion of a certain hormone that’s the result of lack of sleep, you’ll soon look like your usual self and perform norm ally. If you do feel worn, the cause is stress. Also, there is no number of hours you must sleep to maintain good health. Some people get along beautifully on four and a half hour, others sleep nine hours. Anywhere within that range is norm al.”
Recent studies of patient at sleep clinic have revealed significant facts about the cause of insomnia as well as ways to deal with it. I t is no surprise that stress and depression (over family, health, job, or other problems) are linked to insomnia insomnia m ay be caused by physical illness: itching, aches, asthma, arthritis, ulcers, and heart problems that involve shortness of breath or difficult in breathing.
In order to overcome insomnia, millions of Americans turn to drugs_ both over_ the_ counter drugs and prescription drug “No pill will produce normal sleep,” says Dr. Jam es Minard, sponsor of Sleep Studies at New Jersey Medical School. “You reach no proper levels of sleep through a pill; you’re m erely sedated”.
1. The topic of the text is ____.