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You’re not getting enough sleep. Study after study shows that most American adults have been depriving themselves of the amounts of sleep they need.

Dr. William Dement, the director of Stanford University’s Sleep Center, says that “most Americans no longer know what it feels like to be fully alert.” In his landmark book The Promise of Sleep, Dr. Dement unequivocally states, “like bricks in a back pack, accumulated sleep drive is a burden that weighs you down. Every hour that you are awake adds another brick to the pack.”

“The brain keeps an exact accounting of how much sleep it is owed,” Dr. Dement says. “Each successive night of partial loss is carried over and the end effect appears to accumulate in a precisely additive fashion…The size of the sleep debt and its dangerous effect are directly related to the amount of lost sleep. Until proven otherwise, it is reasonable and safe to assume that accumulated sleep loss must be paid back hour for hour.

“In just a few decades of technological innovation we have managed to totally overthrow our magnificently evolved biological clocks and the complex biorhythms they regulate.”

A Prevention magazine survey showed that 40 percent of U.S. adults-tens of millions of individuals- “suffer from stress every day of their lives and find that they can sleep no more than six hours a night.”

How important is it to your overall health and effectiveness? Vitally important.

Short-changing your sleep on any given night (provided it’s only one) won’t cause you much harm. You might feel crummy the next day, but you can compensate by taking a nap or going to bed early the next evening. However, don’t use naps to catch up on sleep if you habitually short-change yourself each evening. It doesn’t work.

Sleep Deprivation: A Disaster in the Making

In The 24-Hour Society, sleep-researcher Dr. Martin Moore-Ede found that repeatedly getting less sleep than you need day after day can lead to disaster. Moore-Ede contends that a rash of plane, train, and other transportation mishaps can all be traced back to insufficient sleep on the part of those responsible.

How much do you need to sleep each day? It depends – for some people, seven hours a night is great; for others, it’s eight; for others still, it’s nine. Most adults need about eight hours. College students may need an average of nine to nine-and-a-half hours (whether or not they stayed up until three in the morning, they’d still need more sleep than a 35-year-old). As people age, some need more than eight hours a night; some need less.

Dr. Jack Edinger at Duke University’s Sleep Center says, “The older one gets, the less smooth one’s sleep pattern. It is normal for someone between 40 and 70 to be awake some part of the night.” As you age, you may need more than eight hours of sleep nightly if it’s punctuated by wakeful periods.

If you’ve gone to bed at 11:00 p.m. or midnight for the past several months, chances are you’ll go to bed around the same time this evening. If you feel compelled to turn in after Jay Leno does his monologue, you’ve developed a habit of retiring late.

Alternatively, if you have magazines, newspapers, CDs, and all manner of things to read and hear surrounding you, it’s tempting to stay up yet another 20 or 30 minutes – which can balloon into 40 to 60 minutes. If you’re among the lucky ones who doze off as soon as you begin reading, be thankful. Many people remain awake longer when surrounded by information stimulants.

If you use drugs (especially alcohol), your sleep patterns will be disrupted and you’re likely to get too little sleep. Alcohol might knock you out faster, but it can cause sleep difficulty and frequent wake-ups.

Maddening Microsleep

Your eyes may be open, but don’t let that fool you. Moore-Ede found that many people engage in microsleep (the body’s attempt to compensate for under-sleeping) throughout the day.

Microsleep is a 5-to-10-second episode when your brain is effectively asleep while you are otherwise up and about. Microsleep can occur while you are working on a computer or driving your car. Imagine the dangers of these drivers engaging in microsleep:

• Bus drivers who have full passenger loads
• Truck drivers racing down hills hauling nuclear weapons
• Mothers transporting their babies.

Drowsiness comes in waves. You can be alert one moment, drowsy the next, and not know the difference. Having too little sleep the night before, and certainly on an extended basis, increases the probability you’ll engage in microsleep.

Rapid Eye Movements Every Night

You’ve probably heard of REMs – rapid eye movements that are a crucial part of your overall sleep cycle.

If you sleep too little or are awakened at inopportune moments, your REM pattern can be disrupted; hence, even eight hours in bed may not yield the benefits of a solid eight hours of sleep. To win back your waking time, protect your sleep time:

* Don’t sleep with your head by a telephone that can ring aloud. Remove the phone from your bedroom, or install an answering machine and switch off the ringer.

* Once a week, get to bed by 9:00 p.m. Your body will thank you. Let yourself go to dreamland for 9, 10, 11 hours – whatever it takes. Allow yourself at least one weeknight in which getting sleep is your only objective.

* One Friday night each month, crash right after work and don’t get up until the next morning. Have dinner or skip it, as suits you. If you want to experience a fabulous weekend, this is the way to start.

* Avoid caffeine for the six hours before retiring. This means if you’re thinking about going to bed around 10:00, 4:00 in the afternoon (or before) is the last time to imbibe any caffeine. But hey, why drink this drug-in-a-cup anyway?

* Avoid alcohol in the evening. Sure, it’ll put you to sleep quickly, but it tends to dry you out and wake you up too early. Then you have trouble getting back to sleep, your overall sleep time is reduced, and the quality of your sleep is poor.

Dr. Martin Moore-Ede notes that if you stay up too late one evening, you are borrowing from the next day.

* If you fall asleep when you read in bed, then do so to induce drowsiness.

* Go to bed when you’re tired. Let your body talk. It’ll tell you when it’s tired. Have you ignored the message?

* Don’t fret if you don’t fall asleep right away. You may need some time. After 30 consecutive minutes of restlessness, do something else until you’re tired again.

*Moderate exercise several hours before sleep aids in getting sound sleep.

*Moderate intake of proteins, such as a glass of milk, also aids in sound sleep.

* If you’re kept awake by your spouse’s snoring – or if you’re the one snoring – you need help. I recommend a snore-control device. Whenever your snoring is above a certain decibel level, you receive a gentle vibration that breaks the pattern and helps you return to quiet sleep.

Catching Up on Sleep: Myth or Reality?

If you’ve been depriving yourself of sleep for the last three years, you can’t literally add back all the hours you missed. That kind of “catch-up” sleep won’t support the continuing need you face each day.

Nevertheless, your body is extremely forgiving. Ex-cigarette smokers know this. Even lungs abused by years of smoking begin to cleanse themselves once the smoking stops for good. The effects of 10 years of abuse can greatly diminish in as little as one year. So it is with chronic under-sleeping.

Sleep Habits for Tired Campers

Getting enough sleep, as with engaging in other healthy practices, is a habit. Albert Gray, a successful businessman of yesteryear, said, “Every single qualification of success is acquired through habit. Men (and women) form habits, and habits form futures. If you do not deliberately form good habits, then unconsciously you will form bad ones.”

You can rationalize about it until doomsday, but depriving yourself of sleep is a bad habit. Of course you have a lot to do. No one will debate that. You’ll get it all done more effectively and more efficiently with sufficient sleep, not with less sleep. Here are several suggestions to develop (or perhaps redevelop) the habit of getting sufficient sleep:

* Let others know about your newfound quest – this means family members who might otherwise impede your progress.

* One weekend day or more per month, linger longer in the morning before getting up – sleep in.

* Anytime you’re traveling for work, give the TV remote control to the front desk at the hotel. You can’t afford to be still clicking away at midnight. Get sleep when you’re on the road.

* Schedule extra sleep any time you’re on vacation as well. An extra 30-45 minutes can make all the difference in the quality of your vacation.

* Recognize that at first you may have to force yourself to get into bed, even if it’s 9:00 or 9:30 on a weekday evening and you’d rather be up and around. You may have to break the flow of your normal evening activities to get that sleep.

Got Sleep?

Your sleep deficiency likely ranges between 45 and 90 minutes daily. If you’re deficient by more than 10 hours a week, as a benchmark it’ll take you about a month to “recover.” Again, this doesn’t mean you can replace all the hours you’ve lost. It means that you can get to the point where you’re fully functional and minimize (maybe eradicate) the effects of past deprivation. To get there, start at square one: Make a list of indicators that you’re probably not getting enough sleep. Some of these may be familiar; some may be news to you:

• You bump into things more frequently than is normal for you.
• You slur your words.
• You have trouble digesting food.
• You’re short with people when normally you wouldn’t be.
• Your eyes are tired.
• Your joie de vivre is missing.
• You don’t enjoy sex as much as you used to.
• You need to wake up by alarm clock. Many people wake up when they want to, on their own.
• You don’t want to face the day.
• Even small tasks seem to loom larger.
• Your life has achieved a level of fine monotony.
• You find it easier to engage in tasks that don’t involve talking to others.
• As much as you hate going to the dentist, you find leaning back in the dentist’s chair rather relaxing.
• You find yourself nodding off in what are otherwise interesting and/or important meetings.
• You zone out for unknown periods of time while working.

Only you can determine how much sleep you need. I know I’ve had all the sleep I need when I bolt out of bed in the morning, ready to face the day. I recognize it as a signal that I’m well-rested. To determine your optimal sleep time, consider the following:

*Experiment with the number of hours you sleep each night for a week. Start with eight hours, say 10:30 p.m.-6:30 a.m.

*If eight hours feels good, stay right there; no need to move on. If not, increase the amount by 15-minute increments.

*If you’re waking up before you’ve slept eight hours and you’re not napping excessively during the day, perhaps you need less than eight hours.

*To make your test valid, give up your alarm clock! Yes, give it up anytime you can afford to – not, of course, when you have a plane to catch.

Daytime Snooze Rules

If you have the opportunity, taking naps throughout the day (even on a weekday) can enhance your overall effectiveness and put you in the driver’s seat of winning back your time.

Some people nap without problems; others can’t nap at all. One study found that if you nap for 30 minutes each afternoon, you actually have a 30 percent lower incidence of heart disease than people who don’t nap at all. Napping increases your alertness for the rest of the day. Although many people feel a little groggy for a few minutes after a nap, it gradually subsides and they feel more alert.

The extra edge napping provides can last for 8 to 10 hours. So if you can steal one, you could be good for hours. However, naps are not designed to be substitutes for missed nocturnal sleep.

Short naps are actually more productive than long naps. A short nap will leave you refreshed, whereas a long nap may interfere with your sleep that night. The experts say that the best nap time is between 2:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. Any later, and your nap may be too deep, interfering with your nightly sleep. If you can, nap in a bed or a cot, but not a chair. Your quality of sleep will be much higher and the immediate benefits more apparent. The only caveat: Naps are not a substitute for the proper amount of sleep.

Sleepy, Dehydrated, or What?

Hydration and dehydration play an important role in how much sleep you need. About half the time I feel tired during the day, I haven’t taken in enough water. Nutritionist David Meinz of Orlando, Florida says that every chemical reaction that occurs in your body requires water. In fact, your brain is 75 percent water.

Meinz says that your thirst mechanisms lag behind your true need for water on a continual basis. Even a 2 percent reduction in your amount of body water will render you less productive than normal. A 5 percent reduction can seriously decrease mental functioning. Here are Meinz’s suggestions for ensuring you’re sufficiently hydrated:

* Eight cups of water a day is the standard, but don’t wait until your thirst reminds you that you need water. Drink before you’re thirsty.

* If you work out a lot, your body requires a full 24 hours to regain the water supply that you need. Hence, you have to have much more water than you think when you work out.

* Drink 8 ounces of water before starting your workout. During your workout, drink as often as you can.

* Sign on with the best water-delivery service in your area or buy bottled water. The best choices for bottled water are distilled water and spring water.

* If you use tap water, let it run about 30 seconds so any sediments can clear out.

Meinz also says to take a multivitamin every day to reduce feelings of lethargy and ensure that you’re getting most of the basic nutrients. Along with sufficient water intake, this will help you feel more vibrant more often during your day.

Here are other ways you can get more rest throughout the day without putting a dent in your overall output:

1. Find a quiet place in your office, such as an empty conference room or a coworker’s office, where you can simply sit in a chair for a few minutes and be still without fear of interruption. Even two or three minutes can help recharge your batteries.

2. Go outside to a bench, your car, or some other safe haven where you can do the same.

3. Don’t leave the table immediately after eating your lunch. Linger for an extra minute or two; give your food a better chance to be properly digested.

4. Rest while you walk. This sounds like a contradiction, but you can walk hurriedly or restfully. On your way back from the restroom, a coworker’s office, or lunch, stroll mindfully down the hall in a rhythmic fashion, fast enough that no one will accuse you of being a zombie, but sufficiently slow that you’re hardly exerting yourself. This can work wonders.

5. Practice the same restful habits outlined here on Saturday and Sunday as well as during the week. Who says you have to go all out on the weekend? Obviously, the opportunities for outright naps are much greater on Saturday and Sunday, so take them.

What about when you’re feeling drowsy but you have to be awake and alert? In that case, think light and cool. With bright lights, your sense of alertness is enhanced and your brain is switched on. In essence, brightness equals wakefulness.

If your office or work space is somewhat on the chilly side (say, 68 degrees or less), you’re also likely to stay more attentive and alert. As a rule of thumb for making presentations, it’s better to have an audience cool and awake than warm and sleepy.

Road Rest

On the Road With Hampton published by Hampton Inns states that there were 43,900,000 individual business travelers in 1998 (one out of every five American adults). Suppose you’re one of them. You’re bedding down for the night in a hotel and need a good night’s sleep so you can summon enough energy to hold your own at the meeting the next day. Unluckily, the guest from hell is in the next room and seems to be trying to break the decibel barrier at 2:30 a.m. Normally you’re a sound sleeper, but this time you find yourself tossing and turning for four hours before you finally doze off. What can you do after checking into your hotel room to make sure you get a good night’s sleep every night, regardless of the quality of your sleeping accommodations?

Noise is invading the room you’ve rented. If it’s easy enough to determine the direction of the sound, and if the intrusion is from the room to the left or right, you could try tapping on the wall. This alone sometimes works. In many hotels, the phone system allows you to readily dial adjacent rooms. If the noise is from across the hall or above or below you, you could call and ask the night manager to handle the situation.

To maintain greater control of potential sound disturbances, there are some essential items you can use before checking into any hotel room: a “sound screen,” earplugs, and a timer.

1. The Sound Screen¨ is a portable white-noise device developed by the Marpac Corporation. The Sound Screen emits different frequencies and amplitudes of a droning, non-disruptive blanket of sound. You can use this device to minimize the effects of startling or disruptive sounds outside your room. By placing the screen about 10 feet from your head in the direction of any disruptive noise, you are able to minimize the intrusive effects immediately. If you’re interested in this product, contact the Marpac Corporation at P.O. Box 560, Rocky Point, NC, 28457, or email them at info@marpac.com.

2. Create your own white noise. If you’re awakened and the offending noise isn’t too outrageous, use an empty channel on your TV set or radio as a white-noise machine. If you’re using a TV this way, turn the brightness down to nothing, or cover the screen set with a blanket or towel to minimize light from the screen. If the TV isn’t bolted down, put it between you and the noise. Experiment with your room’s thermostat. Perhaps you can turn on the fan.

3. Space-age earplugs called Noise Filters are available from the Cabot Safety Corporation. They cost little and weigh even less. Airline gate and runway crews use these industrial-strength plugs to shut out heavy-duty noise; they can provide you with a near-silent world. The plugs expand in your outer ear canal, blocking out sound in ways traditional earplugs cannot. You can get these godsends in Walgreen’s and CVS pharmacies.

4. The next essential device is your own alarm clock or timer. You can wake up on cue without having to keep your room phone plugged in. When you remove the plug from the phone, be sure to position the cord so the end is exposed to you; it will remind you to plug it back in when you get up.

Well Rested and Ready

If you’re committed to getting back to the level of sleep and rest you need – and if you’re looking forward to being more awake, alert, and refreshed during the workday – you’re already well on the way to making this happen. Even though you’ll feel the difference, here’s a checklist of indicators that let you know you’re getting the amount of sleep you need.

• You look forward to facing the day.
• You no longer need an alarm clock to get up.
• You awaken with energy, feeling great.
• Your eyes look clear, not red and bloodshot.
• You put in a full day at work and have a deep-down satisfaction about what you accomplish.
• You have sufficient energy for activities after work as well.
• You look forward to sex.
• Your joie de vivre is back.

Although sleep should vary, people who sleep about eight hours, on average, tend to live longer. “There will always be people who think that they can handle the affects of fatigue or believe that they can train themselves to get by with less sleep to get more work done,” says William Dement, Ph.D. “All scientific evidence available says that this isn’t so.”

To Summarize:

• Within a month, you can recover from a prolonged pattern of insufficient sleep. Start tonight.
• Insufficient sleep has a high impact on your effectiveness. Don’t pretend otherwise.
• Safeguard your sleeping area by removing the phone and converting your bedroom back to a bedroom (not a den or living room).
• You may need to take a nap during the workday. Get some type of brief rest. You definitely need to drink more water.
• You know you’re getting enough sleep when you bolt out of bed in the morning without having to use an alarm clock.