Insomnia
InsomniaFlowers fold their petals; plants fold their leaves as evening falls. With the exception of owls and their nighttime predators, the creatures of land, sea, and air curl up into their bedroom niches in the rocks, trees, and sand. Dawn comes and the unfolding begins. The outside world, which has been barred from the senses of the sleepers, is once again admitted. This rhythm is the most natural thing in the world, intended no doubt to be accomplished effortlessly. Yet, many people find themselves disconnected by the natural flow of sleeping and waking that nature intended us to follow. How many people suffer from insomnia? The estimates vary, ranging from 20 million to 70 million Americans, from one tenth to one third of the population. If we accept the smallest estimate, that's a lot of tossing and turning. These estimates are usually based on the number of serious insomniacs, the definition of which varies considerably. Some doctors define insomniacs as those who cannot sleep at all; other are willing to categorize insomniacs as all those who merely complain about their sleep. The currently accepted definition, to become known as DIMS (Difficulty Initiating or Maintaining Sleep). Several surveys have tried to pin down the exact cause of sleep problems. Of 1,000 households, one third had someone with current problems and in 42 percent someone had suffered from sleep disorders at sometime. Some doctor's polls have been revealing yet somewhat disparate. In one survey, roughly 19 percent of the patients seen by the 3,000 doctors had complaints of some type of insomnia. That figure may actually understate the case, for some say that more people in the United States visit doctors for help in getting to sleep than any other single complaint. It is also estimated that half of those not considered insomniacs have a sleepless night on occasion, and a large but undetermined number do not sleep as well as they should. If you lose sleep chronically, you often awaken unrefreshed and feel tired during the day; it might be a big mistake to attribute your problem only to the situation or the environment. Even the most intelligent find it easier to point the finger of blame at something outside ourselves. Safe explanations are easier to live with. Unfortunately with insomnia, they often cover the real problems. Failure to sleep properly is a strange phenomenon; nature has made it easier to fall asleep than it is to eat. The comparison indicates just how important sleep can be. Someone can go without food much longer than one can last without sleep. Only breathing requires less effort than falling asleep, nature does all the work. It is as if our nervous systems were automatic transmissions. We shift into the proper gear or stage of sleep when they are needed. There is no simple answer as to why sleep does not...
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