Get Your Sleep!
None of us needs a study to tell us that we feel better after a good night’s sleep. But research is showing that getting enough sleep, between seven and nine hours a night for most people, is one of the pillars of good health, along with exercise, eating plenty of fruit and vegetables, and staying slim. No one study made a big splash in 2007, but the evidence has reached a critical mass.
Studies have linked short and poor sleep to many modern maladies: diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, inflammation, stroke.
Short sleep may be a factor in the obesity epidemic: sleep lab studies have shown that it alters the activity of leptin, the “fullness” hormone, and ghrelin, the “appetite” hormone.
Meanwhile, scientists are beginning to understand the sleeping brain and the role it plays in our mental lives and health. One popular theory is that we need sleep to store, and possibly attach meaning to, our memories. So if you make sleep a priority, you might improve your memory and your health.
