New Lily

Modern Technology and Sleep Deprivation: You Might Want to READ THIS!

sleepslSleep. It’s a beautiful thing.  Yet it is also a source of frustration for many.  It has recently come to my attention that a few of my children are having trouble sleeping.  I thought it might be situational. Our oldest son is in flight school, training to fly the F-18 Super Hornet.  Over the last few years he has spent a lot of late nights in the simulator or studying so I am not that surprised that his sleep routine has been altered.  However #6 (Grace), who is a freshman in high school, also often has trouble sleeping.  She is a VERY active 14 year-old.  If I was doing what she is doing (in terms of physical activity), I would crash every time my head hit the pillow.  Then #3 (Thomas), when he was home for Christmas, told me he has trouble with sleep as well.  A Division 1 athlete, Thomas has a daily afternoon practice of 2-3 hours and attends morning practice 2-3 days a week around 5 am. So why is he having trouble with sleep? I can’t imagine making it to 10 pm without falling asleep on my feet with the physical schedule Thomas keeps. [Read more…]

Sleep and Athletic Performance

Sleep is an elusive thing for me. I jokingly say I have been sleep deprived for twenty-two years, but I think it’s actually true. Now I’m just wondering what the physical effect has actually been. I wonder about this for more than just myself. As a mother to many kids who have all participated in athletics and have busy schedules, I question whether any of them are really getting the amount of sleep they need to perform at their best, both mentally and physically.

I have always been interested in the subject of sleep (I’ve written about it on 9 Kid Fitness) and how it affects performance, etc., but I stopped reading about it because it just left me depressed and, frankly a little exhausted. But recently I am back on the bandwagon and I am taking more serious efforts to get more sleep. I realize with a two-year old and three teenagers who keep later hours than me, this is almost an impossible task. However, I am determined-somehow – to get more sleep. [Read more…]

Take a Nap…and a Quote of the Week

NapQuote of the Week: The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep. W.C. Fields

There is always something extremely frustrating about learning how much sleep deprivation, even in small amounts, can affect us negatively. I mean how many people do we know who don’t like sleep? Most of us like it and would like more of it, but usually because of kids, jobs, and the demands of life, we just don’t sleep as much as we should! So I thought I would hand out a little bad news, but report a little good news as well. First the bad…
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