October is the time of year when you start to notice the stress increasing and the temperature decreasing. Walks home from the library are tortuous and forcing yourself out of a warm bed to leave for class seems unbearable. You struggle through the day and yet before you know it, your crazy schedule has come to an end. Entering in your room you kick off your shoes, change into flannels and put on your favorite oversized sweatshirt. You stretch out in your bed, prop your head against the pillow and begin to read. Two hours later you find yourself in a sea of saliva. You, my friend, have succumbed to a nap, and it did more of a service than you think.
College is one of the rare times in adult life when our schedules allow us to stay up until 3 a.m., wake up at nine in the morning to go to class and sleep again at four in the afternoon. The nap, however, is controversial because of the lethargic feeling that occurs upon waking. When first getting up from a nap, some feel anxious, others frustrated for falling asleep and some just simply feel "out of it." Yet if naps are beneficial, why do we feel bad about them? Should we fight naps or adhere to the body's request for rest?
"It's okay to fall asleep when feeling sleepy," explains Dr. Richard Allen, a Hopkins professor and Bayview neurologist. "The only time when it is absolutely prohibited is at four o' clock when sitting in my class."
Dr. Allen explains that the body runs on a 24-hour cycle, also known as a circadian rhythm. During this cycle there are two times in the day when you will feel sleepy. For college students it occurs around 4:00 in the afternoon and again between 1:00 a.m. and 3:00 a.m. The body is also more likely to be in a deeper sleep at these times than at eight at night. This rhythm is internal and changes with your biological clock. Elderly people, for example, tend to take morning and afternoon naps.
You can, however, throw off circadian rhythm by traveling into a different time zone. It is harder to travel east and shorten your day than traveling west to places such as Hawaii, where you lengthen the day. You can find the total amount of time you will need to return to circadian rhythm by counting the number of days behind you are in the new time zone. It is roughly two hours per each day you were thrown off.
Dr. Allen also believes that by breaking up sleep into two points of the day, such as late at night and late afternoon actually causes better sleeping. The nap you take in the afternoon is generally an undisturbed high quality sleep because your body craves it so desperately.
He suggests taking a 20-minute nap because it is just enough time to rejuvenate the body. One to two hour naps may be necessary if you are consistently sleep deprived, but Dr. Allen warns not to sleep past two hours, because at that point the body will feel more tired than rejuvenated.
It should come as no surprise that sleep deprivation is unhealthy. Besides feeling tired, studies show that sleep deprivation can also lead to weight gain. One reason is that when up late people tend to eat. This is the worst time of the day to eat because the food tends to sit in your stomach like a lead ball. In addition your metabolic rate is affected by the amount of sleep you get, those who are sleep deprived to do not burn calories as efficiently.
Dr. Allen points out that when waking up from the nap you will experience a "sleep hang-over." The first few minutes awake may not be pleasant, but in the long run the nap was highly beneficial.
How important are naps? Apparently, they're important enough to be the subject of a book series. Just ask Dr. William Anthony, psychologist, professor and Director of the Center for Rehabilitation at Boston University. Dr. Anthony, however, is not a trained expert in sleep. He was inspired by his family's love for naps, and upon discovering a "whole napping market," made it his mission to encourage people to get into bed and nap.
His two books, The Art of Napping and The Art of Napping in the Workplace (co-written by his wife) serve to educate people on the benefits of napping. His books have appeared on "The Today Show" and "Good Morning America" in addition to being featured in publications such as The Boston Globe, The New York Times and USA Today.
Anthony and his wife also own The Napping Company, which provides napping "products, services and advocacy." Together, they give presentations and workshops on how to achieve "the perfect nap" and why one should be proud of napping.
Anthony feels that no one should feel frustrated about falling asleep during the day. As The Napping Company motto says, "it is time for nappers to lie down and be counted." According to Anthony napping should not be a crime. He feels that there is no need to hide or 'steal' a nap, and that napping should be recognized in both the home and the workplace. Anthony bases his studies on surveys that people of all ages fill out and send in via mail and web site; results can be found in his books. He finds that most people report that they keep it a secret when they nap. Several employees who nap in the workplace find clandestine locations such as the bathroom stall or their cars. He recalls one anecdote of a workplace napping technique:
"One guy sent in an email that explained that when at the workplace he tips his head back in his chair and goes to sleep, but puts a bottle of eye drops in his hand to look like he would be able to explain to his boss and fellow employees, 'I was putting in eye drops.'"
People have all different ways of hiding naps. Anthony thinks the world of napping should be publicized. He thinks that the American culture places a negative label on the word 'nap.' People elsewhere tend to embrace the nap. In Spain, the mid-day siesta is a cultural practice.
However, he is starting to see an improvement in the general opinion of napping. Airline pilots and truckers are being told to take naps. Large corporations are planning rooms for nap purposes. On Apr. 5, 2004 there is even a National Workplace Napping Day.
"The benefits of a nap last up to 10 hours," he explains.
Anthony thinks that those who are "sleep-deprived" are simply just "nap ready." He advocates naps by using the term using terms 'nattitude' defined as a proud attitude about one's napping. He also urges the use of 'napnomics' (things that assist a person to nap). Some of these tools include soft blanket, music, candle and a favorite pair of loose sweatpants.
Anthony finds that a nap during a low point in the day is more beneficial than exercise. "A nap is no cost, no sweat, cannot gain weight, doesn't hurt joints, improves performance, and you don't need a shower," he explains.
He says based on surveying people, that the most popular time to nap is in the afternoon.
"If you go to the zoo in the afternoon, not many animals are doing anything because they are napping," he says.
Anthony claims that 70 percent of college students take naps and the remaining 30 do not out of guilt or fear.
"You learn many things in college, but napping is one of the most important skills you pick up," he says.
He suggests that college students plan a nap into their schedule and to prevent letting them occur by chance. This will avoid the "sleep inertia" or hangover that Dr. Allen discussed. His book gives several tips on how to snap out of the grogginess felt when awakening from a nap. Some include a shower, splashing cold water on your face, a walk outside or simply telling yourself "I am glad I did that"
Unfortunately, most Hopkins students are constantly groggy.
"We have students coming in [to the Health and Wellness Center] who actually are off the wall due to a combination of being up all night, having ingested huge amounts of caffeine or Nodoze," says Dr. Alain Joffe, Director of the Health and Wellness Center. "Regardless of their methods, students are jittery."
Joffe feels that a little caffeine is okay, but not to have an extreme amount. This is because it often leads to irritability and sleeping trouble. He recommends sticking to black coffee, as all of the fancy drinks with lots of sugar and whipped cream tend to give people sugar highs and lows.
Many times students need the afternoon nap because they are not sleeping well the night before. Factors causing the lack of sleep are due to high stress levels caused by exams and work. Joffe understand that students at Hopkins are not going to get the recommended eight to 10 hours a sleep a night. In fact students can last awhile without sleep. Typically one can be up with little sleep for about a week until hitting the ultimate crash. People between ages 18-21 are in the prime time of being able to push themselves under harsh conditions. He does recommend training the body into some sort of routine. If you go to sleep late continuously you should try to nap in the afternoons. It is not good to one night go to sleep at nine and the next at three, because it throws off the body's circadian rhythm.
Yet most college students have at least a few late nights a week, especially during midterms and finals. Yet a recent Harvard medical study shows that cramming the night before an exam actually isn't the most effective way to remember material. Sleep is not only a time for the body to repair itself physically, but also to encode memories in the brain. Pulling an "all-nighter" clearly doesn't give the brain a chance to do so. The study showed that a nap reverses information overload and those who take naps show a 20 percent improvement in learning a motor skill than those who don't.
Joffe recommends to stop studying an hour before sleeping. Instead of stressing about the exam, students should take a warm shower or listen to music.
"Sometimes even a glass of milk can help calm the body; basically anything relaxing to decompress the brain will suffice," explains Joffe.
Joffe realizes, however, that sometimes students aren't to blame.
"College forces everyone to conform to one schedule," he says. "It's too bad school cannot be like cable on demand in which professors come every half-hour, and you can tune in when you want."
Whether you have a healthy "nattitude" or feel uncomfortable with a "power nap," you should remember that naps are a great way to reap the benefits of sleep. There are several good sources to read up on naps. Check out http://www.daytimesleep.org/what.htm, http://www.sleepfoundation.org, www.napping.com or http://www.nih.gov.
