Time for a nap. I mean, app.

It always catches me by surprise when I am reading an article in a mainstream magazine (in other words, pretty much anything but my de riguer copy of HME News) and I happen upon a story featuring someone I've interviewed for HME News.

The most recent case in point, an article in a women's health magazine about sleep in which Nancy Collop, formerly of the American Academy of Sleep Professionals, was quoted. Naturally, the article was about sleep: its importance to your overall health and well-being, how much do you need, etc.

Sleep, or the lack of it, as we all know, is big news. You may recall my recent short failed experiment with glucosebuddy. It simply won't work on my phone and they never responded to my inquiry. Well, in the same issue of Diabetes Forecast that included that app in its annual product guide, they also mentioned an app (I forget the name) that supposedly will track your sleep waves (or some such thing). You download it and place it near you while you sleep.

This I gotta see.

At no time are the arguments for getting better sleep more apparent than when I am sleep-deprived myself. Take this week, in which I have been having trouble staying asleep. The past two nights, I have fallen asleep around 11, only to wake up at 1:55 am (seriously, not 1:30 or 2 am but 1:55). I fall back to sleep only to wake up again (!) around 5 am and unable to get to sleep until around 7 am. Needless to say, I am quite tired this week, not to mention, late to work.

To be sure, it's not unusual for me to have problems sleeping (this week, I am hoping it's simply the cough medicine I have been taking). But maybe it's time to say, enough is (yawn!) enough. What's triggering these patterns of wakefulness? And, if I can figure that out, are there changes I can make to address them?

First, I have to see if the nap, I mean app, will work for me.

Theresa Flaherty