Sleep shenanigans

I know I'm not the first person to have my sleep patterns interrupted by a new baby, but if you knew how I slept before said baby, you'd feel for me, I swear.

Before said baby, I was the type of person who went to bed at 9 p.m.—9:30 p.m. the latest. I'd read a few pages of The New Yorker and fall asleep uninterrupted until 6:30 a.m.—maybe 6 a.m. if I was going for a morning run.

That's right, I got about nine hours of sleep nearly every night.

Enter said baby, and I'm getting six hours of interrupted sleep every night. (Never mind the mind-boggling early days of three or four hours of interrupted sleep every night. I never want to go back there, ever again.)

I now have a new appreciation for how not only the quantity but also the quality of your sleep can affect every aspect of your life. If you're low on both, your energy (sluggish), your relationships (fragile), your concentration (fleeting)—they all suffer. I don't even want to think about what it's doing to my health.

This got me to thinking the other day: Is this what it feels like—the interrupted sleep and the resulting negative effects—to have sleep apnea? (By the way, I don't want to minimize what it's like to sleep with a CPAP mask strapped to your face, but if I could wear one and guarantee I'd get eight hours of uninterrupted sleep, I'd wear one tonight with glee.)

Luckily, I know the reason why I'm sleeping poorly, and one day (please God), I hope to return to my 9:30 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. uninterrupted sleep pattern.

But for many people with sleep apnea, they don't know why they're sleeping poorly and why they feel sluggish, etc. That's why the Sound Sleep Institute, a sleep consulting and treatment program from IntegraSleep and Active Healthcare, released a fun music video this week called “All About That Sleep” that parodies “All About That Bass.” The video showcases how patients can be unaware of their sleep disorder until their bed partner recognizes the signs like snoring and pauses in breathing, and they finally get help.

The Sound Sleep Institute released the video to celebrate Sleep Awareness Week, a national campaign by the National Sleep Foundation to educate Americans about the importance of sleep.

I, for one, now consider myself very educated.