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Health and wellness is increasingly getting popular for many people, not just the young and active, but even for the elderly. The surge in health food supplements, healthy diet concoctions, various exercise programs like pilates, aerobics, and most recently zumba fitness are clear indications that more people are into healthy living nowadays.

For a person’s body to be able to work and function properly, regular exercise should be kept as part of one’s daily activities. This is notwithstanding the other healthy lifestyle habits one has to inculcate in one’s self to be able to have a good physical and mental well being. Surely, at some point in time, you have felt better and invigorated after a good exercise regimen or even just a walk around the block. Exercising can take many forms: a workout in the gym, a lap or two at the running tracks, a swim at the pool, an early morning or evening walk around the park or an hour of zumba fitness in the health club. Whatever form it is, exercise helps to keep the body and mind healthy and active.

People used to exercise to keep their body in good shape. These days, some people exercise to have a good emotional and mental well-being, as exercise can help improve depression, anxiety, self-esteem, drive away problems, and give a sense of control.

In general, people who are physically active tend to have less anxiety, depression, and stress than people who are sedentary. Research suggests that exercise can help specific mental health problems. A relapse of depressive symptoms may be prevented if a person keeps a regular exercise regimen.

If we take into account today’s world of household and office or work-related chores being automated, it is clear that there is a greater need to keep regular exercises in the daily routine. There is less and less physical activity because almost everything is on automatic mode. And a sedentary lifestyle may bring about a lot of problems not just in one’s body but also in mind such as depression, low energy, poor motivation, etc.

Effects of No Exercise

People who lead a life with limited physical activity are more likely to develop:

• Depression or low morale
• Tension
• Anxiety
• Sleeping problems
• Memory problems

Benefits of Exercise

Knowing that exercise has helpful effects on the brain even for the elderly, one should be able to get some exercise even for a short duration few times each week. Exercise is said to have good effects and benefits on one’s mental health; improving brain functions of the older people, and preventing and slowing dementia. There are research studies that show that exercise increases the level of brain-derived neurotrophic factor or BNDF, a substance that is said to improve mood and help brain cells live longer.

The treatment for some mental disorders and illnesses include exercise and keeping a healthy lifestyle. Exercise has been linked to significantly reduced symptoms of two of the common mental conditions, depression and anxiety disorders. Physical activity has been consistent in causing enhanced physical condition, life contentment, cognitive functions, and psychological or emotional state. Because of these findings, doctors have prescribed exercise as the first line of treatment for mild depression and anxiety disorders.

Other forms of exercises like aerobics, jogging, swimming, cycling, dancing, etc., have been proven to reduce anxiety and depression which is caused by the increase in blood circulation to the brain and by an influence of the hypothalamic-pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis on the physiologic reactivity to stress. The HPA axis gives communication signals or messages to the different regions in the brain including the limbic system which is associated with motivation and mood; the amygdale which is associated with generating fear in response to stress, and hippocampus which plays role in memory formation including mood and motivation.

Patients with schizophrenia also benefit from exercise showing improvements on weight control, reduced blood pressure levels, increased energy levels, etc.

Other health benefits derived from regular exercise include:

• Improvement in quality and duration of sleep
• Enhanced endurance
• Relief from stress and worrying
• Better mood
• Invigorated strength and energy
• Reduced fatigue
• Improved mental alertness and focus
• Decrease in cholesterol levels
• Improved cardiovascular condition

Patients suffering from some serious mental illness could benefit from exercise interventions as a helpful treatment along with psycho-pharmacology and psychotherapy.

Helpful Tips to Remember when Exercising

Any form of exercise should be done in moderation for safety reasons. It is a good idea to talk your doctor before starting exercise. Following these simple tips will get you through a good physical activity:

• Start slowly. A moderate level of exercise is a good way to start. Increasing the activity should be in stages to allow the body to absorb the physical strain caused by the exercise.
• If the activity is causing severe pain, especially chest pain or severe breathing problems, discontinue the exercise. Shift to a lighter activity. If pain symptoms continue to manifest, call or visit your doctor.
• Start with simple physical activity like walking, cycling, swimming, or short-distance jogging. You should not push your body in the early stages of the exercise program.
• Test your exercise level using the talk-sing test. You are doing okay if you can talk during exercise; if you can sing during exercise, you should increase the activity level; if you are not able to talk, you need to slow down and decrease your activity level.
• Allow a 5-minutes cooling down after exercise. Light stretching may be done during the cool-down period.
• Drink water, before and after the exercise.
• Moderate exercise for a total of 2-1/2 hours in a week should work your body fine

Make daily activities part of your exercise program. You can:

• Walk to work or to do errands.
• Mowing the lawn, raking leaves or shoveling snow
• Sweeping or vacuuming
• Taking the dog for a walk or engaging in play activities with children

Remember that exercise is not just for those who want to keep in shape and to be physically fit. It helps with one’s emotional and mental well-being, too. When stressful situations arise, a good 30-minute exercise may help improve your emotions and alleviate your mind of the stress. It is a good way to improve your self-esteem and have an optimistic and better outlook in life in general.

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Self-confidence is important in almost every aspect of a person’s life and yet everybody seems to be struggling to develop it. Without it, success will be elusive. Self-confidence seen in people who have it inspires confidence in others – peers, bosses, customers, and friends. A person can find success when he or she earns the confidence of other people.

There are two main features that contribute to self-confidence: self-efficacy and self-esteem. A sense of self-efficacy is gained when you see yourself attaining goals with mastered skills.  This kind of confidence if learned and used properly will get a person to succeed. And it’s this type of confidence that makes people to meet challenges, and overcome when faced with setbacks.

This overlaps with the concept of self-esteem, which is a more general sense of coping with your life and deserving to feel happy. This comes partly from a feeling or sense of approval from people around you – something that you may or may not have control of. It also comes from knowing that your behavior is virtuous, that you have competence at what you do, and that you can succeed if you put your mind to it.

Affirmations and positive attitude can help build up self-confidence. By setting reasonable, attainable goals and working to reach them you are building your competence, and self-confidence comes with competence. Without it, what you will have is a shallow over-confidence along with all of the issues, failures and frustrations that it brings.

Your level of self-confidence can manifest in many ways – your behavior, body language, manner of speaking, what you say, etc. Check the list below and determine the actions or thoughts which you recognize in yourself and the people around you:

Self Confident Behaviors

• The ability to do what you believe to be right, even if faced with strong opposition or criticism from other people
• The willingness to take risks and go beyond what is expected to achieve better things
• The openness to admit mistakes in order to learn from them
• Being humble enough to wait for others to congratulate you on your achievements and not bragging about them
• The ability to graciously accept compliments without sounding arrogant

Poor Self-Confidence Behaviors

• The mentality of doing everything based on what other people think or expect
• Practicing self-regulation by avoiding risky undertakings and staying in your comfort zone due to fear of failure
• Exerting effort to cover up mistakes and finding means to fix the problems getting noticed by anyone
• Pronouncing your own virtues to everyone as much as possible
• Returning compliments with arrogance

From this list, one can see that poor self-confidence can be destructive and manifest a level of negativity. On the other hand, people who are self-confident are generally carrying positively inspired attitude – believing in what they are capable of doing and what they are capable of and the need to live their lives to the fullest.

Building Self-Confidence

Fortunately, there are skills that can be learned and practiced in order to improve self-confidence – whether you are doing it for yourself or for other people. The downside is – it cannot happen overnight. It takes time to build self-confidence.

So how do you build this sense of balanced self-confidence? For anyone who has the focus, will, discipline, and commitment to do what’s necessary, building self-confidence is possible. And what’s even better is that the things you’ll do to build self-confidence will also build success – after all, your confidence will grow with real, solid achievements.

Below is a basic three step approach to self-confidence:

Step 1: Preparing for Your Journey. As the first step this involves getting yourself prepared for your journey to self-confidence. You have to pause for a while to assess your present situation, and where you see yourself moving forward. Getting yourself to have the proper mindset for your mission, and making a commitment to that cause, will be a good way to start your journey.

To best prepare for this journey, it is recommended to do the following:

• List down your major achievements
• List the ten best things you’ve achieved in an “Achievement Log.” An example would be when good grades from projects, tests, and other similar accomplishments
• Think about your strengths and what other people see as your strengths and weaknesses.
• Take time to check your values, what you want most and what you want to be in the future. By setting your goals you have clear directions on what you need to do to achieve them
• Start managing your mind and mood
• Commit yourself to success. Promise to yourself and your loved ones that you will do everything in your power to achieve your goals

Step 2: Setting Out. This is where you start moving towards your goal. By doing the right things, and starting with small, easy wins, you’ll put yourself on the path to success – and start building the self-confidence that comes with it.

• Determine the knowledge, skills and abilities necessary and start to learn, practice, and improve them
• Focus on the basics. Don’t reach for perfection right away. Remember the perfect can be the enemy of “good enough.”
• Set small, realistic goals, and get into action to reach them. Don’t set goals which are particularly challenging at this stage.
• Hone your stress management skills. Continue positive attitude and thoughts. Learn to handle failure, be open and honest with yourself and people around you. Accepting your mistakes.

Step 3: Accelerating Towards Success. By this stage, you should notice your self-confidence improving. Now, you may start stretching yourself to meet bigger goals and tougher challenges. Commit more and extend the skills you need in order to achieve the new challenges.

Self-confidence is a very important asset for everyone – a clear understanding of what you can achieve and a clear vision of what you can become. Believing in yourself, in what you do and in the ideas and dreams that you have –are among the basics of self-confidence.

In much the same way, you must recognize your own suffering or difficulty in order to be compassionate to yourself. People who are self-compassionate steer clear of ruthless assessment or un-constructive criticism of themselves, seeing their flaws or deficiencies as a part of the human condition. This does not mean they do not try to correct them and improve themselves.

Compassion involves being affected by other’s suffering in a way that makes your heart feel their pain. When this happens, you are filled with the desire to extend your help to the needy person in some way. Being compassionate also means that we skip harsh judgement when others make mistakes or fail and instead offer understanding and kindness. Feeling compassionate for others includes realizing that imperfection, misery, or disappointments are part of anyone’s life.

Self-compassion is doing all of those compassionate things towards yourself during difficult times, failure, or even when you don’t like something about yourself. Normally, under these circumstances, you ignore your pain alongside giving unkind judgment and criticisms of yourself. By practicing self-compassion, you comfort and care for yourself when under a difficult situation. You extend the same kindness and understanding to yourself when faced with personal failures. It comes with the acceptance that no one is perfect, including yourself. Any changes, you do to become healthier and happier, must be done not because you think you are of no value, but because you care about yourself, first and foremost.

Being compassionate to yourself is accepting and acknowledging that you are a human being, like everybody else. And that in one’s lifetime, things will not happen the way you expect them to; there will be disappointments, failures, and setbacks. By acknowledging this reality, you will be able to open your heart to feel compassion for yourself and others.

The Three Elements of Self-Compassion

• Kindness to Yourself. When things go astray, you feel inadequate and a failure. With self-compassion, you are extending the understanding towards yourself just like you would to a friend or family member. Sparing yourself from self-criticism and unforgiving judgment and being kind yourself is showing self-compassion. When you recognize and accept that life comes naturally with imperfections, failures, difficulties, or frustrations, you will learn to be gentle with yourself instead of getting angry or frustrated. Circumstances that fall short of your expectations are frequent and inevitable. Therefore they should not cause unnecessary stress, self-criticism, or disappointment.
• Common humanity. Being human means being vulnerable, mortal, and imperfect. With this acceptance, no amount of shortcomings, failures, or disappointments should be enough to make you feel that you are the only person suffering or feeling inadequate. You are experiencing this reality of human life along with other fellow human beings. Being self-compassionate is recognizing the fact that as humans, people do not have full control over their circumstances and even sometimes to a degree over their behavior. External factors like genetics and environment come into play that could have a positive or negative impact on such behavior. If everyone recognizes one’s essential interdependence, failings and life difficulties shouldn’t have to be taken on a personal level, but can be accepted with compassion and understanding.
• Mindfulness. Having a balanced attitude on one’s negative emotions, thoughts, or actions will thwart suppressed or exaggerated feelings under difficult situations. That’s having self-compassion. And this attitude is brought about by relating personal experiences to that of the experiences of other people who are also suffering. This puts your own predicament into a larger perspective, helping you to notice the bigger picture and not feel victimized with your own situation. The willingness to open up and feel one’s own negative emotions and thoughts is required to reach mindful awareness. Mindfulness is a non-judgmental and sympathetic state of mind wherein one objectively observes thoughts and feelings without any attempt to suppress or deny those thoughts or feelings. One cannot ignore pain and feel compassionate about it at the same time. Mindfulness also means that one should not over identify or become preoccupied with thoughts or feelings and avoid being swept away by negative reactions.

Self-Compassion is Not  – 

• Self-pity. Having self-pity is being absorbed by one’s own problems and forgetting about other people who may be in similar situations. One misses his interconnections with other people and harbors a feeling of isolation in terms of feeling that they are the only ones in the world subjected into such suffering. Self-pity usually emphasizes self-centeredness, selfishness, or insensitivity so much so that the feeling of personal suffering is almost always exaggerated to unprecedented levels.

Contrary to self- pity, self-compassion allows one to relate his experience to the experience or situations of other people around him. One does not entertain feelings of isolation and disconnection of the world. Self-compassionate people have a more balanced and objective view of situations and are not embroiled in their own emotional crisis.

• Self-indulgence. Some people have this notion that being self-compassionate means they are letting themselves get away with anything. Always making excuses of feeling stressed out or overwhelmed, in order to do things like watching TV all day or eating unlimited amounts of comfort foods, is not self-compassion. It is self-indulgence. One should keep in mind that self-compassion should bring happiness, health, and serenity in the long run. With self-indulgence, you are always in the pursuit extreme pleasure, which usually harms your well-being. This could lead to addictions, laziness, and health problems. To be successful one should be able to work hard, postpone gratification, and limit pleasure and sometimes sacrifice from short gains for bigger rewards on the long run.

In general, people can be very hard on themselves especially when they know they need to change something about themselves, but are worried about being ashamed with such actions. This is the self-flagellation approach which can backfire if one is not able to accept difficult truths about oneself for fear of hating yourself. Such weaknesses may remain unacknowledged when one avoids self-observation, -reflection, and -examination.

On the other hand, compassion comes with inherent and natural caring, motivating growth and change. It also provides the safety needed to see oneself with total clarity but without fear of self-condemnation.

Everyone’s life is faced with problems, challenges, hassles, and pressures. No one is exempted from that. For some, these experiences help them respond well to stressful situations. Unfortunately, there are those who are not able to respond well to problems or situations that warrant stress or fear or anxiety.

Stress, like fear is a normal human response activated when faced with events or situations that make you upset or threatened. Technically, it is defined as the way the brain responds to any stimulation. If the situation presents some kind of danger or uncertainty, the stress caused by such will let the body and mind respond in a protective way. One becomes alert and focused, ready for any eventuality. In some cases and situations, the stress response could even be lifesaving.

Types of Stress

Stress can be categorized in three groups:

• Good stress or Routine Stress – This is when stress is used to rise to the challenges. This kind of stress usually has good outcome and can be helpful in one’s learning and growth. This usually stems from pressures derived from work, family, and other daily responsibilities.

• Tolerable stress – This is the person’s response to some bad events like losing a job. Most has the tools to hold up and contain the emotion. Reaching out to one’s support network helps in one’s coping with the bad situation.

• Toxic stress – This stress is elicited when something bad happens and some people cannot activate inner resources or reach out to their support network to deal with the situation. These people seem to have vulnerability in coping or controlling their response to stress, which is likely triggered by environmental factors. This may cause major emotional and physical crisis.

Like fear, people respond to stress in different ways. It is important that a person understands the level of stress he can tolerate and cope well, and what level of stress can cause uncontrollable situations and anxiety disorders. Generally, people respond to stress in three ways:

• Angry or agitated response. Your emotions are high, restless, disconcerted, tense, and jumpy.
• Withdrawn or depressed response. Low energy and no significant reaction or emotion. You shun people and isolate yourself.
• A tense and frozen response. It’s a concealed agitated response, showing no violent reaction. You may look paralyzed but underneath is extreme distress.

Symptoms of Stress Overload

There are signs and symptoms which indicate if your stress level is overboard.

• Cognitive Signs – The warning signs include failing memory, lack of focus or concentration, poor judgement, racing thoughts, and constant, endless worrying.
• Emotional Signs – The warning signs may range from frequent mood swings, irritability, extreme nervousness, overpowering feeling, severe loneliness, feeling of isolation, and depressed mood.
• Physical Signs – The warning signs evident are constant bodily pains and aches, upset stomach, bowel movement problems (diarhea or constipation), nausea, vomiting, palpitation or hyperventilation, tightness of chest, loss of sexual desire and frequent bouts of cold.
• Behavioral Signs – Stress is manifested by poor eating habits, bad sleeping habits, isolation from other people, forgetting responsibilities, alcohol and drug consumption to relieve stress, constant jittery gestures like nail-biting, cracking of knuckles, etc.

Common Stressors

Factors that contribute to the onset of stress symptoms are called stressors or triggers. These factors may be external or self-generated, such as:

• Big life changes
• Work, business or profession
• Difficulties in relationships (family members, wife, children, friends, associates, etc.)
• Financial crisis
• Hectic schedule
• Pessimistic attitude
• Unrealistic projections and expectations
• Perfectionism
• Passiveness
• Negative value on self

Managing and Coping with Stress

If stress is not addressed and resolved, the effects it may have on a person might lead to an uncontrollable emotional outburst. One needs to undertake practical measures to maintain one’s physical and mental health which can reduce or minimize these negative effects. Learn how to:

• Maintain a good support group or network of people who can help you talk through the situations
• Recognize signals sent out by your body about overwhelming feeling of stress like sleeping problems, increase in alcohol or drug consumption, etc.
• Focus on positive thoughts like accomplishments for the day and not dwelling on failures or disappointments
• Set priorities according to urgency. Don’t get yourself overwhelmed with numerous tasks
• Keep a regular 30-minute exercise regimen to help improve mood and get rid of stress.
• Explore and engage in relaxation activities
• Get proper care and treatment for existing or new problems
• Consult with a professional mental health specialist when feeling overpowered by stress, feeling you are unable to function well and resorting to alcohol and drugs as coping mechanism.
• If you are entertaining suicidal thoughts, it’s time to seek professional help. Remember to call crisis/help lines or 911.

When a person feels stressed out, she or he may try the following:

• Take deep breaths in longer gaps (do not exhale before counting to ten slowly)
• Have a long warm bath
• Divert attention to music
• Walk around the house, or the park or just taking long walks
• Do yoga exercises
• Go to a spa for a massage
• Drink warm milk or anything that has no alcohol or caffeine content

One’s ability to cope with stress is largely dependent on one’s lifestyle choices. Keeping it to the basics : Healthy and balanced diet, good sleeping habits, regular physical and mental exercise and strong social networking, will help you get the inner strength and resources needed to ward off and manage toxic stress.

• Try to get as much sleep as possible
• Keep in touch with family and friends for support
• Engage in regular physical and mental exercise to help ward off toxic stressful feelings
• If one is smoking, try to quit. Just as alcohol and caffeine triggers stress so does nicotine.

Stress Relief

Stress is part of life. Having some stress is normal. However, if one gets too much stress, it can affect one’s quality of life and health. Hence, certain steps should be taken to get relief from stress.

A person should understand the problems causing stress and carry out actions to solve the problem or manage the response. The first step in successfully relieving stress is identifying what are causing the stress and making a decision to implement changes in how one manages such stressors. A simple example would be changing the TV channel if the program is showing news that are too distressing. If there is no way to avoid a stressful situation, one can think of ways to divert the mind from thinking too much about the situation – listening to music on an mp3 player may be a good way to reduce the stress. One can also ask family and friends for help by checking with them their own ways of handling stress. Or maybe one can try some tai chi, meditation techniques, yoga, or other relaxation exercises. As stress is not about to leave one’s life, one might just as well learn to deal and cope with it.

Relaxation Techniques

One important part of managing stress is doing relaxation exercises. Relaxation is essential in keeping a good health and well-being. And it can be achieved quite easily if a person practices the process. The following activities may help to some during stressful situations:

Hands and arms

• Make your hand into a tight fist
• Bend the hands back at the wrist feeling the tension release
• Bend arms at the elbows with hands made into fists and taut biceps.
• Shrug shoulders

Head and neck

• Make your forehead wrinkle into a deep frown
• Give the widest smile possible
• Press lips tightly together
• Press the head back against the floor
• Touch the chin to the chest

A mental disorder known as ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) is characterized by hyperactivity, inattention, and inability to control urges or drives. ADHD has proven links to various sleep disorders.

Children who have ADHD may be observed to have disturbed or interrupted sleep. Studies have shown that ADHD children have more severe sleep disorder than other similar illnesses. There are more below on relationship between ADHD and some Sleep disorders:

• Snoring and ADHD. Snoring in children is usually caused by large adenoids or tonsils blocking the airway. This blockage may develop into sleep apnea and cause ADHD-like  symptoms. Snoring may be a reason for poor sleep quality and this may eventually cause attention problems the following day. Studies have shown that snoring is common among ADHD children. And snoring children are likely to be afflicted with ADHD as well.

 Removing the tonsils or adenoids is found to help improve the child’s sleep pattern and better behavior without the need to take medications.

• Sleep Apnea and ADHD. Apnea means ‘without breathing’. Sleep apnea is used to describe airflow disruption of at least ten seconds. One of the three kinds of apneas is obstructive apnea – it makes up *65% of all apneas. The absence of airflow from the nose and mouth to the lungs happens during obstructive sleep apnea. There is no airflow because the entrance to the trachea is blocked caused by various collapsed structures in the pharynx. The respiratory muscles continue to make efforts to get air into the lungs even when the trachea entrance had closed.

In general, people with sleep apnea have episodes of stopped breathing. When this happens, they are awakened from their sleep – awakening could happen from early stage of sleeping and even from the time they are already sleeping soundly.  Even with the awakening, one will remain absolutely oblivious of the sleep interruption or breathing disruption. The episodes are likely to happen many times during the night.

In the U.S. there are more or less *2% of the children population who manifest some form of disrupted breathing while sleeping. Enlarged tonsils and adenoids are found to be the most noted reason for the children’s having apnea. This sleep  problem  observed in children may also be caused by obesity and chronic allergies. As with adults, children with sleep apnea will be tired during the day.

There is treatment available for sleep apnea in children. To begin with, your  pediatric doctor  or a specialist for ear, nose, and throat problems can identify and diagnose if your child’s tonsils are causing the apnea. The size of the child’s tonsils must be significantly larger than normal to cause obstruction in the airway to cause breathing disruption. For the diagnosis of sleep apnea to be confirmed, the child should undergo polysomnogram – a special laboratory-based study of sleep. Some children may have enlarged tonsils or are snoring loudly but do not have sleep apnea.

For children with abnormally large tonsils and adenoids, the treatment option is surgery. There are other treatments available for those having constrained breathing while sleeping due to other health problems.

• RLS (restless leg syndrome) and ADHD. Restless leg syndrome is characterized by crawling sensations felt in the legs or arms which are very uncomfortable and annoying. This creates an overwhelming urge to move, thereby causing disruption in sleep and sleepiness during the day. People with RLS are not able to get good sleep. Hence, they will experience inattentiveness, moodiness, or hyperactivity. These are the same symptoms for ADHD. RLS is identified using polysomnogram or sleep study. Both ADHD and RLS may be treated with medications.

These cases show the clear relationship between ADHD and Sleep disorder symptoms. It sometimes happens that because of the overlapping symptoms of ADHD and Sleep disorder, some patients are misdiagnosed for the other disease.

 Ways to Help ADHD Children Get the Needed Sleep

• Stay away from caffeine or other sleep-disrupting food or beverages. Check the label of the foods being eaten by your ADHD child. They increase nervousness, agitation which results to interrupted and disrupted sleep.
• Keep a consistent and regular routine for sleeping, waking up or even eating schedules.
• Soundproof your kid’s bedroom to shield from outside noises.
• Don’t take sleep medication unless prescribed and recommended by the doctor..
• Check for other medical problem or illnesses. Asthma, allergies and other conditions which cause airway narrowing or pain may contribute to disrupted sleeping.
• Introduce your children to a light exercise regimen during the day. Exercise should not be done near bedtime.
• A hot bath before bedtime can do wonders. A cool-temperature room may be helpful for a child to sleep in after a warm bath.

*Sourced from webMD

Photo by: CarbonNYC

People have different reasons for not getting enough sleep – stress with school, family problems, or work-related issues. Other times, lack of sleep is caused by a sleep disorder, which breaks and disrupts sleep in many ways. And it has significant negative effects on one’s quality of life and health. Sleep deprivation can also put one at risk for serious medical problems. Identifying the causes of sleeplessness and subsequently implementing lifestyle changes will help protect you from daytime exhaustion and health problems.

A lot of times people experience the after effects of sleep loss such as exhaustion, lack of concentration, forgetfulness, clumsiness, and irritability. A person’s overall functioning and feeling during the day reflect how well a person slept the night before. In the same light, some remedies for sleep problems result from one’s daily lifestyle choices and they can make a huge difference in the quality of sleep.

Sleep Hygiene Practices

The following sleep habits, also named sleep hygiene can help optimize one’s nightly rest in order to be productive, focused, refreshed, emotionally stable, and physically energetic throughout the next day:

• No napping during the day as this disturbs the normal sleep pattern (possibly except up to 1 hour siesta after lunch).
• No stimulants (caffeine, nicotine, etc.), or alcohol. These should not be taken close to sleeping time.
• No heavy meals before bedtime.
• Not sleep with an empty stomach.
• No heavy exercising before bedtime. Usual energetic exercises should be completed at least 4-6 hours before bedtime.
• Remove anything that adds to light and noise in the bedroom at night. Keeping the room dim, quiet, with comfortable room temperature and with relaxing music can set the right mood for sleeping.
• Practice relaxation exercises like yoga, meditation, deep breathing, light stretching or a winding down routine before going to sleep.
• Avoid stressful activities and conversations before going to bed. The subconscious might pick up on these thoughts and cause sleep disruption.
• Keeping a regular bedtime and wake up time every day including weekends and holidays.
• Use the bed ONLY for sex and sleep and not for other activities like watching TV, reading, surfing internet, listening to the radio, texting, etc.

Keeping a Sleep Diary

Some sleep specialists also recommend keeping a sleep diary where all sleep habits and patterns will be recorded. The diary should contain the following information:

• What time you go to bed?
• What time you wake up?
• What time you wake up during the night, how many times, how long does it take to fall back asleep?
• How much alcohol, caffeine, and cigarette were consumed and at what times?
• What time you had your meal, what food you ate and beverages you drank?
• Any emotion or stress experienced during the day, and what time?
• Any drugs or medicine taken and what time they were taken?

The sleep diary may contain more than the information listed above. Any information that might be associated with having sleep problems should be included. This will help the doctor or the sleep specialist to identify the possible triggers to the sleep problem.

Sleep Hygiene for Travelers

A common problem of frequent travelers is jet lag. The change in time zones causes disruption in the body’s biological clock and the difficulties in adjusting to the new time zone results to sleep disturbance. There are ways to minimize the effects of jet lag on one’s sleeping pattern:

• Condition the mind and body to the change in time zone when you make the trip by adjusting your sleeping and waking up schedule according to the time zone of your destination a week or so before the scheduled travel date.
• Adjusting your watch to destination time as soon as you board the plane.
• If possible, select a flight that arrives in the destination early evening.
• Do not take alcohol or caffeine for 3 – 4 hours before bedtime at your destination.
• No heavy exercising before bedtime.
• Use earplugs and blindfolds to mask outside noise and lighting while sleeping.
• Don’t stay indoors most of the time as this worsens the jet lag.
• Make arrangements with the hotel for voice mail services and let them handle all your calls.
• Request wake-up calls from the hotel staff.
• Some people find use of melatonin to induce sleep helpful.

A change in the environment, i.e., time zone, requires the body and mind some time to adjust. By allowing the mind and body to prepare early for such anticipated change, the adjustments will be less when you are actually in the new time zone area.

Sleep Hygiene for Older Adults

As people age, there are normal changes in the sleeping patterns – sleeping and waking up earlier, and feeling rested even with less deep sleep. However, if less sleep becomes disturbing and disruptive to daily functions, it is not any more a normal part of aging. And just as good sleep is important to younger people, so it is as equally important to senior people as it helps maintain good concentration and memory function, refreshes the immune system, and allows the body to recover from the effects of cell damage that happened during the day. The following sleep hygiene tips can help alleviate age-related sleep problems to have better sleep at night:

• Limit caffeine intake late in the day. Avoid caffeinated drinks such as coffee, tea, soft drinks and chocolate.
• Don’t take alcoholic beverages before sleeping because alcohol disrupts sleep.
• Keep stomach satisfied before sleeping. Light snacks like crackers, cereal, and warm milk may help having a good night sleep.
• Do not eat big meals or spicy foods before bedtime. Spicy food can cause indigestion and stomach discomfort. The best is eating dinner at least three hours before sleeping.
• Reduce intake of liquid before sleeping to minimize middle of night bathroom visits. Drinking liquid should be limited an hour and a half before sleeping.

Mild cognitive impairment is said to be a precursor to dementia or Alzheimer’s disease, which is the most common type of dementia, as it increases the risk of dementia especially if the main difficulty of the person is with memory. This is not to say, however, that a person with MCI will get worse no matter what. There are some people with MCI, who never get worse or develop dementia and some of them may actually get better eventually.

Symptoms

The brain undergoes some changes as a person grows older like the rest of the body. Most aging people become too forgetful or it may take a longer time to think of a word or remember a person’s name.

Cognitive problems may go beyond what is expected and may indicate possible MCI if a person experience the following symptoms:

• Frequent forgetfulness of things
• Forgetfulness of events like appointments or social events
• Getting lost in the middle of a conversation, or a book, or a movie
• Feeling overwhelmed with decision making, planning steps to accomplish a task or following instructions
• Having trouble remembering ways around familiar places
• Showing signs of impulsivity or increasing poor judgment
• Family and friends of the person are aware of these changes

A person with MCI may also experience depression, aggression and irritability, apathy, and anxiety.

Classic examples of symptoms observed in people with MCI are being unable to recall the names of people they already know or met recently; trouble keeping track of the flow of a conversation, and frequent misplacing of things. In most cases, the person is quite aware of these problems and tries to compensate the difficulty by using notes and calendars as reminders.

These problems are similar on a milder level to the neuropsychological findings associated with Alzheimer’s disease or other dementias. In some cases, the patient may have mild difficulties performing daily activities.

Diagnosis

The doctors conduct a clinical evaluation that may lead to the diagnosis of MCI as the likely cause of the symptoms observed in a person as there is no specific test to confirm such diagnosis. The doctor’s medical evaluation include extensive investigation of the memory loss problems like details on what was forgotten, when it happened, and how long has it been happening. The doctor also orders imaging and lab tests and if necessary psychological tests to rule in or out MCI diagnosis and explores if other cognitive problems are present or occurring like organization and planning problems, visuospatial abilities, etc.

Most doctors diagnose MCI based on the following criteria determined and developed by a panel of international experts:

• You have memory problems or another mental function, such as planning, following instructions or making decisions. Aware of the problems, you affirm by checking with someone close to you.

• Some of your abilities and capabilities have dramatically declined over time. Your medical history reveals that your performance and thinking abilities have declined from a higher level. Again, this change will be confirmed by someone close to you.

• Your overall mental function and daily activities are not affected despite these changes. In a general sense, your overall abilities and daily activities are not impaired, although there may be specific symptoms that can cause worry and inconvenience.

• Testing of mental status will show a mild level of impairment based on your age and education level. Doctors usually assess mental performance with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) test. If necessary, more detailed neuropsychological testing may be conducted to understand how severe memory impairment is, if other mental abilities are affected and which types of memory are seriously affected.

• Your findings do not meet criteria for dementia. The doctor evaluated that the memory problems complained about which are also documented through corroborating reports, your medical history or mental status testing are not severe enough to make a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease or another type of dementia.

The doctor may conduct other neuropsychological tests to help in determining the degree of memory impairment.

• Neurological exam

The neurological exam includes basic tests that will indicate the coordination level of your brain and nervous system –spontaneous response, eye movements, gait and balance, and the sensory ability. These tests can also help detect any indication of Parkinson’s disease, or other medical conditions like strokes or tumors that can affect memory and physical functions, as well.

• Laboratory tests

Laboratory blood analysis may be required to help rule out specific problems that affect memory such as deficiency in Vitamin B12, folate, vascular inflammation, systemic lupus, rhematoid arthritis, sarcoidosis, HIV infection, syphilis, lyme disease, or thyroid problems.

• Brain imaging

If necessary, MRI or CT scan of head may be ordered by the doctor to check for the presence of other brain-associated problems such as tumors.

Treatment

There are not any the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved drugs or treatment for MCI. But MCI is an active area of research and clinical studies aimed at shedding more information and valid explanation on the disorder to find treatments that may help improve the symptoms or prevent or delay progression to dementia.

• Alzheimer’s drugs

Cholinesterase inhibitors or NMDA inhibitors (memantine), FDA approved drugs for Alzheimer’s disease are sometimes prescribed for people with MCI if the main symptom observed is memory loss. However, these drugs aren’t advised for routine use in MCI for their short-term benefit.

• Treating other conditions that can affect mental function

MCI is not the only condition causing memory loss. There are other medical conditions that can be attributed for a person’s forgetfulness. Diagnosis and treatment of such medical problems can help enhance memory and mental functioning. These conditions that commonly contribute to memory loss include:

• High blood pressure. MCI usually links problems with the blood arteries inside the brain. Memory difficulties may be aggravated by hypertension. Monitoring of blood pressure is necessary and interventions or treatment to lower it are recommended if it’s above normal limit, usually 140/80 mmHg.
• Depression. Depressed people often become forgetful and mentally “foggy.” This condition is common in people with MCI, too. Treatment of depression is essential to minimize memory loss problems and even may eliminate all memory problems. Hence another name for depression is “pseudodementia.”
• Sleep apnea. This condition, in which breathing stops and starts repeatedly while asleep can make a person feel excessively tired during the day. It will also cause forgetfulness and inability to concentrate. Treating sleep apnea can improve sleeping habits of the person and consequently improve MCI symptoms and restore alertness.

Studies were conducted by Jeffrey Kaye, MD and colleagues at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland and both showed that people with MCI withdraw and isolate themselves as the condition progresses over time.

Amnestic mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a condition that involves memory, language, thinking, and judgment problems that are more severe than normal for their age and education. MCI increases the risk of developing dementia or Alzheimer’s disease especially if the main problem is with the memory.

The researchers studied 148 people, 28 of whom have MCI, enrolled in the Intelligent Systems for Assessing Aging Change (ISAAC) trial. The participants had a mean age of 84.2 and were followed for up to three years. During that time, their homes were outfitted with new technologies to evaluate 24/7 activity patterns with a focus on quantity of time that was spent out of the home.

The study revealed that an average of 4.5 hours a day out of their home is spent by the participants during the first month. As the study progressed, people with MCI displayed a significant decline in spending time out – from 4.5 hours, it went down to 2.4 hours a day compared to 3.8 hours spent outside by those without MCI.

The findings suggest that withdrawal from social activities can be a warning sign of future Alzheimer’s disease and that it is important that people living with MCI or dementia maintain a connection with the community and have continuous social interaction with other people in the community.

For more details on the studies, you can visit:   http://www.alzheimersreadingroom.com/2012/07/research-links-mild-cognitive.html.