The intense red glare of 4:55 a.m. scalds into his eyeballs like a cow being branded. The dankness of his room has almost given way to insanity, and his covers are strewn about like a stampede came through. He has been laying in bed for the past four hours, his imagination has taken the best of him and now he is not sure if the numbers on the clock are even changing. He envisions ice cream sandwiches, the smell of permanent markers, dirt being shoveled, nothing. Sleep is impossible.
This is the life of an insomniac. According to the National Institute of Health, insomnia is defined as perception or complaint of inadequate or poor quality sleep. Sleep is crucial to both our well-being and our health, and a lack thereof can contribute to psychological problems, inactivity and stress in almost any aspect of life.
Philip Longbechevi, a UW-Madison sophomore, has been struggling with insomnia since his junior year of high school. \Each night I used to go to bed with random thoughts. And then they would switch, for no reason. Really random, and I could never remember what I thought about, like, 'How does a battery work?'""
Insomnia is a symptom that often affects college students. Yet if there are video games to be played, parties to go to and books to be read, why should students make time for sleep?
""We understand sleep is essential to our existence,"" said Steven Barczi, assistant professor of medicine and geriatric and sleep medicine specialist. ""We believe we need to sleep for body restoration, so we aren't achy or dragged out, for brain restoration so it has time to recuperate, for our memory's sake and for other reasons that we are still under investigation.""
Insomnia can be short term, on and off (transient) or chronic. Although the specific cause of insomnia is not known, the main theory states that a number of brain systems that are typically active during wakefulness and not during sleep are inappropriately active during sleep in the insomniac's brain.
""The problem is that certain arousal-related systems are not being shut down in the brain of an insomniac,"" said Craig Berridge, a UW-Madison professor of psychology.
It is mostly environmental factors that contribute to short term and transient insomnia, such as stress, environmental noise, extreme temperatures or change in environment. In terms of chronic insomnia, both environmental and biological factors typically combine to cause the disease.
""Our body is sensitive to rhythms. College students usually rob their sleep time to do other daily objectives. We expect our body to do weekday and weekend schedules, however, when you end up shifting those bed times the body doesn't automatically respond,"" stated Barczi.
Yet there are various ways to combat insomnia. Often college students having trouble with sleeping try to use drugs or alcohol as a way to induce sleep. However, despite the fact that marijuana or alcohol may make one ""pass out,"" imposing artificial sleep does not reproduce natural sleep.
""There is an architecture to sleep,"" said Barcizi. ""Those patterns which typically repeat themselves are disturbed when you use outside substances, and therefore do not produce quality or restoration.""
Cleaning up one's sleep hygiene can be very effective and pivotal to improving sleep. Behavioral procedures such as relaxation techniques, not exercising before bed, eliminating caffeine from the diet and not sleeping in are just a few changes that can help. Over-the-counter pharmacological anti-histamines are a safe bet for short term sufferers. Yet for those who are plagued with chronic insomnia, there are prescription drugs available through a physician or a sleep clinic.
The UHS Web site offers tips on falling asleep and how to get better sleep and can be found at The Sleep Foundation also has a Web site with helpful information. The Web site, , also offers tips and has information on when an individual should seek help for sleep problems.
