In this brilliant one-and-a-half-hour show, BBC host Robert Winston examines common sleep problems. To help him, there are six volunteers and various sleep experts and health professionals.
Although the show is Britain-focused, the advice and tips apply to anyone anywhere who has sleep problems. BBC has a bunch of documentaries about sleep and dreaming, but this one is unique because it’s designed to be a practical guide. Very well done and very watchable right through.
Over the show, they put volunteers through several tests, determining what kind of sleepers they are and what levels their executive skills (concentration, attention, reaction time etc) are. Everyone also goes through sleep profiling – including us viewers. The volunteers get customized advice and try and act on it by making changes to their environment, routine or pattern of sleeping. And finally everyone goes through the tests again to compare. Everyone showed improvement except for one person who was disqualified because he changed his situation halfway through by quitting his night job.
Among the problems taken up were snoring loud enough to wake your family, neighbors and yourself up, not being able to get to sleep because the baby is crying all night, being completely zombied from tough night shifts, being under so much stress you can’t sleep etc. \
One volunteer had such a busy jam-packed room it was impossible to relax in it. Only she didn’t realize it and felt she must have all her worldly possessions around her within reach. There was, of course, a space constraint to begin with. So what was she to do? An expert visited her apartment and found it was more like a cell than a sanctuary. They helped her reorganize her room, leaving one side of it for storage and one for rest. And a lot of her things were put out of sight. Also, they had her change the colors of things like the bed linen, which was also very busy. The room was redesigned for rest. She loved it. Clean and spacious looking, ivory sheets, a soft light – she was finally able to sleep. Makes me want to get rid of all the bright orange stuff I have in my own bedroom!
If you can’t get hold of this show, visit the BBC’s site on sleep at http://bbc.co.uk/sleep and profile your sleep to figure out whether you’re a night or day person, whether your work interferes with your sleep etc. Also browse the guidelines and tips on the site.