Tips help stop sleep procrastination

Q: I can’t seem to make myself go to bed at a reasonable hour, even though my workday starts at 8 a.m. I am dragging — and grumpy — all the time, and it interferes with doing my job well. Help! Jessica R., St. Louis

A: It’s not just toddlers and teenagers who rebel against going to sleep at a healthy hour.

According to a new study conducted at the Florida Social Cognition and Emotion Lab in the University of Florida’s Department of Psychology, folks ages 18-25 ignore their planned bedtime most frequently, and it’s a common behavior by people of any age who feel they need more “me time.”

With the demands of family, work and friends, many people are simply trying to carve out a few hours late at night for themselves.

The problem is, it backfires, and instead of doing something positive for themselves, they get too little and poor-quality sleep.

The health repercussions include lower immune strength, weight gain, mood swings and poor decision making — and, now we know, an increase in the brain of Alzheimer’s associated amyloid tangles.

A study in JAMA Neurology looked at 4,417 older adults and found that getting six or fewer hours of sleep nightly was associated with a higher amyloid burden.

And sleeping either less than six or more than nine hours nightly was associated with reduced cognitive performance, depression, weight gain and daytime napping.

If you want to change your bedtime habits and have real “me time,” psychologists suggest you set a hard stop for work — no emails, texts or tasks after, say, 8 p.m. Get a minimum of 30 minutes of moderateintensity physical activity daily. Once in bed, avoid playing games or watching shows on your phone or tablet; you want to wind down, not up. Adopt a meditation routine to do 15 minutes before lights out.

You’ll be giving yourself the best “me time” possible by making sure you get seven to eight hours of restful sleep a night.