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This is my 3rd project at toastmasters - objective of the speech was to 'get to the point'...posting this cuz im feeling a little lazy to write something out....and i did write this at 2 a.m. - my usual blogging time ;)
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Y’know I’ve had many epiphany’s at 2am. End up sleeping pretty late once in a while…even if I’ve had a great day…a long day….once I get in front of the tv and even if I’m tired enough to hit the sack – I stay awake.

Madame toastmaster, fellow toastmasters and welcome guests.

Like I said I stay awake. The good thing is that I’ve rediscovered my love for writing – I blog at 2am – and I wrote this speech past 2 am.

Insomnia.

1 in 8 people in the US suffer from Insomnia – that’s about 32million people. In India – estimates peg the figure at 125million people – second highest in the world. After China ofcourse, because nowadays everything is ‘after China’. Y’know I was at a design seminar on Friday and the speaker said that all the bindi’s and bangles available in Delhi’s local markets – are now made in China.

Moving to a different part of the world - In England in 2002-2003 – 98% of people coming for a checkup related to insomnia – were diagnosed with Insomnia and had to be hospitalized. The average age of these patients was 36.

So what is Insomnia about? And why are such an extraordinarily high number of people suffering from it?

In simple terms – Insomnia is your body’s way of telling you – ‘something isn’t right’. Typical causes of insomnia include :

Stress – concerns/worries about your health, work, family keeps your mind too active making it difficult to relax

Anxiety / Depression – Everyday anxieties once again keep your mind too alert. Depression can be caused by chemical imbalances in the brain – worrying in depression keeps ur mind active.

Then you have ‘Stimulants’ like caffeine or prescription drugs.

These were the causes; now the different kinds of Insomnia itself are -

Transient Insomnia – can be one night or a few weeks – typically happens when you’re having some problems at home or at work and you don’t get good sleep for a few days – what we refer to as having ‘sleepless nights’ 

Acute Insomnia – when you have pretty bad or restless sleep for 3 – 4 weeks at a stretch

Chronic Insomnia – when you don’t get sleep or hardly sleep for a time period of a few weeks to a few months at a stretch. That I’d imagine can be quite scary. I know we’ve all had our days where we wake up in the morning with dark circles that look like round tyres…nice and black…and you have a client meeting at 10am – just that morning.

I remember watching a play once – called ‘Insomnia’. It was a series of monologues about these 4 young people who had very normal lives during the day but had almost dual lives at night – these are 4 separate lives – so the techie comes back home at 1 in the morning and can’t sleep until daybreak – he’s depressed and has lost direction in life so he sits and watches morbid films at night while eating omlette bread – every night.

Or there’s the young girl in love…she’s going through a torrid time in her relationship of only 3 months – so following the lack of sleep initially because she would sit up till 5 in the morning talking to her bf…now she suspects him of cheating on her and calls him sporadically at 2 or 3 in the morning just to see if he’s talking to anyone else. Her parent’s got divorced.

So you see Insomnia effects everyday people in everyday situations – and in most cases Insomnia is a result of either some medical or psychological problem – so treating that, automatically takes care of the Insomnia as well.

If you feel you’ve been having consistently bad sleep for more than 2 weeks at a stretch – you should meet with your doctor. Your doctor might ask you about your sleep patterns, how long do you lie in bed before falling asleep, how many times do you wake up inbetween – so in such cases it might make sense to maintain a ‘sleep diary’ – keeping track of how many hours, when you wake up, how long this has been going on for etc. It might help your doctor in diagnosing your condition more accurately.

Lack of sleep is known to slow down your problem solving skills – to all the C.A’s here – can even raise the chances of you taking unnecessary risks. Long term sleep deprivation can even lead to high blood pressure or the emergence of diabetes. Don’t forget – a large number of accidents on the roads today are due to drivers falling asleep at the wheel.

Now – since prevention is better than cure – you could:

- Limit your time in bed – if you sleep the extra hour, that doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s an extra hour of good sleep. Chances are you’ll get out of bed more drowsy than if you had not slept that little extra.
- Exercise – but avoid exercising atleast a coupl’ve hours before going to bed.
- Check your medication – it’s worth checking if it’s contributing to your insomnia.
- Limit your take of alcohol, caffeine and nicotine – smokers, this is for you.


You could also try alternative approaches like acupuncture, or in Buddhism they have the concept of metta bhavana – meditating on the feeling of ‘loving-kindness’. The idea being that meditating on love and kindness has a soothing and calming effect on the mind and body – so your mind and body are relaxed -  and you can sleep better!
If nothing else works – you can watch the movie – ‘the cure to insomnia’, that was designed to cure insomnia – it runs for 87 hours so you’re sure to fall asleep at some point in the movie!

So good night, sleep tight – don’t let the bed-bugs bite!

Madame toastmaster