In a world where so many of us are struggling to get enough sleep, the issue of sleeping too much might seem like a luxury problem.

It’s actually not. Like insufficient sleep, oversleeping is a sign of disordered sleep. It may be connected to a mental health issue such as depression. It’s often a signal that a person is experiencing poor sleep quality, and it can be a sign of a clinical sleep disorder, including obstructive sleep apnea or narcolepsy.

Sleeping too much is linked with many of the same health risks as sleeping too little, including heart disease, metabolic problems such as diabetes and obesity, and cognitive issues including difficulty with memory. Similar to people who sleep too little, people who sleep too much have higher overall mortality risks.

We talk a lot about insufficient sleep, and the risks that a lack of sleep poses for physical health, mood, relationships, and performance. But oversleeping isn’t something to ignore.

Hypersomnia is the clinical term for excessive sleeping, and excessive sleepiness during the day. Like its counterpart insomnia, hypersomnia has several core symptoms:

• Sleeping for extended hours at night (typically well beyond the 7-8-hour general norm)
• Difficulty waking up in the morning (including sleeping through an alarm)
• Trouble rising from bed and starting the day
• Grogginess on and off or

When I was first dating my wife, she would fall asleep on any car ride that was longer than about 15 minutes. My daughter is now the same way. At first I thought it was just that they were tired, or bored.

This week I decided to explore this interesting topic and one that I have given considerable thought to over the years. Recently, there has been a fascinating new research study, from down under (Australia!) which sheds new light on this topic.

Historically I used to think that many people who would fall asleep either while driving or as a passenger in a car were either bored, sleep deprived or afflicted with something called Sopite Syndrome. Sopite Syndrome is a variant of motion sickness, where you don’t feel sick, you get sleepy when moving. This could have something to do with your vestibular system (balance in your inner ear).

However this new study from Australia has shed new light on this very topic. Researchers were able to discover that it is the vibrations at low frequencies ( like we experience when driving cars or trucks) that over time make us feel more and more drowsy. This make perfect sense to ANYONE who has a small child who would only fall asleep when driving them around the block late

I’m a parent of two teenagers, a boy, 16 and now driving, and a girl, 14. They’re full of energy (just not so much first thing in morning) and they’re busy all day long. School, sports, music, friends – their jam-packed schedules and wide-ranging interests make for lots of long days and nights.

I’m The Sleep Doctor—and getting my teens to sleep as much as their growing bodies and minds need is a challenge. If you’re a parent of a teenager, I’m right there with you in the trenches.

We’ve been learning a lot of important new information about teens’ sleep in recent weeks. I thought I’d bring that information together in one place, to take a closer look at some new details that are important for every parent to know.

A quick primer on teens’ sleep

Before we dive into the latest science on sleep in teens, it’s important to remember that teen sleep works differently than adult sleep. It’s also different from the sleep patterns that teenagers had as younger children. Teenage sleep is a unique time in the sleep lifecycle.

When boys and girls hit puberty, the timing of their biological clocks begins a dramatic shift toward a preference for evenings, a shift that lasts throughout adolescence. Teens’ bio clocks are delayed by much as

As many of you know when I work with patients one of the things I try to do is meet them where they are in the process of getting to sleep (or not). That could mean:

• Working with their doctor to determine a taper schedule to get them off sleep meds
• Starting cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia to begin to replace sleep medication they are currently taking,
• Trying to help them find the lowest effective dose so that they can still get the benefits of the medication without having too much of it in their system
• Finally, I am always on the lookout for potential addictions or abuse of the sleep medication as well.

It turns out that sleep medications can have a complicated relationship with the end user. I read an amazing article in Sleep Review magazine by Kristin Daley, PhD CBSM ( a behavioral sleep medicine specialist) this week, that I wanted to add a few ideas too, and explain the information in more detail to everyone, so here goes…

We all know the data that sleep medications are both quick and effective. So, short term I can completely understand why doctors are quick to prescribe them, they work. There is very little out there that can help you “turn off your brain” better than some of the