a map in my own mind

I wrote a while ago about how to get up in the morning. But now I am reminded that it’s particularly hard to get up if you didn’t get enough sleep. I’m not talking about the get-to-bed-earlier issue, but rather what if you really don’t sleep when you think you do?

People with sleep apnea stop breathing while they sleep. According to SleepApnea.org, it could be hundreds of times during the night.

And your body, not wanting to DIE, wakes up a little to kick start the breathing.  You might not notice that little up-from-sleep place, but your day time performance could suffer.

My dad had apnea, although we didn’t know it back then. I just remember the stories about his snoring and then … stopping… So my mother would kick him to start breathing again.  Didn’t get her the best sleep either!

All kinds of things in life are worse with out sleep.

According to a report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM), and posted on the website of the National Sleep Foundation,

Less visible consequences of sleep conditions are far more prevalent, and they take a toll on nearly every key indicator of public health: mortality, morbidity, performance, accidents and injuries, functioning and quality of life, family well-being, and health care utilization.

And besides what you’d expect from not enough sleep–stuff like, oh, tiredness,no energy, irritabity and difficutly concentrating–it might also show up in  higher levels of depressed mood, anxiety, behavior problems, alcohol abuse.  And almost all those things might either look like ADHD when it’s not, or make your symptoms of ADHD much worse.

If you sleep with someone, ask if they think you might stop breating in the night.  If you snore, it might be easier to tell, but you might have apnea even if you don’t snore.

Check out the sleepapnea.org for more information. And ask your doctor if it might be a problem for you.

I love to read about ADHD in the news when the authors are actually interested in some new twist in the reporting.Check out “New World Disorder: Was ADHD an evolutionary asset?” by William Saletan (Posted Thursday, June 12, 2008, at 12:52 PM ET) in Slate.com. He said in part:

The study, led by Dan Eisenberg of Northwestern University and published in BMC Evolutionary Biology, examined a Kenyan tribe called the Ariaal. Part of the tribe has recently settled into an agricultural community. Another part remains nomadic. The tribesmen were tested for DRD4 7R, a genetic variant that, Eisenberg notes, “has been linked to greater food and drug cravings, novelty-seeking, and ADHD symptoms.”

You might be familiar Thom Hartman’s notion of the lives of hunters and the farmers as a explanation of ADHD traits. You can read more about it in his book Attention Deficit Disorder. But in a nut shell: Hunters have to pay attention to everything that’s going on around them–see the rabbit in front AND the bear in the back. Farmers, on the other hand, have to wait a lot. They have to focus and pull weeds and not the food. Wait for the weather.

In this picture the farmers are better suited to sit in school and focus and learn. The hunters are too busy paying attention to the kid in the back row who’s making spit balls. Obviously much more interesting than world history.
Sometimes attention to exactly what you’re supposed to be doing is the right thing. And sometimes seeing the big picture and all the stuff going on around you is the right thing.

I’m thinking small business owners have to be a lot like hunters. You gotta pay attention to everything all the time and make decisions based on as much information as you have. You can’t always wait for more.

Anyway, Thom’s theory is a great way to explain ADHD to kids at the very least. AND it’s really nice to get some scientific study to support it.

If you’re in business for yourself, or even if you just (as if, just!) get to make business decisions for your company, you gotta take the inspiration for progress where you can.

Some times those sparks come in odd places.

Check out this article by Amber Conrad over at InsideCRM : “25 Things I Learned About Business from “South Park” What the comedic cartoon can teach you about navigating the business world.”

South Park is not for everybody and most certainly not for children. (Sheesh, if teachers in the 80s thought the Simpsons was bad!)

But often buried outrageous stories is some hint of something important. That’s one way that comedy works. The joke starts with a story that the audience expects will have a certain progression. But when the unexpected happens and yet, it seems logical, well, people laugh.

I learned that from Basil White’s Comedy Workshop at the Writer’s Center in Bethesda, MD.

If you’re a fan of South Park or have a slightly off kilter sense of humor, check out that post.

And if you’re not a fan, please don’t hold it against me!