Franziska Haydanek: One of things you can do to ask your patients is when you wake up, how do you feel? And if they say that they feel tired, then at least the next question is like, well, have you ever been told that you snore? And if they have other disorders that you're concerned about. So for example, if it's anxiety or depression, more times than not, sleep is not looked at. And I've had s you know so many patients that were diagnosed with anxiety or depression and were able to get off medication. Because they had their obstructive sleep apnea treated. Welcome back to I Did My Own Research. I'm Dr. Fran, and today I'm joined by Dr. Christopher Allen. Dr. Allen attended medical school at Wayne State University School of Medicine. He then went to the University of Chicago to complete his pediatric and child neurology residency, and then attended the University of Michigan for his sleep medicine fellowship. He currently works as the lead physician and CEO of Quality Sleep and Neurology online. You know him better as Sleep Doctor Chris, where he focuses on making sleep science practical, relatable, and actionable for everyday life. Dr. Chris, welcome to I Did My Own Research. Thank you for having me on the show. It's a pleasure. I'm glad no one here. I look at your content all the time. I'm fangrowing right now, so I'm just basking in this. So thank you for having me. my gosh. The feeling is mutual. Listen, if there's one thing that we could all have better of is sleep. We are almost getting enough sleep. I'd love for you to just tell the audience what your real job is. What is what is it that you do all day or at night? Do you work at night or is it daytime? No, I usually work in the daytime, but it's funny. I there's a lot of there's a lot of moving parts because I do breed sleep studies and I have a lot of my patients that will go to the sleep center and have a sleep study, but they're sleeping, I'm sleeping, I wake up, I look at that data. There might be times where I'll fill calls from the sleep lab. But pretty much I have mini hats. So I'm a pediatric neurologist. And so I do that. And then I love neurology, but sleep is my passion. So I did a sleep medicine fellowship, like you said earlier. And I treat kids and adults because when you're for certified in sleep medicine, you have that option to do so. And so some of my colleagues will go back to like, look, I'm just gonna keep seeing kids, or my colleagues, no, I've just see an adults. I don't want to deal with those kids, but I fell in love with both. And I live in I'm practicing in my hometown and there was a need there. So I love seeing kids and adults for sleep and my city needed it. So I'm like, that's that's a win-win for both of us. Yeah. I love that you get to treat your own people, right? You get to come back and serve your community. That's amazing. I wanted to get into a sleep study since you brought it up. I I see a lot of people and I have a lot of my own patients who are very hesitant about getting sleep studies done. Why do you think that is? And can you just walk us through what a sleep study is and what it does? Sure. It's funny. I I think at the beginning, sleep is something that is very sacred and very personal and very intimate. And so when we start talking about that and approaching on someone's sleep, it's something that everyone wants. Everybody wants to sleep well. Everybody wants to wake up. And I think the hard part about it, if there's two reasons. One, a lot of people don't know what a sleep study is. And then some of the people that do know what a sleep study is, they're afraid of the results. So for example, if it says, well, if I have a sleep disorder, does that mean I'm going to wear the mask? You know, that's CPAP therapy, and they call it the mask. But to answer your question, there's many ways that you can do a sleep study. Primarily the one that you do the most is the in-lab sleep study or a polysomnogram. So you go into a sleep lab. There's usually like a bed or a hospital bed. You lay down, there's a belt that you put on your chest, you put it on your abdomen, and then there's leads that can be on your legs. Sometimes arms if you think they're moving in their sleep. And then there's sensors that goes under your nose and monitors your breathing. So if you do have pausing and breathing, which is obstructive sleep apnea, we'll be able to find that out. Also, there's like EEG leads on your head. And with that, what'll happen is I'll get to see what type of sleep stage you're at. So you might be in your stage one or N1 or your REM sleep or stage R, where I can see what's happening. So That sleep study will let me know if you have any type of sleep disorder or extractive sleep acne. And then there's a camera that looks at you when that's happening. So just be aware of that when you have that. Yeah. I can imagine that's the one reason that some people don't want to go do that. Cause you said that it does feel a little invasive if I'm sleeping and there's a camera on me. I don't I can see why people don't like that. Right. And the funny part about it is that like that's why you're always up front and I always tell my patients what to expect if they're going into the sleep lab. So Knowing that you're going to sleep. Yes, there's a camera, but the cool part about it, I only need like 20% of that data to actually figure out what's going on. And you got eight hours to give me that. And so even if there's problems and someone says, Well, I'm not gonna sleep, most of the times they do. And there's other studies, especially if you're trying to rule out obstructive sleep apnea, there's one you can do from home. So there's a home sleep apnea test. Where there's different types of ways you can do that. There's one where there's a one that goes around your chest, one that you just put on your finger, or like or someone on your face, or there's one that you have two stickers that you put in your chest and around your abdomen. So there's many ways to see if you have a sleep disorder, like obstructive sleep acne. And I always tell people knowledge is power. And getting that information, I think is amazing to to understand what you need to do because. I've seen too many times where people do have a sleep disorder and they don't know. And once they find out and get that treated, their life is a lot better. Their high blood pressure is down. Their mood is better. And men, they may have erectile dysfunction. That's improved. So there's many things you can do to get that treated. Yeah, I mean the several friends who I know who have sleep apnea and have a CPAP love their CPAP. They said their life was drastically improved when they started using their CPAP. And I believe you yourself have shared your experiences with your CPAP, correct? Yeah. I always give them the shameless plug. I sound like a funny, cheesy commercial, but I tell them, like, not only your doctor. You know, I have obstructed sleep apnea. I've been treated for well over twenty years. So I've been with it for a while. And the thing for people that are listening, you know, CPAP therapy stands for continuous positive airway pressure. And that last word is the most important part pressure. You wear a mask and it provides a pressure to keep your airway open so air can go in and out. And that's pretty much what obstructive sleep acne is. If this is your mouth and this is the back of your throat, when you're relaxing, muscles are relaxing and right in the back it gets small. So when you breathe in, that's how snoring happens. But it relaxes more, then airways closed. So no oxygen is going to your heart, your lung, or your brain. But they don't know what's happening back there. And that's why your heart's working harder. That's why your lungs are breathing in deeper. That's why your body's sending stress signals all over your body. And then you wake up. Well, your body does, not you. And it happens over and over again. You know, that's obstructive sleep acne. And so when someone's snoring, doesn't mean that you have obstructive sleep apnea, but it starts asking those questions. Because like You know, people don't know. And the funny part is when I'm in my clinic, the most common word I hear the most are two, my wife. Like the guys will come and it's like, well, my wife says I snore, or my girlfriend, my spouse. And so ask your bed partner because the hardest part about my job, I'm talking to you about things that happen when you're unconscious. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Well, I do appreciate that you've shared your own experiences with this area of medicine. And I think a lot of us who have a condition within the field that we practice in, do try to talk about it online at least because it normalizes it a little bit. It gives context to the conditions that we talk about. It lets people know that we too are patients. and our experiences with that. And I do that in person too, right? Like when I'm talking to my patients about getting, say, a a screening colonoscopy, and they're like, No, I really don't, you know, I'm afraid of the prep. And I have the ability to say I've gone through a colonoscopy prep and I I personally didn't find it terrible. And I'm really happy because I found out I for sure don't have colon cancer despite having symptoms. And I think in a way, when you practice in a field of medicine and have a condition within that field, you are even more knowledgeable, not just like medically, but also you can share your experiences with your patients and now you're doing that online as well. Do you find that there's a lot of people who have like misunderstandings online about like CPAPs and sleep apnea? Or is this like kind of an untouched part and everyone's like pretty chill about it? no. Everyone has like their deceived notions about it and seeing what it's about. And there's a lot of myths that are out there. And that's one of the biggest reasons why I go on social media. One, to meet patients where they are. meet people where there are to talk about sleep and which is which is amazing by the way. You know, I'm in Saginaw, Michigan. It's like an hour north of Detroit. And I get to communicate with people that might be in California, Texas, Australia, just to know about sleep. And that is amazing. And just like you, you know, we're certified. You know, we went to med school, we did our training to make sure that we can, you know, help people. And I get to do that. And one of the biggest things that people think a couple of things. One, snoring is normal. It's like, I'm really sleeping deep. No, as I said earlier, snoring is not normal. Doesn't mean that you have a sleep disorder. It means that you need to talk about it to see if you do. Because snoring means that your airway has collapsed and you might be pausing in your breathing and you might have obstructive sleep acne. And a lot of people think, even with sleep, as far as like You know, Mr. Saman wants his money. And how you're gonna be you have to sleep. If you don't, they literally call it sleep debt. And so for adults, you have to sleep anywhere from seven to nine hours. Now I know someone's listening right now. It's like, I don't sleep that much. And if you don't, that's when you ask yourself, well, why? And get someone and get someone to help you like a sleep doctor like me. Because That's one thing. And then there's n another person that will say, Well, I mean, I feel fine on five hours. And the hard part about that, when you go to bed, your body is recharging. Everybody knows that. And when you're also within your brain, there's a lot of stuff that's happening outside of the recharging. Your body is getting rid of all these toxins, even your brain. And I always use this example. It's kind of like washing dishes. If it takes you seven hours to wash dishes. And you only give it five, what's happening? You got some dirty dishes left over. And in your brain, those are certain proteins and toxins. If it sticks around, the older you get, that can lead to dementia, that can lead to Alzheimer's. And so I'm really big on people, even if you don't have a sleep disorder, you can still wreck your sleep by doing that. You know, someone will have a phone, and if you know, my phone's right here, and then go to bed, plug it in. And if you woke up and it's at 60%. You're gonna be upset. Like, what happened? But for us, you know, we'll say, I I know only slept four and a half hours, but let me keep going through my day. And so that's one of the biggest things we have to look at. Yeah. I mean, I think that's hard too, because you've talked about and I've seen some of your posts talking about those of us who work night shift either all the time or occasionally. Like I work probably like three overnights per month, but it is kind of hard to recover after one of those days, right? If I was up all night doing C sections at three the morning. I try to get a couple of sleep a couple of hours of sleep when I get home, but then I feel a little like awe for a couple of days. What tips do you have for people who either are full-time night shift workers or those of us who do it occasionally? You know, and I'm glad you brought that up because that's where I have the most respect for the people that are doing night shift. You know, we live in a world where everyone works, you know, daytime and they're it but in hospitals, in law enforcement, even in shops where open they are twenty-four hours. There are people that are still working and trying to make their livelihood and things are needed. You know, I put post on there talking about how hard it is because your body is set to sleep at night. That's a hard truth. That is a fact. And when you are not doing that, you're causing harm to your body. So you have to be intentional when you're doing something that can cause harm to your body for that. So my tip is one, to be intentional with your sleep. And I said earlier you need anywhere from seven to nine hours. Just because you work the night shift, that doesn't change. So you have to do that. And there's three rules that well, three scenarios. I'll say when you are going to bed, how you want your room. You want your room to be cool, dark, and quiet. So making sure when you go home, you are doing that. If you have someone there to help you out after you know the shift, I know you might have children, then I have to get to school. And I understand to do that, but you have to be intentional with that. And that's why I talk about it on social media. That's why I have like a night shift survival guide so you can look at that because towards the end of your shift, you have to treat it like it is daytime, where you have bright lights in the mor on at the beginning of your shift. When it gets towards the end of your shift, starting that wind down time, making sure that you're not eating close to the end of your shift because you're getting ready to go to bed. And then when you're in bed, those three things: cool, dark, and quiet. Like how quiet are we talking here? As quiet as possible. And when I say that, to put you in a scenario where it's quiet, where all you can do is go to sleep. Now, if you're a diaper person where like I need like white noise or through music, that's fine. If it's not bothering you, it's not bothering me. But you need that dark because this is me putting my neurocap hat on now. Any light that goes into your eyes is going to mess with your melatonin. Everyone's heard about melatonin. And with your circadian rhythm, that's your body clock telling you when it's time to go to bed. Those are one of the things that can dictate it. And so if you're working at night, that's what you're fighting against. So you need to make sure to shut out that light because your body knows like, wait a second, it's light. It's time for me to be up. And so you have a good sleep mask or a good blackout curtain to help, you know, to help with that. That's great. Sound machine, I'm okay with that. Cause that's like a a calm quiet that you have. And just making sure you get that recommended amount of sleep. And if you're having problems doing that, again, on the sound like a broken record, that's when you see a sleep doctor like me. Yeah. I only wanted to clarify because I am a sleep machine girly. I have like ones on my phone. I'm at work. Like every one of my children has one. So if you told me I couldn't have my sleep machine, I would not I would go against doctor's orders. You're like, all right, well, that is this is like conversation. Yeah, like this has been really great, Chris, but we're gonna stop talking now. I did wanna go into the cause I've seen and I've have fallen for this on the internet, like the sleepy girl cocktail, like these, like it's like cranberry and like magnesium powders. And like I'll be honest, they're they were pretty tasty. But is there any evidence that's like actually those things are helpful? Is this more placebo effect? It's a little bit of both. One thing I will say, like when someone tells me about that and I remember That's been over a year where I've done a video. It's like, well, it tastes good. But one of the things that they're doing, they're trying to push ways to help you fall asleep. And some of the juices through there might have some extra melatonin to help. But my thing is that when you're doing that, you're trying to push yourself to fall asleep or trying to get to sleep. And you know, we as humans always try to correct and it's like, well, if I can do this, then it'll be fine. But those are the signs where if you're reaching for like a sleepy girl mocktail. You need to be seeing a sleep doctor or telling your provider because there's a problem where you're not falling asleep and they could be a quicker fix. And a lot of people will do that in nasal strips. And there's not really like evident data this to show that this will work. Now, some of the stuff with magnesium, it can relax your legs and can make you comfortable to fall asleep. Melatonin, this is my public service amounts of melatonin because a lot of people use it, but a lot of people use the wrong dose. at the wrong time. what's the right dose in the right time? I know. And so it is funny. I'm very calm when I say this because people will hear that. It's like, well, sleep Dr. Chris said I can do this. Normally, if you're doing it, so if you're doing it by yourself, I wouldn't go over one milligram. And the hard part about that is that there's five milligrams, there's 10, there's even 20 milligrams. And the thing is is that if you take it at the wrong time, it can actually mess up your sleep. And make you stay up even later or go to bed too soon. And so the correct time to do it is like two hours before bedtime. And it's sad because on the bottle, we'll say about a half an hour before. And if you're like, well, doc, I'm doing that and I'm still having problems, that's when you get to see a sleep doctor to help because I hear that all the time. And I use melatonin in my practice, but I know how to use it to do it at the right dose at the right time. I've had patients where they're like, Well, yeah, I couldn't sleep, so I just put it in the middle of the night. You do that, it'll mess up your sleep. And I always tell people, you know, med melatonin is not a sedative. It's a signal. It's a signal in your body to say, Hey, it's time to go to bed. So you want to make sure you're taking that right dose at that right time. Yeah. I mean, I think that's, you know, more of the point of over the counter like supplements, medications have a time and a place, but you still have to know how to use them correctly and You sleep Doctor Chris isn't there in the aisle with us telling us, like, sh yeah, but you can get melatonin, but make sure you get this one and this is how you take it. And I think that's the hard part with like over the counter stuff and supplements is that sometimes you actually do need guidance just because you can buy it over counter doesn't mean that you that there's not a correct or wrong way to use it. So I think that's helpful. I mean, I don't use that much melatonin. I use it when I'm coming back from a night shift where I'm like kind of off because I nap from nine to twelve and then I'm like, okay, now I'm in the middle of whatever. So I try not to use it that often. But it is a nice supplement, I guess, to use when you need it. And one of the things with melatonin is that we already make melatonin in our body. And so if you feel like well I I'm not taking my melatonin anymore. Well your body was already making it and it's still making it. It actually helps. And it's like it's honestly it's a hormone. It's a hormone to tell you to go to bed. And there's other things that melatonin does, but in regards to sleep, at least that portion of sleep, that's what it's used for. Is that gonna help my four year old not come into my bed at 3 a.m.? That part not so much. And you know, and it's funny because you know, that's why I love where because I take care of kids and adults, have kids of my own too. So I can understand that. And you know, with children, there is like this type of insomnia. where it's like behavioral insomnia of childhood. So with behavioral insomnia of childhood, there's two reasons why it happens. There's one reason, there's a second reason, and there's a combination of both. And one of the first reasons is that it's one where you have sleep onset association. So it's a fancy way saying I need mom or dad to go to bed. And it's funny because think about it, when they're a baby, you know, you rock them, rock them asleep. They start crawling, you rock them asleep. They start walking, put them in their lap and and pat them to sleep. And then they get a big boy or big girl bed, and you're like, all right, bye. And they're like, wait, what's what's what's going on? And so, you know, it takes one of those things where if you're not there, then they need you to sleep. And I always tell patients this and families, if that's what you're doing at home and you're okay with that, and they're snuggling up with you, going to bed, then that's fine if you're okay with it. But I know it comes to the point where you want them to have that independence. And if you do, there's ways to like do that. And yeah, I've I've had literally webinars where I help families talk about that. So there's one way to do that. And the other type is limit setting where they're like, I'm thirsty. I want another story. Can I do this? Can you read this? Can you check this? And then there's the combination of both of them. And the cool part about it, there's things you can do to help. And you know what? I want to give, you know, something free of charge for you, friend. So What you're gonna do is like if they're coming into your bedroom, what I do is I have like two index cards and you're gonna have them write one and you're gonna have them write two. They can color it, make it look very pretty, and that's gonna be their past. So if they come to your room, like, where's your past? What do you need? Can I have a hug? Sure. Can I just wait with you for two minutes? Like you can wait, but it's only for five minutes. That's great. Now get back. And you can give them two. Sometimes you can give them one, but I say no more than two. then what that will do, that'll give them that option to say, you know what? Maybe I'm not I'm not gonna use this pass yet. Or like, what's that? Or or if they're on the passes, like, I'm sorry, or out of passes. And it's something that gives to them that independence and that onness to say, like, do I really need to get out and talk to mom or mom and dad? And so that just gives them those choice. Well perfect. I don't know if at three in the morning I'm gonna have that in me because I'm just gonna get up and go to his bed so that he can snuggle with his father because I cannot sleep next to a four year old. But I will definitely give that one a try. I also wanted to talk about your video talking about women getting diagnosed with sleep apnea and how we are underdiagnosed for several reasons. Frustrating, of course, for any woman listening to hear that in all aspects of medicine we are compared to our male counterparts and a lot of diagnoses are based off of men rather than us. But I would love to learn how, as the clinician who takes care of women, how can I do a better job screening these patients and getting them to you? Like what am I what should I be asking them? I'm glad that you bring that up. And as you meant mentioned earlier, when these studies are coming out or these, you know, criteria, more times than not it was based off of men. We are noticing that now. There are more studies out there to show that. And even for example, for obstructive sleep apnea, you know, it can present differently in women. Yes, they can still snore and yes, they can have pausing and breathing. But there's this skill that we use to show pausing and breathing. Or if there's partial pause, which we call a hypopnea. So the words A H I. It's apnea hypopnea index. And so that hypopne the partial breathing. And sometimes with women, you'll see more of that. And their oxygen will dip down, but maybe not as much. So we know that. And so one of the things you can do to ask your patients is a simple question. One, when you wake up, how do you feel? And if they say that they feel tired. Then at least the next question is like, well, have you ever been told that you snore? I don't like to ask, like, do you snore? Because more times than I was like, no, or I was asked, like, have you been told? And so usually that will give an aspect like, well, there's a couple of times. One time I was with my girls on a girls' trip and they were saying I was snoring. And those answer to those questions. So you can like, you know, do that because when I and when you talk about snoring, everyone will give you a reason. It's like, well, I'll snore, but you know, I was really tired that night. But you know, you go into that. And if they have other disorders that you're concerned about. So for example, if it's anxiety or depression and you're not figuring and they've been on medication, more times than not, sleep is not looked at. And so a simple question, how do you feel that you sleep? How do you feel when you wake up? And have you ever been told that you snore? And that can open up a cascade of other questions or say, you know what, maybe we should look into this. And I've had You know, so many patients that were diagnosed with anxiety or depression and were able to get off medication because they had their obstructive sleep apnea treated or had other sleep disorders. You know, sleep acne is one of the biggest disorders out there, but there could be something that's called Russis-like syndrome. And that happens with a lot of women. especially women that were pregnant and during pregnancy they have this urge that they just gotta move their legs. I had that it was terrible. you had it. yeah. You know what it's funny, you know, I'm a man and I've not had it, but just hearing the stories and seeing how it is. And I told someone I was like, could you describe it to me? They were like, you know how you when you have to go pee and you just really have this urge, like you just have to pee. And then once you pee, you're like, that feels good. It's kind of like restless leg syndrome. Like you have that urge and when you move your legs you get like this relief. And sometimes it's like a creepy, crawly sensation, feel like it's ants in your pants, or something that's even just unexplainable. It's like I just got this weird feeling. I really notice it at night. And treating sleep disorders like obstructive sleep apnea helps it. But more important, check your iron. If your iron's below a certain point, it can be normal, but we look at this little bank of iron. We call it ferritin. It's like the I love a ferritin. I love a ferritin. It goes, yeah, it's that storage of iron. And if it's below a certain point and that number is like if it's below 70, back in the day we used to say fifty is like, no, if it's below 70, then look and like give us more iron to see if that helps along with it. my god, I check ev basically everyone's ferritin level. Anyone I see and I'm getting blood work, I'm like, you we should probably check a ferritin. Cause like for those of you listening, forty percent of menstruating people are iron deficient. So they're not gonna be anemic. Their CBC is gonna be normal. But if you check a ferritin, I very every day have parent patients who have a ferritin of six. A Ferriton of eight. And they're like, I feel like garbage. I'm like, no kidding. Yeah. And I always tell people, like, you Ferriton, it's kind of like someone walking around is like, look at all this money I got. I got all this money, but you look at their bank account and they got like twenty dollars in their bank account. You're like, I see the money you have, but I know the real deal. And so that's what Ferriton is, is showing us like how where how are your iron stores? Yeah. I love that that is something that kind of like connects, you know, me and you, right? So like my my medical problems are causing your medical problems. And maybe if we fix both of them, then both of them will go away. I know, yes. And then and it's funny and then the even extra connection, because even with pregnant women, when you have obstructive sleep acne, not only can it hurt you, it can hurt your child. And if you're depri depriving yourself of oxygen, you're depriving your baby of oxygen and has to help them even work harder just to make sure everything else is okay, you know, as well. Yeah. I think that's probably an area of medicine I know I should be better about. I feel like a little lost in how to get them to the right people sometimes. Or like does your insurance cover the CPAP? Cause there's like a lot of insurance rules when it comes to CPAP, right? There is, but at the end of the day, you can get them to treatment. And the cool thing about it, there's more than one way to treat obstructive sleep apnea. And it also depends on severity. So you have your CPAP therapy. There is mild facial therapy where you can train your mouth to open up like your airway, depending on mild to moderate cases of it. There's a mandibular advancement device, a literal mouthpiece. Not the one where you watch like late at night. It's like, call this number. Not that one. There's actually one where you put it in your mouth and it opens up your airway. So when you sleep at night, there's even medication to help with weight loss that's been approved to treat obstructive sleep acne. So there's many ways, you know, from that. And I think my field, you were really good at talking about CPAP therapy or people call it the mask. But I know that you gotta meet people where they're at. And you know, I love CPAP therapy, but I love even more patients getting their obstructive sleep act and you're treated. Yeah, I think that's really important for people to hear, especially if you're a clinician, because it isn't just like their sleep, which has a big impact on their day today, but Everyone has to sleep every day and so it's cumulative effects that you're gonna see over long, long periods of time. It's not just like, if you stop smoking cigarettes, like it's you know, that goes away. Like you have to sleep every day. So if you're having really bad sleep and your heart is we're having you work harder because you you're not oxygenating, that has big effects down the line. I know, and it's hard because we live in a hustle culture because we live where people say like the first thing people will do is sacrifice sleep. And it's like even unfortunately it's our colleagues They literally, you know, when we're in med school it's like, man, I have this test going up. So what you do? You stay up late. But we showed studies, you know, your memories form better when you get better sleep. So if you're in college, you're listening, get that sleep. And it's you know, that part is really hard, you know, for it, but it's doable, especially if you get that quality sleep. Yeah. I mean, like I said. Kind of all parts of our lives, stop pulling all nighters. It's not good for you. Even though I mean, even like the internet makes it feel like that we have to constantly be doing that. And I will I will say I do sacrifice my sleep for at the end of the day, and you're gonna hate this, but at the end of the day, when I'm tired and I've been hustling all day, taking care of patients and my children and whatever, it gets to be like nine forty five. And I was like, you know what sounds amazing right now? Laying flat in bed and scrolling on my phone. And you know what? I I can understand that and that goes into the whole revenge bedtime procrastination. It's like, look, I gave everyone this time, but it's my time now. And when I tell people that have that feeling, and I've heard that too many times, you know, set that time for yourself. I just say don't do it in bed. If you want to look at something and it's not bothering your sleep, that's fine. I usually say like an hour, two hours before bedtime, don't. But if you can only do like three minutes or forty five, then that's when you're starting. Like if you're not having any problems, then that's fine. But remember it can lead to problems. And one of the things that I just remembered, I wanted to make sure to tell everybody is, you know, when you're a woman, don't blame it because you're a woman. Don't blame it because you're a mom. It's like, well, I'm tired. Well, I'm a mom. No, moms can get good sleep as well. If you're a woman, you can get good sleep as well. And so we I don't want us to use that as a badge to say like I can go through not getting good sleep. Yeah. I mean the moms of newborns are probably like, well, I'm exempt from this conversation, but the rest of us, yeah. We you know, with that, like you know, it's hard. And that's one of the hardest moments in like not just a woman's life, a human's life, where you have a child and you have to care for that, but that's where it takes collaboration. And you know, and and when you can, it takes to detangle. But dad, look, dad can sleep, but put him on shift, like to make sure that you can get your quality of sleep from that. And there's ways, you know, men are not nursers, like they can't nurse, they can clean the bottle. They can get the breast milk together and awesome breast milk. So you can get some time. There's and and I know it's for a time period. So you do the best you can. And it's not just sweep when the baby sleep. You know, there's ways to help, you know, that as well. So I it's hard for me. I will I refuse to chalk things up because this is the way it has to be. There, there's ways to do that to help along. No, you're so right. I do tell my patient, less especially when I had my first child, I would go to sleep at like eight PM and I will have will my husband would take like what we call like first shift and I would sleep from like eight until one. And at least I got five hours. And I and then I still, you know, slept, but it was like every two hours. But it just getting those four to five hours uninterrupted and the baby got a bottle of like milk that I had pumped throughout the day, like that that's how I survived that. So you're right. There are ways and having partners participate is absolutely a vital part of surviving that newborn time. Yeah, and just, you know, and people that you know don't have that option, there's still options for you too. And I know that like look, if the babies nap and you need to set a time, you can do that as well. And if anyone, and this goes to anybody, if you want to take a nap, the magic number is either twenty minutes or ninety. Twenty minutes is long enough where you're not getting into that second stage of sleep. Where you get into deeper sleep and you try to wake someone out of that deeper sleep, you're going to feel groggy. But if you do 90, you have enough to go through that deeper sleep and get back to the other side of sleep where you have that quick recharge. So set a timer for like 20 minutes or 25. So like, you know, it takes me five minutes to wind out, and you you'll be surprised. And it's funny, I made a video about that and I know that. And there's times like, man, I'm so tired. didn't get good sleep the other time. I was like, let me get 20 minutes. And then I did 20 minutes. I'm like, why do I feel so amazing? And so, you know, I tell people, but yeah, I I live it too. At least I try to. And most important, give yourself grace. Cause I know when I talk about sleep and there's a lot that you feel like, Well, I'm not doing this or that. That's okay. It's telling you where you need to be and what to do to help from that. And do I sleep seven to nine hours every single single night? Definitely not. But I know to get to that part and giving myself grace to say, okay, I know this night, you know, it's March Madness and I need to see those buzzard beaters. And so I know I'm not gonna get my seven to nine hours watching that, but being aware of that to know what you have to get up to. Yeah, I think that's super important. I'd love to go into a little rapid fire with you. Okay. What is your favorite pillow? My my favorite pillow. Just gonna so I there's this pot pillow called Twilla. Love it because I I love a good comfortable pillow. Yeah. Where do you get those pillows? So if you literally go to toilet.com and transparency, like I do have an affiliate with them. So if you put in sneak Dr. Chris, you can get a percentage off. But honestly, the only reason why I did that, because I love them so much. I'm like, man, this feels awesome. Yeah. Well, shout out to I'm gonna have to go find them. I I do like my pillow. Mine is from the brand I think Coop. It's like the one where you can put more stuffing into it. pull it does the same thing, but there's these little products you can put in. And it's yeah, and it's customizable. It it is great. It it's a good pillow. That's that's my go-to pillow. I mean, it's like life changing once you finally find the pillow, that's like your pillow. All right. Sleep mask or blackout curtains? Depends. I would say both. It's it's a tie. Like because if you get a good sleep mask, it's almost as good as a good blackout curtain. And it depends on where you are and how you and where you live. Because sometimes you might live somewhere where you might not be able to get a blackout curtain, but you can like tape your blanket. to the window so you can do that. So if you can't sleep well with a sleep mask, then just do blackout curtains. But I like blackout curtains because I just, you know, wake up it's something about a cold dark room that is nice. And if you have problems with it, then try the sleep mask because that's just as good. Yeah. I got this amazing sleep mask for Christmas that not only like completely goes around so it's like completely dark, but also play you can like air Bluetooth. to it so then I have my like brown noise like right in my ear. You probably are like cringing so hard. But I love You know it's funny, like I said, I look I'm a lover of music and there's times where I will fall asleep, especially if I'm on a plane and I have that. And I have a Bluetooth mask as well. Again, it's funny this is the name dropping session because there's there's one that's called Mantis Sleep Mask. They are the they're they're a good company and I I have some of their stuff. So that's a good yeah. It's a It's a good mask to have. And if you have music, like I said, if something is calm and collective, then then I'm all for it. What's the number one thing that's ruining people's sleep? just one. Just one. The time that you are sleeping. Yeah, that's the one. Like Yeah, if there there's so many. That's the it's I I thought about five, but the one at the top is that you need to get your quality of sleep because that hurts you down the road. It it hurts you now. It affects your mood. It can still lead to high blood pressure, diabetes, stroke. But you need at seven to nine hours. And that's for adults. And especially for for kids and with their IQ and their mood and moving forward, it's getting that quality sleep. So if I had to change one thing, it's making sure you're getting the recommended amount of sleep. Perfect. What's your favorite form of magnesium? My favorite form of magnesium? Hmm. So Magnesium's fine. I would say before you reach magnesium, reach for the sleep doctor if I had to do one. Magnesium glactonate. That's one I've tried and it's it's fine. It's fine. Okay, perfect. And who are your three favorite content curators to follow right now? They don't have to be medical. Okay, absolutely. You don't have to be medical. Okay. well, it's funny. I thought it's medical. So I'll throw I'm gonna give you some of my guilty pleasures. And so yeah, shout out to Andrewski. He's funny and And it's I, you know, being a content creator, just seeing the the work that he puts into it. And sometimes he puts stuff out there that could be controversi controversial to people, but like he is, I feel like the epitome of like how you like get the conversation going and to look at that. And so, you know, if anything is inspirational. So he's cool. Another one, I'm trying to I'm trying to do non medical. I'm I'm gonna do two non-medical and then one medical. one medical. shout out to Dr. Mike. He does like it's it's good. I, you know, we we both are, you know, physicians and we know what it is to have to treat patients and to do our best to use the information that we have to make great decisions. And we're in a world right now where our profession can be doubted, and I think that's I feel like it's always okay to ask questions, but the other part is to listen to it because I always tell my patients, you know, I'm gonna tell you to do something, but I will always give you the why. And then understand that. And if you're hearing something that's alternative to what I'm telling you, make sure you're getting that why. And there's a lot of alternatives out there. And I like how Dr. Merrick just puts it out there and just and very candid about that. I love Dr. Mike. I think he's kind of one of the people that a lot of us look up to when it comes to remaining calm when addressing misinformation. I don't know how he does it when he sits in that big room of people who all disagree with them and he just sits there and listens and then like knows how to speak in a way that connects with people. I mean, it's like I was saying to someone else, like my podcast is basically a little bit of an echo chamber because I'm just inviting other people who we probably agree on a lot on and we're just like chatting about all the things we agree on. But he invites people who they don't agree. And have open conversations about does this make sense? What's the evidence? How do you feel confident saying this? And I think it's a really inspirational on trying to cross a divide, but also sometimes point out the inaccuracies of what is said online and elsewhere. And yeah, Dr. Mike definitely is like the blueprint, I think, for many of us. Yeah. And I think it's not just only the blueprint on social media, but how you handle your patients when you're in when they're in your office and when you're talking to them. Because now not only is it on social media, that stuff is coming into our office. And so that's one. And then the last one, it has to do with like music. I'm a I love science. I'm passionate about sleep and I'm a lover of music. And it's funny. I you know when you watch something, you don't know their name, but you like you you have this. There's there's this guy, he does a one second challenge, and he I know I everything about him except his name. which is funny. Whenever this era, I might just tag his name because it's awesome. He'll give you one second of a song and like what's that song? And I love music and so and I love a challenge. And so when I hear that, it's like, I know that song. And it'll give you a clue. It's like, what's this number one? Like, what's this nineties song? You know, he'll play, it's good. I'm like, I know it. It's good. And I in here. Which is 2000 before someone types. It's like practical person. That's always not in the nineties. That's two Yeah, that was from two thousand and one. Okay. look at that. All right. It might have been memory to that song. You're like, I know the year. I do. I'll have to fact check that one actually. But it's funny. Actually, no it's funny. I haven't actually it's two thousand it's two thousand three. I Okay. I know that for a fact. I had to think about that. You're close. We're close. It was college days and I just remember being in a club. I'm like, Wow, there's a song it's like, how are people dancing to this? This is amazing. That was college Doctor Chris, not sleep Doctor Chris. my god, I college Doctor Chris I think is a whole nother episode we're gonna have to get into I have to come with a warning. No, no adjustment. Trust me. I was I look. I was the guy in the band. Okay. So All right, Sleep Dr. Chris. For the people who aren't following you, where can everyone find you online? I try to make it very simple. So you just put in sleep drch. So sleep dr chris. If you're on Instagram, if you are on TikTok, if you're on LinkedIn, and if you still can't remember that, just go to sleepdrch.com. And then you can find it on there and some other tidbits. Amazing. Sleep Doctor Chris, thank you so much for being here sharing all of your guidance for sleep. I really appreciate you. Thank you.