Reset Your Inner Clock: The Drug-Free Way to Your Best-Ever Sleep, Mood, and Energy

by Michael Terman Ph.D., Ian McMahan Ph.D.

Overview

An enlightened approach to insomnia, depressed mood, fatigue, and other sleep-related problems of everyday life, harnessing the power of light therapy to reset the natural clock.

Sleep problems and depressed mood often go hand in hand, forming a frustrating cycle. Michael Terman, Ph.D., has devoted his career to studying the brain functions that feed these disorders. In Reset Your Inner Clock, Terman and Ian McMahan, Ph.D., reveal the heart of his findings, a powerful program that recalibrates our internal clocks—our exquisitely designed, natural sensitivity to the timing and brightness of light exposure. These delicate mechanisms are often decimated by the modern demands of a 24/7 lifestyle.

Beginning with a questionnaire that pinpoints the problem areas, Terman helps readers decipher when their natural internal night begins and ends. The treatment process can then start, incorporating the power of natural light and, when necessary, supplemental light therapy. His approach has brought relief to thousands of sleep sufferers, as well as those burdened by bipolar disorder, seasonal affective disorder, depression, sleep disorders due to around-the-clock work schedules, and other impediments to vibrant health. For the first time, his findings are now available for a general audience, sharing the essential elements of chronobiology in clear, authoritative, scientifically grounded chapters that are easy to apply to a variety of situations.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780698148246
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/29/2013
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	352
File size:	965 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Michael Terman, Ph.D., directs the Center for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms at Columbia University Medical Center in New York. He also founded the Center for Environmental Therapeutics. Ian McMahan, Ph.D., is a widely-published, award-winning developmental psychologist and a professor emeritus of psychology at Brooklyn College, City University of New York.

Table of Contents

Foreword John F. Gottlieb, M.D. xiii

Preface xvii

Introduction: In a New Light xxiii

Part 1 Time, Sleep, and Rhythms

1 External Time vs. Internal Time 3

2 The Pressure to Sleep 18

3 Owls, Larks, and Hummingbirds 34

Part 2 Time, Light, and the Brain

4 Getting Light into the Brain 49

5 Getting Light Wrong 60

6 Geography and Time 80

Part 3 Interventions

7 Healing Light 95

8 Nighttime Meds and Melatonin 114

9 Hospitalized with Depression 131

10 Beyond Light: The Charge in the Air 150

Part 4 Stages of Life

11 The Promise of Pregnancy 165

12 Strategies for Babies and Children 180

13 The Challenges of Adolescence 196

14 In Later Years 222

Part 5 Chronotherapy in Your Life

15 Coping with Shift Work 245

16 Racing the Clock, Racing the Sun 262

17 Chronobiology in the Home and Workplace 275

18 Dawn of a Circadian Science 290

Resources for Follow-Up 301

For Further Reading 303

Index 305