insomnia

The Sleep Doctor Michael Breus is back in the studio to solve all our snooze-related questions, and he also brings us a new toy! He's showing off the Renew SleepClock by Gear4, a sleep management tool that knows when you're sleeping and takes careful measurements to record your sleep patterns.

It also works as a tailored alarm clock that wakes you up at the lightest moment in your sleep cycle, so you'll arise super refreshed. Dr. Breus also gave us one to give away on a future show, so be sure to tune in to find out how to win.

As usual, the Doctor also answers questions from our listeners. Today he'll respond to inquiries about the correlation between memory and sleep, and whether or not we can learn things like languages and facts just by sleeping.… Read more

Health and wellness firm Zeo's labeling of sleep problems in America as an "epidemic" might not be hyperbole. Some 64 million of us grapple with sleep issues every night, and another 49 million struggle at least a few nights a week, according to the firm's analysis of U.S. Census data.

Zeo, which first caught our eye in 2005 under the name Axon Labs with an alarm clock called SleepSmart, now offers a highly evolved mobile sleep system that employs a wireless headband to track all known sleep phases, including Light, Deep, and REM sleep.

The Zeo Sleep Manager then sends the resulting sleep data directly to the user's mobile device (iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, and soon Android-based smartphones), which then syncs to the user's online Zeo account, where a ZQ sleep score that summarizes sleep quality is calculated. (It used to be transmitted to an SD card and then had to be manually uploaded.)… Read more

It's an age-old question: why am I sleeping poorly?

As we reported earlier today, a new study from the National Sleep Foundation says the active use of electronic devices such as TVs, smartphones, computers, and video games one hour before going to bed might be what's keeping us awake.

For its 2011 Sleep in America poll, the NSF queried a random sample of 1,508 adults between the ages of 13-64. Almost everyone surveyed, 95 percent, said they use some type of electronics at least a few nights a week within an hour before bed.

CBS "Early Show" contributor Taryn Winter Brill, like many, goes to bed with the TV on or has her laptop or BlackBerry close by. She decided to set up an unscientific sleep experiment to find out why she's sleep-deprived. What happened when Winter Brill pulled the plug on all of her technology? She shares the results with "Early Show" viewers and co-anchor Erica Hill.

This article originally appeared on CBSNews.com. … Read more

UPDATED at 12:05 on May 13: The RSS feed has been fixed. Sorry for the inconvenience.

It's an odd day in the studio this week as Dong attempts to end his honeymoon with President Obama by complaining about not being about to refinance his house. This of course leads him to take out his frustrations on black people. Namely, me. I play the world's smallest violin while he does this.

When is it OK as a 50-something man to stalk 20-something girls on the Internet? Before you answer, listen to what Dong and I have to say … Read more

Despite their calm demeanor and sweet, jovial humanity, it appears that the British are Europe's worst sleepers.

Sixteen percent of Brits claim their nights are not like white satin. (The finest European sleepers are, in fact, the Spanish, of whom only 2.4 percent report problems. We can learn a lot from the Spanish.)

While the British do accuse stresses associated with their jobs, their bank accounts, or their miserable spouses of keeping them up and getting them down, there is a new abomination for insomniacs: gadgets.

Yes, we can now happily diagnose a new disease for which some … Read more

Remember the TV that hides under your bed? Well now we have a bed that hides under your TV.

It's not an exact opposite, however, because this bed is actually vertical when in hiding. As BornRich points out, the flat TV appears when the Murphy bed folds into its upright position, exposing an underside that looks remarkably like a wall unit. But we're not sure how comfortable we'd be swinging our TV set around like this every night, not to mention the fact that we'd never be able to doze off while watching Letterman.

Neither concern … Read more

So that's the reason: We have an "overactive mind," and that's keeping us awake at night, not the three triple lattes.

This, at least, is the thinking by the people behind "GLO to Sleep," a product designed to cure your insomnia. (Full disclosure: They didn't actually mention the lattes.) GLO is essentially an eye mask lined with glowing bars of "photoluminescent pigment" that supposedly lets you "fall into the relaxed alpha-waved state and eventually into dreamland," according to Chip Chick.

If you're still having trouble nodding off, we … Read more