A\u00a0recent tweet from Dr. Oz caught my eye: “one of the hardest rules to follow . . . @DrOz said no to snooze button. makes you feel worse.” This idea intrigued me.\u00a0Is it\u00a0true? Does the snooze button make you feel worse? <\/p>\n
I’m\u00a0currently quite\u00a0in love\u00a0with my\u00a0snooze button. Some might even say I’m an addict. My cell phone alarm (which I set because I’m paranoid about middle-of-the-night power outages wrecking my regular alarm . . . it is springtime in north Texas, after all, and that means power-killing storms can blow up in nano-seconds) is set for 5:45 am Monday through Friday. Lofty goal, yes. My standard alarm clock is set for 6:01 (yes, I’m strange and prefer to have the alarm go off on an odd-numbered minute), but it’s typically sometime between 6:35 and 6:45 (or, on REALLY bad days, 7:15) when I actually get my butt out of bed. I’m a heavy sleeper, so I need the annoying, blaring alarm sound instead of the radio to wake me, so yes, all that time between 6:01 and the time I get up is spent in 9-minute segments with the snooze button.<\/p>\n
I started looking into this so-called “snooze button effect.” I think we all know it’s pretty much a mind fake-out, but is it truly detrimental to our health?\u00a0 In this article<\/a>,\u00a0author Kevin Ngo,\u00a0states that “the problem with [the snooze button] is that 9 minutes isn\u2019t enough time for you to fall into any beneficial sleep stage, therefore, all you\u2019re really doing is deliberately allowing your sleep to be interrupted. ”<\/p>\n The article goes on to describe adverse effects of interrupted sleep, such as tiredness, agitation, headaches, and mood swings, and also likens the snooze button to a form of procrastination. Well, Mr. Ngo, you’ve got me there. I always attributed those symptoms to being a working wife, stepmom, and just generally having too much to do each day, but now I potentially\u00a0have another reason, and one that’s actually something I can do something about. I’m also an admitted procrastinator (no comments on how that is ALSO something I can do something about, please), so it makes sense that I’d want to procrastinate doing something that I really dislike – getting up in the morning (in case you hadn’t figured it out already, I am NOT a morning person).<\/p>\n