Oh snap, it's a new app.

It's hard to be me. There is so much to worry about. And as I learn more about health - food, sleep, exercise, hormones - the list keeps growing and growing. Today we'll focus on sleep. More and more people seem to be writing about the importance of sleep and how completely messed up one will be with improper sleep. Of course, it's not just enough to be in bed for 8 hours. Or even asleep for 8 hours. It seems the quality of sleep is vital. And the quality can be influenced by oh so many things - the light you're exposed to before bed (blue light from electronic devices is EVIL), how dark your bedroom is, when you last ate etc etc etc. The list of details to get right (or wrong) are endless.

So, imagine my excitement yesterday when I bought an app that will tell me the quality of my sleep!  Here's how it works, you place your phone on your mattress and it monitors your movement. Supposedly this allows the app to know what level of sleep you're in. For those of you (ie me) worried about wireless signals whirring about your room ruining your sleep quality, the phone can be on airplane mode while it does it's thing (phew).  The actual point of the app is pretty cool. It's an alarm clock.  You set a window of time in which you need to wake up, and it wakes you up in the best part of your sleep. So, you know sometimes when you wake up in the middle of a dream and you're REALLY tired all day?  This is supposed to avoid that.

I was so excited about this app, it actually affected my sleep. I kept dreaming about checking the app. First, I dreamt that I was some type of doctor or something. There was a sick boy and I was working with him and his mother. Somehow sleep was part of or could improve this sickness. Anyhow, we went to the doctor (the boy, his mother and I), which was at the Southcenter Nordstrom. The doctor couldn't see him, so I was going to show him and his mother his sleep data. But then I couldn't get the data from the app. In the second dream, I was about to compete in some sort of sporting event with the women I used to race bikes with. We were all given water bottles that had our sleep information on them and this was supposed to predict our performance! After all this dreaming, I woke up all excited to see how I slept. Only to discover it was only 4.23, much to early to check.

So, the results?

Sadly, I'm not sure they were very accurate. As you can see in the graph above, the app showed me waking up once. Well, I know for a fact I got out of bed and went to the bathroom TWICE last night. Not to mention waking up at 4.23 and again at 5.20. Somehow, the app seems to miss a few of those events. I'll keep testing in the hope that this will make me happier and healthier! Oh, and I actually got two apps. So I can try the other one too!!!!

(BTW, you may notice with alarm I woke up at 5.52 on a Saturday!  Yes. That's what happens around here! That's why I get grouchy if I stay awake past 10!)