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Michael Breus, PhD Sleep Specialist:

What should my bedtime be for a good night's sleep?

Michael Breus, PhD Sleep Specialist:

I have a formula that people can use. The formula is basically this: take a 90 minute segment, and count back five 90 minute segments from when your scheduled wake up time is and that should probably be about when you should go to bed. Pick your wake up time. So, let's say it's 7:00 am. Then we know the average sleep cycle is somewhere between 80 and 90 minutes, so you want to count, and we know you need about 5 of those. So count backwards for 5 ninety minutes segments from 7:00 am and you'd get, I believe it's 11:30, okay. There is a myth going on out there that we all need eight hours of sleep, and I'm here to tell you that's absolutely not true, okay? There is no perfect sleep number out there for everyone. Everyone's number is a bit individualized, and so what we've learned from the data basically is when you wake up and feel refreshed, look back and see how many of hours of sleep you got and that's probably your sleep number. That's how you can really tell if you're refreshed, sleep deprived, things of that nature, because if you're not getting that individualized sleep number, as it were, that's when you're going to feel it.