December 19, 2022
Neurologist Navab debuts with a sensible program for treating sleep problems. “When individuals sleep better... hopefulness extends to their waking lives,” he contends, discussing how to overcome sleep disturbances arising from insomnia, sleep apnea, and traumatic memories. Navab outlines the four stages of sleep, noting that brain activity slows down during the first stage and that REM sleep (stage four) is integral to memory consolidation. Fictional case studies illustrate how sleep disorders manifest, as when the author describes an imagined session with a successful Los Angeles chef suffering from nocturnal panic attacks, to whom Navab recommends the 4-7-8 method that pulls the body out of fight-or-flight mode by breathing in for four seconds, holding for seven, then breathing out for eight. The cases bring a novelistic flair, though the level of detail sometimes feels gratuitous given the clients are fictional, as when Navab describes a patient whose “dazzling blue eyes... were brighter and stronger before this pandemic that had stolen the person she once was.” The advice delivers though, whether keeping a sleep diary to identify habits that might be cutting into one’s rest or imagining oneself in a relaxing “halcyon scene” as a “distraction from your insomnia.” This solid manual will put readers to sleep, in a good way.