One of the hottest new books is Stephenie Meyer’s series called The Twilight Saga. My sister-in-law gave my wife a copy of the first book in the series and for three straight days, she couldn’t put it down. She was going to bed about 1-2 hours later than her usual time, and when my wife is sleep-deprived, even a little bit, we all pay the price. Furthermore, she’s now 8 months pregnant!

Going to bed at a regular time, along with practicing good sleep hygiene (such as not watching TV or eating in bed) should be practiced by everyone. Of course things happen and you can’t always go to bed at a regular time, but choosing a particular book to read is one thing you have control over. Especially now that I’ve warned you.

Consecutive nights of even mild sleep deprivation have been shown to diminish memory, mental acuity, and reaction times, not to mention mood changes and irritability. Imagine if you went through all three of Ms. Meyer’s books. Depending on how quickly you can read, most women (since mostly women are reading these books) will probably lose anywhere from 1-2 hours of sleep on average for about 1-2 weeks. In our already sleep-deprived, stressed-out society, additional sleep deprivation is the last thing we need.

I rarely put my foot down on any issue with my wife, but on this issue, I insisted that she stop reading further books in the series.

Are you currently reading one of Stephenie Meyer’s books, and if so, how much sleep are you losing?