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Oh, Dr. Sandman The sleep exptert tells us his dreams

Photo: Lenny Gonzalez
Tohei Yokogawa among fish tanks. He stayed up nights to learn whether zebrafish sleep.

William Dement, the father of sleep medicine, struggles to get a good night’s sleep. Just like the rest of us.

One of the world’s foremost experts on sleep disorders, legendary for his research on dreams and one of the most popular lecturers on the Stanford campus, even Dement has had his fair share of insomnia.

In his 45 years as a Stanford professor, it was the pressure of grant proposals and on-site evaluations that were the most frequent culprits. These days, entering his 81st year, it’s mostly due to his age.

“Unfortunately,” he says, “sleep deteriorates with age just like everything else, and I have achieved considerable seniority.”

The nightly routine for the white-haired grandfather is to head upstairs to his bedroom between 9 and 10 p.m. and climb into bed. He has no idea what type of mattress he sleeps on, but he did get rid of a water bed.

“I have come up with a pretty successful method to help me fall asleep,” says Dement, MD, PhD, the Lowell W. and Josephine Q. Berry Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. “My method is to have something going on in the environment that’s distracting, but not exciting, like a very dull television or radio program.

“Most TV sets and radios have automatic turnoffs. It’s so easy. I recommend it to everyone,” Dement says in the booming voice that has lectured 15,000 Stanford students on the perils of sleep deprivation since the 1970s. “The bed becomes the battleground. You need to distract yourself.”

Who’s going to argue sleep tips with “Mr. Sandman” — a man who has spent literally decades up all night, sipping coffee, watching other people sleep, trying to figure out why we dream? Decades past the typical retirement age, he still refuses to end his lifetime quest to unravel the mystery of sleep. And dreams.

“I still don’t know what the heck they’re for,” he says.

The story of how Dement’s obsession with sleep took hold and wouldn’t let go began in the 1950s, when he was a medical student working in the University of Chicago laboratory where REM (rapid eye movement) sleep was first discovered.

Researchers found that the sleeping brain exists in two entirely different states that cycle regularly through the night. During one of these states, REM sleep, the brain is busy dreaming.

The discovery launched Dement on his future career and toward the exploration of a whole, new scientific field of research. In his later years, he turned his focus from research to educating the public about sleep, such sleep disorders as sleep apnea and narcolepsy, and the dangers of sleep debt.

But questions about sleep and the two hours we spend dreaming every night obsess him still.

Dement has no immediate plans to retire. Still, he’s thoughtful about his aging, and in particular has noticed how it has affected a change in his dreams.

“I’ve started to have dreams about facing mortality. Dreams of being lost, or going back to a place, and it’s not there anymore.”

He shrugs and looks thoughtful.

“The fundamental purpose of dreams and sleep,” he says, “is still a complete mystery.” —Tracie White

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