Light Therapy, How Do You Do It?

I have seen numours posts about light therapy, but I am still in the dark when it comes to how you are actually supposed to do the treatment and what benefits you receive, while using it with cpap treatment.

Would anyone like to tackle this? How about the nuts and bolts in simple terms.

Regards,

Ted/Titrator

Ted,

The hypothalamus in our brain actually registers light that enters the eyes. We've evolved to synchronize with day and night, by literally keeping track of light via that hypothalamus. Got light? Time to wake up and not feel sleepy. It's day time. Got no light? Time for the pineal gland to secrete melatonin to initiate sleep. It's night time. That biological sleep-wake syncronization with day and night is referred to as our circadian rhythm.

For many people, that circadian rhythm gets easily skewed out of sync with respect to waking at the right time of the day and sleeping at the right time of the night. During the short days of winter, especially, some people's circadian rhythms can skew more easily for lack of adequate light being introduced to the hypothalamus via the eyes. Enter light therapy. Either full spectrum or blue spectrum light is placed within close proximity to the eyes (at the appropriate time of the day) to coax the circadian rhythm back into sync with a proper wake up time and sleep time schedule. Essentially, a person with a circadian rhythm out of sync experiences "jet lag" which is a circadian rythm sync problem because of time zone travel. Some people get just as easily circadian-rhythm-skewed in the summer as they do the winter---in which case they can feel groggy and/or mentally depressed throughout the day until they get their circadian rhythm restored.

SWS, Fantstic explaination. Wow! Ok now, can someone explain the routine of using light? What is your routine?

T

Hi Ted,
I got my routine by the assessment questionaire on the Aplollo Website. They are the ones who make the popular light therapy device here is US:
https://www.apollohealth.com/apps/circ_ ... urvey.html
My routine is:
Day Start Time Duration
1 10:00 am 30 min.
2 9:00 am 30 min.
3+ 8:00 am 15-30 min.
I have Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome where I tend to sleep late and wake up late.
The have several articles on their website on light therapy for different problems. I found this to be very helpful for my condition:
http://www.apollolight.com/pdf_files/Bi ... evised.pdf

I have to add, there are those of us with our day/night clocks reversed and I use the light at bedtime so I can sleep. I found over the years I could not sleep all night but could fall asleep in the daylight almost at will. Works great for me.