Hello, darkness, my old friend.

How does your body let you know you're under too much stress? Some people feel compelled to their refrigerators for some comfort food. Others start suffering from headaches or backaches. Some people I know well suffer from a variety of uncomfortable intestinal problems.

When my stress levels are heading up, the first sign my body gives me is a series of lousy nights of sleep. I've never been much of a "morning person." In fact, at most of my jobs the running joke is Don't talk to Larry before 10:00 a.m. So it's not unusual for me to have a bit of trouble falling asleep. That's not the stress-related sleep trouble I'm talking about.

When I'm under stress, not only will I be up a bit later than normal, but come 3:30 or 4:00 a.m., it's like my eyelids have rockets attached, and I'm just wide awake. And I hate that! But sure as anything, I'll spend the next couple of hours (before the clock radio turns on) thinking about all my problems (usually work-related), and trying to solve them.

I've come to realize that solutions you reach at 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning usually aren't very effective. But try telling that to my brain when I'm shocked awake while it's still dark.

After spending almost eight years as editor of this health magazine, I've learned a few things about being healthier. And I know that getting enough restful sleep is one of the best things you can do to improve your health. But recently a news item crossed my desk that drove home just how important a good night's sleep can be.

University of Pittsburgh researchers have been analyzing the sleep patterns of volunteers for about 16 years. And here's what they've found. When a person wakes up and stays awake for 30 minutes or more, they have a diminished quality of life and tend to be sick more often. But that's not all. It appears that poor sleepers tend to die prematurely. And they don't die just because they get older. The increased risk of death holds even after adjustments for age, gender, and preexisting health problems of the volunteers.

These researchers report that they want to do more investigation into this problem, because right now they're not sure just what changes poor sleeping causes in your body to increase your risk of dying. But this information clearly shows that your state of mind when your head hits the pillow has long-term effects on your health.

I'm going to follow the progress of this research, and as more information becomes available, we'll pass it on. But in the meantime I think I'll go to bed early tonight.