Adjusting to life outside of the military can be a difficult transition for many veterans, whether coming home from a deployment, ending a service contract, or retiring after a career.

If you're not sleeping as well as you used to, if you feel irritable, anxious, sad, or don?t get as much enjoyment out of the things that you used to, please call our research team and we may be able to help you find out more about your sleep and effective strategies to help you sleep better.

Sleep is often disrupted during and after military service. Many different aspects of life in the military that can disrupt sleep, such as:

• Deployments
• Field operations and exercises
• Shift Work
• Irregular sleep-wake schedule during the high-demand operations
• Being stationed in a different time zone
• Other events encountered during military service

Recent surveys show that as many as 70% of returning veterans experience sleep disturbances. Surveys done with Gulf War or Vietnam veterans show that sleep disturbances don't go away on their own over time.

Rather, sleep disturbances often develop into a long lasting problem that is characterized by a unique set of nighttime and daytime impairments. Such impairments include:

• Difficulty falling of staying asleep
• Upsetting dreams
• Restless sleep
• Feeling tired throughout the day
• Being easily irritated and grumpy
• Lack of concentration or memory
• Decrease in level of performance at work or in school
• Decreased level of energy
• Lack of motivation
• Frustration about your sleep or about falling asleep

Call us if you sleep well and are interested in helping other veterans. You can help other veterans by helping us understand how to protect sleep in military service members.

Call the Veterans Sleep Studies at the University of Pittsburgh at 412-246-6965. You can also find some more information about our research studies from our website @ www.veteranssleep.pitt.edu.