"I twist and turn for at least two or three hours before I actually fall asleep," said 16-year-old Elizabeth Hammonds.
When Hammonds finally falls asleep, the unexpected happens. Some people may experience night terrors, sleepwalking and even sleep eating, but for Hammonds, who carries her cell phone everywhere, it's sleep texting.
She doesn't realize she's sending text messages while she's sleeping until the next morning, thanks to her friends.
"You sent me a text message at three in the morning and I didn't know what you meant by it," she said.
Her mother, Betty, is equally stunned.
"She was telling me how she had texted somebody that said 'Close her door'," Betty Hammonds said.
It seems unbelievable, but the proof is captured on the phone.
"Then he showed me on his phone, I'm like, 'Are you really joking? I sent that to you, like at three in the morning?'," Hammonds said. "He's like, 'Yeah, you did'."
She's sleep texted words and sometimes random letters to friends. Sleep expert Dr. Marcus Schmidt says he's starting to see more cases of sleep texting.
"Four out of five kids that have cell phones sleep with the cell phone in the bedroom, next to their bed and only one in ten actually turn it off," Dr. Schmidt said.
He says sleep deprivation can trigger common motor behaviors during sleep, including reaching for the phone when it goes off.
To get a good night's sleep, doctors recommend leaving your cell phone somewhere else, so your fingers don't do the walking.
"As far away as possible and even out of the bedroom," Dr. Schmidt said.
He also suggests making your children go to bed a little earlier to decrease the desire to use the phone.
"They kind of get stuck in a no man's land, where they're not really fully awake, but yet feel the need or urge to be able to respond to that text message," Dr. Schmidt said.
But for a generation that's grown up with cell phones, is it likely children will keep them out of reach?
"Probably not," Elizabeth Hammonds said.
Dr. Schmidt says the phenomenon is so new, that there's not much research yet, but he knows it can be carried to extremes. One conservative young patient was alarmed to find herself sleep "sexting" - sending compromising photos of herself in her sleep. sleep eating, sleepwalking, night terrors, sleep texting might become more common once landline phones are extinct, Doctors noting increase sleep texting,
As more people give up landlines and use only cell phones, he thinks sleep texting will become more common.
Source:wthr
