The Snooze Button

Screw your opinion, what does the science say?

The Snooze Button is back after an eighteen-month hiatus with an all-star panel of experts to tackle this (t)horny question: Does sex improve your sleep?

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

Hey, Bedheads! We're back!

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

Diane Macedo's first book, The Sleep Fix, officially came out today, and we were fortunate to grab some time. (You can win a copy of The Sleep Fix by clicking here.) Diane points out that she and Neil are kind of kindred sleep spirits. They both figured that their sleep challenges were linked to their careers in the media. In Diane's case, Ambien stopped working. Her health was declining. She tried everything. However, relief was coming. Diane the insomniac tackled the problem like Diane Macedo the journalist would - by talking to the world's leading sleep researchers, learning the science, and searching for the truth.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

In this episode

• How Diane Macedo's years in overnight and early-morning news contributed to her sleep problems
• Why she stopped assuming she was simply a lifelong "bad sleeper"
• The myth that every adult must get exactly eight hours
• How circadian timing complicates sleep for shift workers
• Light, darkness, meals, exercise and properly timed melatonin
• Why anxiety about sleep can become a self-reinforcing insomnia loop
• How the bed can become a cue for wakefulness instead of sleep
• Why a "perfect" bedtime routine can sometimes become another source of pressure
• Constructive worry: the notebook exercise Macedo uses to unload unfinished thoughts
• What research does — and does not — show about bedtime writing
• Why The Sleep Fix was almost called Insomnia Hacks
• Dan Harris, meditation and the problem with product-driven sleep hacks
• Macedo's experience with Ambien, tolerance and prescription sleep medication
• Why "I can't sleep" can point to very different sleep disorders
• Restless legs syndrome, sleep apnea, narcolepsy and missed diagnostic clues
• Why sleep medicine education in primary care has historically been limited
• The story of Macedo's two-month-old sleeping through the night — and why it should not be treated as universal infant advice
• How The Sleep Fix grew into an ongoing sleep-education project

About Diane Macedo

Diane Macedo is a three-time Emmy Award-winning journalist, ABC News anchor and correspondent, bestselling author and sleep educator. She anchors ABC News Live First and serves as a breaking-news anchor and correspondent across ABC News platforms, including appearances on Good Morning America, World News Tonight with David Muir and Nightline. Her 2021 book, The Sleep Fix: Practical, Proven, and Surprising Solutions for Insomnia, Snoring, Shift Work, and More, grew from her own experience with insomnia and her reporting on sleep science. She now also runs The Sleep Fix Method.

MENTIONED

The Sleep Fix — Diane Macedo

The book at the center of this episode, published December 14, 2021.

The Sleep Fix — official book page

Diane Macedo — ABC News biography

Current biography and ABC News work.

Read Diane's ABC News bio

The Sleep Fix Method

Macedo's current sleep-education project, expanding the work that began with the book.

Visit The Sleep Fix Method

AASM behavioral treatment guideline for chronic insomnia

The guideline supporting CBT-I and its core behavioral and psychological components.

Read the AASM summary

Recommended sleep duration for healthy adults

AASM/Sleep Research Society consensus: seven or more hours regularly for most adults, with individual variation.

Read the consensus statement

Constructive worry and pre-sleep cognitive arousal

A small controlled study testing a structured worry-and-solutions exercise in people reporting insomnia.

Read the study

Constructive worry added to behavioral insomnia treatment

A small randomized feasibility study examining whether constructive worry added benefit to behavioral treatment.

Read the study

Bedtime to-do lists and sleep onset

A polysomnography study comparing writing future tasks with writing about completed activities.

Read the study

AASM pharmacologic guideline for chronic insomnia

Evidence-based recommendations on prescription insomnia medications, including zolpidem.

Read the guideline

FDA warning on zolpidem and other prescription insomnia medicines

The boxed warning concerning rare but serious complex sleep behaviors.

Read the FDA safety announcement

Sleep education in medical school

The international survey behind the long-running concern that physicians receive limited formal sleep education.

Read the study

American Academy of Pediatrics infant feeding guidance

Current parent guidance emphasizing hunger cues and individualized feeding rather than a single clock-based schedule for every infant.

Read the guidance

10% Happier — Dan Harris

Harris appears in the conversation as a friend of Macedo's and the person she credits with helping move the book away from its original Insomnia Hacks title.

Visit 10% Happier

Dr. Lynelle Schneeberg

Sleep psychologist discussed in the episode in connection with melatonin and sleep education.

Yale School of Medicine profile

Dr. Chris Winter

Sleep neurologist and previous Snooze Button guest referenced during the conversation.

The Rested Child with Dr. Chris Winter

Sleep trackers and tracking technology are among the many obsessive interests of one Jesse Cook, PhD student and perhaps Twitter's most prolific sleep nerd. He's written a ton of papers about trackers and sleep tech. He geeks out with Neil this week on wearables, "nearables" and where the gear is heading.

The two also cover Restless Legs Syndrome, and how trackers can serve as beacons for RLS.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

In this episode

• Why total sleep time and sleep-stage percentages deserve different levels of confidence
• What a consumer sleep tracker can measure directly — and what it has to infer
• Why motionless wake is still difficult for wearable algorithms
• Wearables, nearables and the danger of assuming more sensors automatically mean better answers
• How longitudinal tracker data can point toward a problem without diagnosing it
• Orthosomnia and the downside of trying to perfect a sleep score
• Periodic limb movements, restless legs syndrome and why the distinction matters
• How RLS treatment guidance has changed since the original 2021 episode
• Why the current AASM guideline moved away from routine dopamine-agonist treatment
• A speculative discussion about trauma, hyperarousal and nighttime movement — and where the evidence stops
• Neil’s Beditorial on celebrity, medical misinformation and transferable expertise
• What Jesse Cook is doing now as Dr. Jesse Cook

About Jesse Cook

Jesse Cook, PhD is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He earned his doctorate in Clinical Psychology at UW–Madison and completed his pre-doctoral internship at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System. His research focuses on sleep and mental health, particularly unexplained hypersomnolence, along with wearable sleep technology and the role of sleep and circadian health in athletic performance and well-being.

MENTIONED

Jesse Cook, PhD — University of Wisconsin–Madison

Current UW profile and research interests.

Jesse Cook at UW–Madison

State of the science and recommendations for using wearable technology in sleep and circadian research

The 2024 Sleep Research Society state-of-the-science review co-authored by Jesse Cook, covering wearable capabilities, accuracy, limitations and research use.

Read the review in Sleep

Wearable Technology as a Tool for Sleep-Wake Estimation in Central Disorders of Hypersomnolence

Cook and David Plante’s 2019 review of actigraphy and consumer sleep trackers in central disorders of hypersomnolence.

Read the paper

Plante Lab — wearable sleep technology publications

A collection of Cook’s earlier validation work comparing Fitbit, Jawbone and actigraphy measurements with polysomnography.

Browse the publications

AASM guideline update for restless legs syndrome and periodic limb movement disorder

The newer treatment guidance explaining the move away from routine dopamine-agonist therapy, the risk of augmentation and the stronger recommendations for alpha-2-delta ligands and iron evaluation.

Read the AASM summary

The Sleep Fix by Diane Macedo

The book Neil previews in this episode before Macedo’s appearance on the following week’s show.

The Sleep Fix

In this episode

• How Erin Davis went from morning-radio wakeups to bedtime stories
• Why she calls retirement “rewirement”
• How Drift was conceived and launched in 2021
• The original Drift format: breathing, story and waves
• Why bedtime narration requires a different broadcasting voice
• Public-domain stories, original stories and choosing material that will not keep listeners awake
• F. Scott Fitzgerald, Oscar Wilde, Edith Nesbit and why Edgar Allan Poe is risky bedtime material
• What current research says about slow breathing before sleep
• Why turning the bed into an office runs against stimulus-control therapy for chronic insomnia
• Erin’s experience with L-tryptophan — and what the evidence actually says
• Why alcohol’s effect on REM and deep sleep is more nuanced than the original conversation suggests
• Neil’s complaint about the very blue Anderson Cooper 360 set
• Evening screens, circadian light and why “blue light costs two hours” is too simple
• Mourning Has Broken, Lauren, grief and nighttime awakenings
• Lucid dreaming and the limited evidence for treating nightmares
• Decades of broken-up sleep around Canadian morning radio
• Why Drift is still publishing weekly in 2026

About Erin Davis

Erin Davis is a Canadian broadcaster, author and podcaster best known for nearly three decades on the morning show at Toronto’s 98.1 CHFI. She was named a 2020 inductee into the Canadian Music & Broadcast Industry Hall of Fame. Her memoir, Mourning Has Broken: Love, Loss & Reclaiming Joy, was published by HarperCollins in 2019. After leaving daily morning radio, she moved to Vancouver Island and continued broadcasting through podcasting and voice work. In 2026 she remains the host of the weekly sleep-story podcast Drift with Erin Davis and co-hosts Gracefully & Frankly with Lisa Brandt.

MENTIONED

Drift with Erin Davis

Davis’s weekly sleep-story podcast, launched in 2021 and still active in 2026.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Erin Davis — official site

Current biography, journal and links to Davis’s projects.

Visit ErinDavis.com

Mourning Has Broken: Love, Loss & Reclaiming Joy

Davis’s 2019 memoir about Lauren, grief and rebuilding a life after loss.

Google Books — Mourning Has Broken

AASM behavioral and psychological treatment guideline for chronic insomnia

Current evidence for CBT-I, stimulus control, sleep restriction and relaxation therapy.

Read the guideline

Slow breathing before bedtime — 2026 systematic review

Nine studies involving 457 participants; subjective sleep measures improved more consistently than objective measures.

Read the review

L-tryptophan and insomnia — AASM pharmacologic guideline

The guideline suggests clinicians not use tryptophan as a treatment for chronic sleep-onset or sleep-maintenance insomnia based on the evidence it reviewed.

Read the guideline

L-tryptophan and sleep quality — 2022 meta-analysis

Later evidence suggesting a possible reduction in wake after sleep onset, particularly at doses of at least 1 gram, without improvements across all measured sleep outcomes.

Read the meta-analysis

Alcohol and sleep — 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis

Twenty-seven studies examining dose, timing and changes in sleep architecture after alcohol.

Read the review

Electronic screen use and adult sleep — 2025

A study of more than 122,000 adults examining pre-bed screen use, sleep duration, timing and self-reported quality.

Read the study

Lucid dreaming therapy for nightmares — 2023 systematic review

Encouraging but limited evidence in adults; no included pediatric treatment studies.

Read the review

World Sleep Society endorsement on nightmare disorder — 2025

Supports lucid dreaming therapy as an option that may be used while noting the limited evidence base and stronger support for imagery rehearsal therapy.

Read the endorsement

Earlier Snooze Button conversations

Erin Davis & Mike Cooper — Waking Up With The Country’s #1 Morning Radio Show

Sharon Handy — Boring Books for Bedtime

Dr. Célyne Bastien — Sleep and the Science of Dreams

We kick off our third season of The Snooze Button with the return of Dr. Chris Winter, sleep specialist and author of The Rested Child.

Chris and Neil get into everything from setting a specific bedtime for kids, to school start times, to smart cribs. They even get into the "cry it out" episode of Mad About You, Simone Biles, and 102 mph fastballs.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy

In this episode

• Why Season Three begins with children’s sleep
• How sleep problems can overlap with ADHD, depression, anxiety and learning difficulties
• Why screening for sleep problems should complement — not replace — appropriate diagnosis
• Sleep “crutches” versus optional sleep enhancements
• White noise as a household-noise buffer and the modern volume-safety caveat
• What structured behavioral sleep-training studies actually show about attachment
• The Mad About You “cry it out” episode with Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt
• Dr. Winter’s skepticism about the SNOO as a device that “teaches” sleep
• The SNOO’s later FDA De Novo authorization and the 2026 FDA warning letter
• Why Winter emphasizes wake time instead of putting enormous pressure on bedtime
• Age-based pediatric sleep-duration recommendations
• What COVID school closures taught researchers about later mornings and adolescent sleep
• Why the evidence for later school starts is stronger for sleep and mood than for test scores
• Winter’s prediction of a pandemic childhood growth surge — and what later evidence does and does not show
• Simone Biles, the Tokyo Olympics and why “I could barely nap” mattered as a warning sign
• Why learning healthy sleep early may be easier than repairing fear of sleep decades later

About Dr. Chris Winter

W. Chris Winter, MD, is a sleep medicine specialist and neurologist who has studied sleep since the early 1990s. He owns Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medicine and has worked extensively on sleep and athletic performance with professional and collegiate sports organizations. He is the author of The Sleep Solution: Why Your Sleep Is Broken and How to Fix It and The Rested Child: Why Your Tired, Wired, or Irritable Child May Have a Sleep Disorder — and How to Help.

MENTIONED

The Rested Child by W. Chris Winter, MD

Publisher page for Winter’s 2021 book on pediatric sleep disorders and daytime symptoms.

Penguin Random House — The Rested Child

Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medicine

Dr. Winter’s current clinical practice.

Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medicine

Recommended sleep duration for children and teenagers

American Academy of Sleep Medicine pediatric sleep-duration consensus.

Read the consensus statement

Pediatric obstructive sleep apnea and ADHD — 2026 meta-analysis

Updated evidence on the overlap between OSA and ADHD symptoms in children.

Read the meta-analysis

Pediatric OSA and depression — 2025 meta-analysis

Evidence supporting screening across sleep and mood symptoms rather than assuming they are unrelated.

Read the meta-analysis

Behavioral interventions for infant sleep problems

A randomized trial of graduated extinction and bedtime fading with 12-month attachment and behavioral follow-up.

Read the trial

Five-year follow-up of behavioral infant sleep intervention

Long-term follow-up examining child, parent-child and parental outcomes.

Read the study

SNOO Smart Sleeper — FDA De Novo authorization

The 2023 FDA decision establishing the device category and authorized indication for facilitating supine sleep.

Read the FDA decision summary

FDA warning letter to Happiest Baby — June 2026

FDA concerns involving unreviewed SNOO modifications, hospital use and product-quality issues.

Read the warning letter

Infant sleep machines and noise exposure

American Academy of Pediatrics guidance on safer use of white-noise sleep machines.

Read the AAP policy statement

Remote learning, adolescent sleep and mood

Actigraphy study comparing in-person and remote learning during COVID-19.

Read the study

School start times, sleep and youth outcomes — 2022 meta-analysis

Twenty-eight studies and more than 1.7 million participants.

Read the meta-analysis

School start times and academic achievement

Systematic review examining grades and test scores separately from sleep and mood outcomes.

Read the review

Sleep and growth hormone in children

A 2024 review of the complex and still limited evidence connecting pediatric sleep and growth-hormone physiology.

Read the review

COVID lockdown and preschool height growth

A later study relevant to Winter’s on-air prediction of a pandemic growth surge.

Read the study

Simone Biles after withdrawing from the Tokyo team final

The press-conference context for the “could barely nap” comment discussed in the episode.

ESPN — Biles explains the withdrawal

Earlier Snooze Button conversations

Dr. Chris Winter — High Performance Athletes, High Performance Kids

Paul Reiser & Helen Hunt — the Mad About You sleep-training episode

We're back on October 11 with a new season, new experts, new celebrity guests and a brand new website!

See you then!

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy