Ever since I slipped into a pattern of getting only 6 hours of sleep a night tops, I wondered how it would manifest itself physically. And I believe I am beginning to see. The dark circles are starting to appear under my eyes, and I have to say -- I'm pretty freaked out about it.

I've typically been an 8-hours-a-day type of person. But in September — when I started getting up at 5:15 a.m. some weekdays to go to the gym and the rest of the weekdays at 6 a.m. because my now middle-schooler son's bus comes at 6:45 a.m. — 6 hours a night became the norm.

I kept saying I was going to start going to bed earlier, but it ends up being impossible. On the sort of rare day when we don't have something going on in the evening, I am usually not home from work till nearly 7 p.m. (newsrooms can hold you hostage in the evening very easily). By the time dinner, dishes, homework, showers, laundry, etc. are wrapped up, I'm not heading upstairs to the bedroom till 10 p.m. or later.

Then sometimes there is paperwork, bills or reading to do. It's pretty rare to be able to settle down before 11. And when that alarm goes off just after 5 a.m., I really regret that.

What to do? I often say there are not enough hours in the day, but I think I need to probably go the route of trying to do less in the day.

I've heard so many things about how getting enough sleep is so important to good health. I'm sure the dark circles are not the only issue my lack of sleep is creating.

So, I'm on a mission to remedy this. It's just deciding which things can be trimmed out of the day when everything seems to be a priority.