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If you need an alarm clock to wake you in the morning, you're sleep-deprived.

Most of our schedules are about to be bombarded with holiday parties, shopping, cleaning house for guests and getting wrapped up in the season.

This time of year, we need to remember that sleep will help keep us healthy and happy.

In fact, if we don't sleep enough, we're more prone to mood swings, depression and irritability, said Dr. Stuart Quan, a sleep specialist at the University of Arizona and a professor of medicine, anesthesiology and public health. Nobody knows for sure why we need sleep, he said, but one major theory is that sleep has a restorative function at the cellular level. Animals that have faster metabolisms need more sleep. For example, mice sleep a lot more than elephants, which sleep only about five hours, he said.

On average, humans need seven-and-a-half hours of sleep, he said, but some need more and others need less.

People who sleep fewer than seven hours a night are more likely to be overweight, Quan said, and lack of sleep has been linked to changes in appetite hormones, so people who don't get enough sleep tend to crave sweets and junk food.

You know you're getting enough sleep if you can wake up in the morning without an alarm clock and you feel refreshed. You shouldn't get sleepy in the middle of the day either.

Of course, getting enough sleep sounds easier than it actually is.

In order to be able to get the proper amount of sleep, we need to slow down, said Rubin Naiman, a clinical psychologist and sleep specialist at the UA's Program in Integrative Medicine.

"Sleep isn't a destination. I can go to bed. I can even go to Milwaukee, but I can't go to sleep," he said.

"We don't go to sleep, we let go of waking."

That means we need to acknowledge our circadian rhythms driven by light and darkness and dim the lights before we go to bed. We should also sleep in total darkness.

More importantly, he said, we should address the issues, thoughts and emotions that arise at bedtime well before we want to sleep. Dusk is nature's in-between day and nighttime, Naiman said, and we should use that as an in-between waking and sleeping time by winding down, writing in journals, meditating or practicing yoga.

We should move our bedtimes to an earlier time by 10- 15-minute intervals every few days, Quan said. It's easy to stay up late, but it's very hard to just abruptly go to bed several hours earlier than usual.