Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine
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How Exercise Can Help You Manage Bipolar Disorder

By Elizabeth Millard, Jun 3, 2026

In addition, exercise calms the stress response and strengthens emotional regulation, says psychiatrist Alex Dimitriu, MD, the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in California and a medical reviewer for Everyday Health. Exercise serves as a way for the body (including the brain) to practice handling stress, leading to a more efficient stress response over time. “This can improve sleep quality and act as a natural mood stabilizer for those with bipolar disorder,” says Dr. Dimitriu. “It can also be an excellent tool for countering metabolic side effects such as weight gain, which is often associated with mood stabilizers and antipsychotics.”
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This Ancient Practice Could Save You From an Awful Sleep

By Lauren Vinapol, May 31, 2026

Dr. Alex Dimitriu, a psychiatrist and sleep medicine specialist, agrees that no matter what you call it, NSDR or yoga nidra, it is definitely not comparable to real sleep, let alone four hours of it. On the other hand, that does not mean that non-sleep deep rest is bad; it’s just being misrepresented online. “Yoga nidra is not a replacement for actual sleep, but it is a better alternative to lying there stressed,” Dimitriu explains. 

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This Common Sleep Habit Could Be Raising Your Blood Pressure Overnight, Doctors Say

By BethAnn Mayer, May 31, 2026

Dr. Alex Dimitriu, MD, a board-certified psychiatrist and sleep medicine doctor and the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine, points out that mouth breathing is not ideal. We’re designed to breathe humidified air through our noses. Mouth breathing is a flag and risk factor for high blood pressure. “The simple truth is that not breathing well causes adrenaline spikes—norepinephrine, to be exact—which raises blood pressure and heart rate,” Dr. Dimitriu says. “It’s the same thing that would happen if you were being choked. Your body reacts intensely.” Yikes. Bigger yikes: “In people with sleep apnea, this happens many times during the night,” Dr. Dimitriu says.

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5 Ways to Recharge When You’re Living With Bipolar Disorder

By Elizabeth Millard, May 28, 2026

Bipolar disorder is a mental health condition that can create difficulties in many aspects of your life. Many people who have the condition struggle with spikes and dips in energy, making them feel depleted, says Alex Dimitriu, MD, a psychiatrist and the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in California. “At its core, bipolar disorder is an energy problem because it’s an amplifier in all directions, positive and negative,” he says. “During mania, sleep is reduced and energy is increased, so ideas race and moods are elevated. During depressive episodes, people sleep too much and have low motivation.”
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Want to Slow Your Biological Aging? Sleeping 6.4 to 7.8 Hours a Night May Help

By Mandy French, May 16, 2026

“Short sleep is often more associated with stress of a busy lifestyle, and anxiety. It can lead to elevated blood pressure, cortisol, and blood glucose levels, which all have detrimental effects over time,” said Alex Dimitriu, MD, a double board certified psychiatry and sleep medicine specialist and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in California. Dimitriu wasn’t involved in the study.

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6 Tips for Sleeping Better When You’re Sharing a Bed

By Moira Lawler, May 2, 2026

You may love a soft, plush mattress, while your partner may prefer a firm one. It’s a difficult compromise, but you don’t have to toss and turn on an uncomfortable surface. Instead, consider buying two twin XL mattresses, one in each partner’s firmness preference, and placing them side by side on a king bed frame. This “split king” setup allows each partner to choose their preferred firmness. This isn’t always the most comfortable, though, says Alex Dimitriu, MD, who is double board certified in psychiatry and sleep medicine and the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in Menlo Park, California. “A mattress topper for the person who wants more softness is another alternative,” adds Dr. Dimitriu, who is also a medical reviewer for Everyday Health. Switching your mattress entirely could also do the trick. Choose a memory foam or hybrid option for greater motion isolation, which means you’ll be less likely to feel your partner’s movements during the night.

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Do You Dream in Fear or Joy? The Answer Could Affect Your Morning Mood

By Mandy French, May 2, 2026

“It has been proposed that REM sleep, in which dreaming occurs, is almost a virtual therapy or sandbox environment,” said Alex Dimitriu, MD, double board certified in Psychiatry and Sleep Medicine and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine. Dimitriu wasn’t involved in the study. “In the dream state, and absent any norepinephrine (adrenaline), the brain replays emotional experiences to plans for future ones. Dream sleep is like an emotional playground for the mind. Building on this, people who have more active dream lives may enjoy the benefit of better emotional regulation. Their sleeping brains have had more time in the sandbox. Fear, primal as it is, may be the emotion that requires the most processing in our dreams,” Dimitriu told Healthline.

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AI May Be Making Workers Less Confident In Their Own Decisions, Study Finds

By Jessica Rendall, Apr 22, 2026

Other themes that came up from participant responses in the study were a perceived trade-off between “speed and depth” and a reduced sense of ownership over ideas. “This is a huge deal,” says Alex Dimitriu, M.D., a psychiatrist and sleep medicine specialist and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine. He compares generative AI’s effect on thinking to the invention of other tools and what it did to our collective memory, such as speed dial and remembering phone numbers, and digital maps and remembering how to get around. “When we get better tools, it seems we forget how to do it by hand,” says Dr. Dimitriu. “We now have tools that can replace our thinking and that, then, can become a skill we lose.”

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Tracking Your Sleep Could Backfire If You Have Insomnia. Here’s Why

By Mandy French, Apr 21, 2026

“In sleep medicine, there is something called orthosomnia, which is when people get anxious about sleep metrics, and in turn sleep more poorly from having that data. This study is in line with that concept,” said Alex Dimitriu, MD, a double board certified psychiatry and sleep medicine expert and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine. Dimitriu wasn’t involved in the study.

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How to manage sleep apnea while traveling — experts share what to prep and pack

By Becky George, Apr 19, 2026

“Travel should be no different from home,” says Alex Dimitriu, MD, double-board certified in Psychiatry and Sleep Medicine and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry and Sleep Medicine. “My patients do best when they sleep in a similar position as at home, with the CPAP on the same side. “You can also use an extra pillow placed vertically at the headboard of your bed to hold the CPAP hose up and away from your face.”

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What ‘Emotional Flooding’ Really Means—And How to Handle It

By Angela Haupt, Apr 10, 2026

Dr. Alex Dimitriu, a psychiatrist in Menlo Park, Calif., says the body’s baseline state plays an essential role. He uses a skiing metaphor with his patients: Your psychology is your technique, and your biology is the slope. “When the terrain is gentle, almost anyone can stay upright,” he says. “But when the slope steepens—through poor sleep, chronic stress, hormonal shifts, or untreated anxiety—even the best technique falls apart.” Research supports his point: After even one night of poor sleep, the brain’s amygdala overreacts to negative stimuli by about 60%.

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Can Eating More Fiber Help You Sleep Better?

By Kelsey Kloss, Apr 10, 2026

The gut-brain connection is the network of nerves that allows your brain to communicate directly with your digestive system. Fiber helps promote this dialogue by producing short-chain fatty acids that help regulate sleep-inducing neurotransmitters, says Alex Dimitriu, MD, a double board-certified sleep medicine doctor and the founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine in California. This explains why a healthy gut microbiome helps maintain a stable circadian rhythm in the body, says Dr. Dimitriu.
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1 In 3 Americans Use AI For Health Advice. These Online Services Are A Better Option

By Jessica Rendall, Apr 9, 2026

“The internet, and even more so AI, is an echo chamber,” says Alex Dimitriu, M.D., a psychiatrist and sleep medicine specialist at Menlo Park Psychiatry and Sleep Medicine. Chatbots are also notorious people-pleasers, for example, which can be dangerous in a setting where health information is being exchanged. On the other hand, chatbots can provide a helpful sounding board for people who’ve been to the doctor with symptoms but have not received a satisfactory diagnosis for their health problems. In some cases, chatbots can bridge care gaps between doctor’s visits. “Go to the internet for awareness and information, but if something is really bothering you, be sure to run it by a professional to confirm the actual diagnosis and a treatment plan,” Dr. Dimitriu says.

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When We Trust Wearables More Than Our Own Bodies

By Sarah Campise Hallier, Apr 9, 2026

A growing phenomenon known as orthosomnia describes this pattern: people become so focused on improving their sleep metrics that the stress of doing so begins to interfere with sleep itself. Dr. Alex Dimitriu, a double board-certified physician in psychiatry and sleep medicine, told The Epoch Times that he often sees patients caught in this cycle. “Sleep really does best with space, calm, and regularity,” Dimitriu said. “The more you obsess, stress, and fixate on sleep, the worse it can get.”
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ADHD And Autism Misinformation Is Spreading On Social Media—How To Find Trusted Mental Health Information

By Jessica Rendall, Apr 8, 2026

Alex Dimitriu, M.D., a psychiatrist and sleep medicine specialist and founder of Menlo Park Psychiatry & Sleep Medicine, says that in recent years there’s been a sharp increase in ADHD diagnoses in adults who were never diagnosed as children. The same is true for autism, which exists on a spectrum and has a wide range of associated challenges and strengths. “Autism self-identification has grown even faster, particularly among adults who were never evaluated as children,” says Dr. Dimitriu. This increase in demand for relatable content may fuel the fire of misinformation.

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MENLO PARK PSYCHIATRY & SLEEP MEDICINE

CONDITIONS TREATED: Anxiety, Depression, Attention Deficit Disorder, Insomnia, Bipolar Disorder, and Treatment Resistant Depression

REGIONS COVERED: We serve clients of the Bay Area, including the communities of Menlo Park, Palo Alto, Cupertino, Los Gatos, Los Altos, Mountain View, Portola Valley, Atherton, Sunnyvale, and San Jose

Phone 650-326-5888
Address 1225 Crane Street, Suite 205
Menlo Park, CA 94025
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