SLEEP DEPRAVATION

Do you wake up feeling tired? Do you find yourself dozing off during the day? Then you need to learn how to pay back your sleep debt!

Good Feng shui in the bedroom is one way to ensure a good nights sleep. However it may not be enough. Our stressful lifestyles and attitudes toward sleep may be depriving us of sound sleep.

“Society is being victimised by sleep depravation!”

Depriving yourself of sleep night after night can cause you to accumulate a sleep deficit. Look for everyday lifestyle clues to determine whether you need to catch up. For example, is there a chance you might doze off while sitting in a car stopped in traffic, watching television or sitting and reading?

Most people know that sleep depravation can make them irritable and groggy, but they are unaware of the risks to their health. New research shows that getting enough good quality sleep may be the third component of a healthy lifestyle, after a balanced diet and regular exercise.

Experts used to believe that there was no long-term consequences from sleep depravation!

Kay Johnson, a 36-year-old mother of two sleeps only 5 or 6 hours a night. She is a freelance photographer who works long hours. “Some mornings I get up at 5,” she says. “If I have a project with a deadline, I work all night.

Kay is one of many adults who accumulate sleep debt – the same way a gambler stacks up IOU’s. Studies have found that adults averaged an hour and six minutes less than the recommended 8 hours uninterrupted sleep – and each weekend night 30 minutes. That adds up to over 330 hours lost in one year.

“Society is being victimised by sleep depravation!” says David Dinges, head of The Division of Sleep and Chronobiology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. “Our productivity, our safety and our health is at risk.”

Sleep researchers are now beginning to understand what we loose by giving up our sleep.

Experts used to believe that there was no long-term consequences from sleep depravation. However a recent research report suggests that sleep depravation can increases your risk of developing obesity, diabetes and heart disease.

Thomas Wehr of the US National Institute of Mental Health did a 4-week sleep experiment in which volunteers spent 14 hours in bed.

During the first few days they slept about 11 hours each night. They slept less through the second and third weeks, as they finished paying back an average of 17 hours of sleep debt they had accumulated before the experiment. By the fourth week they were asleep for an average of 8hours 15 minutes.

Sleep researchers are now beginning to understand what we loose by giving up our sleep. Earlier studies showed that people who stayed awake for days could recover quickly, leading experts to believe that there was no long-term consequences from sleep depravation. But recent research has begun to home in on today’s reality by asking - what happens to people who loose a little sleep almost every day?

Eve Van Cauter, a sleep researcher at the university of Chicago, published a ground-breaking study in the Lancet medical journal in which for six nights, a group of young men spent only four hours in bed. During that week, their blood samples showed impaired glucose tolerance – they were in a pre-diabetic state.

Van Cauter believes in the rising levels of obesity. One link is a growth hormone, which controls the body’s fat to muscle ratio.

Another hormone called Leptin tell the body when it should feel full after eating – low levels of Leptin can also cause cravings for carbohydrates (bread and cakes etc.)

We should avoid bright lights after sundown!

Lack of sleep also lowers our white blood cell count resulting in lowered immunity to infections. Richard Stevens, a cancer researcher at the university of Connecticut, says there may be a connection between the increase in breast cancer and disrupted hormone cycles by late night home and street lights. Although there are many causes of cancer - this would explain why blind women are less prone than sighted women. Steven says – “We should avoid bright lights after the sun goes down.”

19% of British men admitted to falling asleep at the wheel!

It seems that people who are chronically sleep-deprived fair as badly or worse in reaction tests, as people who have moderate levels of alcohol in their blood. The UK Department of the Environment and Transport reckons that driver fatigue is responsible for I in 5 motorway accidents. It was reported in the media that 19% of British men admitted to falling asleep at the wheel.

A bedroom should be conducive to sound sleep!

If you wake up feeling tired or find yourself dozing off during the day – then you need to learn how to pay back your sleep debt. Sleep researchers may eventually develop an easy solution, but for now there is nothing like the real thing – sleep refreshes the parts that are hard to reach by any other method.

Being woken by an alarm clock is very stressful. Most of us use alarm clocks to wake ourselves up at a time we choose and the time we choose usually contravenes our body’s preferred waking time. So – we may wake up in the middle of a deep sleep feeling groggy. That may be normal, but it’s not natural.

Depriving yourself of sleep night after night can cause you to accumulate a sleep deficit. Look for everyday lifestyle clues to determine whether you need to catch up. For example, is there a chance you might doze off while sitting in a car stopped in traffic, watching television or sitting and reading?

Scientists have discovered that sleep deprivation increases the risk of high blood pressure and diabetes - heart disease and cancer. It also slows the workings of the brain, which adversely affects our ability to think clearly and make sound, rational decisions.

The only way to reduce this debt is to temporarily alter your sleep schedule. If you feel you are chronically sleep deprived, I have also written an article about how to pay back your sleep debt.

Regards – Vincent Gill – stress consultant

You can request a free copy of my guidelines for successful sleep : info@easihealth.com