Sleep..who needs it?...

a reply to: blend57

I'm a total insomniac but I find a lot of my friends in my age group 40-50 are also faced with the same problem. We are all tired and want to sleep but it is difficult to do hormones, stress etc.

My sleep cycle has always been terrible, I sleep at 4am every work day, and wake up at around 9am so 5 hours sleep a day.

I make up for it on weekends were I sleep 12 hours minimum.

But I do feel it has affected my cognitive abilities, clarity of thought and memory.

SilverOwls

A sleep study in America found life changing differences between two communities on either side of the time line.

That is really interesting! A couple quotes from your linked article that I never would've guessed happened:

* One big takeaway: if you sleep more, you will likely earn more money.
*And we find that permanently increasing sleep by an hour per week for everybody in a city, increases the wages in that location by about 4.5%.

There are some difference in opinion as to whether the study was a valid comparison (the two cities in question are said to be incomparable) But it does make one stop and think a bit. Thanks for the info!

CJCrawley

I'm not sure about the relationship between depression and SD. That is what was stated in most of the articles/papers I read, so I assumed it was accurate. In my head, it seemed to make sense, as you got less sleep and became more emotional, possibly that would make depression more severe. It is not my intention to mislead at all and I'm appreciative of you giving me another subject to look into. Thanks!

YouSir

Ummm...I was thinking the other day that the sleep cycle was a means to keep the wake mind tethered to what we perceive as "reality"...Or the reality we're led to perceive...

I don't really know if that is the case. It is certainly a thought that I'm sure many of us have let pass through our minds from time to time. Maybe to the degree that we need sleep in order to stay grounded here on Earth (mentally and physically adept and alert) Without it it is believed we would die (most likely due to our inability to focus and perform tasks accurately. You would not die from not sleeping, but the effects it has on you). Although no studies have taken place on humans, they did one on rats and found that after 11 days of SD, they died:

Like breathing, sleep is a fundamental human requirement. It has even been said that one could survive for three times as long without food as one could without sleep. Indeed, one of the better known experiments on this subject, found that depriving rats entirely of sleep resulted in their death, or near-dying state, within 11-32 days (Everson et al. 1989) ...

Thanks for the thoughts!

kurthall

Just the 4 hours you missed, you should feel today.

I am very much feeling them. I've never had interest in partying really, just never cared for it. But I have had some experiences and understand what you are saying about being 20 and staying up later not effecting you. I normally run a full 8 hours, getting up at 5 a.m. to start my day. So, being awake at 1 is/was no fun..lol. Thanks for the comments!

AboveBoard
They say you lose close to 44 days of sleep during the first year of being a parent (2.9 hours per night). I bet you have that beat and then some! But that's a sign of a good parent...putting your child's needs before your own, which I know you do put him first by reading through some of your posts on this forum. I'm glad it is getting better and I'm sure it will continue to..hats off to you, Lady. Keep ya chin up and thanks for the comment!

knowledgehunter0986

Unfortunately, i do.. my days are very physically demanding and my body needs the proper rest to heal, or else I will wither down and shrink into a raison.

I do too! I know for some people missing a few hours doesn't bother them. It really shows up in my mood and daily activities if I miss some sleep though...I can see the difference in everything I do on a day I miss more then an hour or so of sleep. I used to think I would opt out of sleeping if I could, after reading up on it though, I'm not so sure...lol.

It is an interesting subject that, as many people have said, we don't know much about even though it seems we've studied it to some degree in one way or another.

Thanks everyone for the responses!
Blend57

For me, the earlier I go to bed, 9pm - 10pm, the fewer hours of sleep I need. That's also related to how fresh the air is. I've stayed in hotel bedrooms with blackout curtains and air conditioning, and only needed six hours sleep. Same with my Norwegian apartment that was having a mini-heat wave due to all the cruise liners putting sulphur into the atmosphere. For about two months, when there no night-time, I'd only need six hours of sleep, and my apartment was nice and toasty.
I was surfing ATS every six hours while between contracts.

If it gets colder or the air is stale, I need more hours of sleep.

When I was in my 20s I could sleep for 3-4 hours and felt good. Now I work as a web designer. I build websites using mostly wordpress car wash tools shop themes, so I have to work all night from time to time. After several such nights I feel really exhausted, but I can sleep 8 hours after that and feel tired. Of course, I understand that I should have a regime, but this is a specifics of my job.