Why Do We Sleep is a Ted Talk by circadian neuroscientist Russell Foster but this is taken from an article of his called "Tired Brains See the World Differently".
I've dabbled on about sleep before in these blogs but it bares repeating because there's a lot of you that see sleep as the enemy so here we go:
- Those who regularly have less then 7 hours of sleep per night are more likely to develop mood and mental health problems
- By depriving your brain of sleep, you impair essential processes in the brain and reduce overall cognition
- What happens to the brain when we sleep defines how effective we’ll be when we're awake
- You lay down memories, consolidate information gathered from the previous day and the brain also comes up with solutions to complex problems
- A tired brain remembers negative experiences and negative facts and forgets the positive experiences
- Tired brains see the world a very different way
- Beta-amyloid, a pre-cursor to dementia and Alzheimers is partially cleared while we sleep and then there's the rebuilding of metabolic pathways/energy reserves throughout the body
- Growth and repair happens at night
- Short term sleep loss effects include being more impulsive, lacking empathy, not being able to lay down memory, lack problem solving, will see a decrease in cognitive function and also a loss of humor
- Long term effects include long term stress, increased cortisol, suppressed immune system leading to infection, cancer, coronary heart disease, metabolic abdormalities, type 2 diabetes and getting hooked on stimulants to stay energised
- You’ll release more gherlin which is a hunger hormone, leading to the ingestion of more carbs/sugars which can lead to weight gain
- You can be more vulnerable to mental health problems ranging from depression to biplor and schizophrenia
- The best indicator of a slide into depression is a change in the pattern of your sleep beforehand
- A newborn needs to 14 – 17 hours of sleep per day, an infant 12 – 16, a toddler 13 – 14, pre-schoolers 10 – 15, school age 9 – 12, teenagers 8 – 10, adults 7+, middle age 7 – 9 and the elderly 7 – 8
- If you have a bad experience then don’t go to bed for 6 – 8 hours so that it doesn’t instill itself in your memories too much
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