THE IMPORTANCE OF SLEEP
Sleep has become increasingly important and precious to our family. As we’ve researched and tried to learn as much as we can about how to create good sleep habits, we’ve been shocked by some of things we’ve uncovered. My husband (Calvin) wrote a post on sleep over at his blog and I wanted to feature it here. Enjoy!
I have been using the app Sleep Cycle for a little over a year now. This app is fascinating because it uses your phone's built-in microphone to track your movements while you sleep. By tracking your movements, the app is able to tell you when you're in deep sleep and when your in light sleep – which allows the app to wake you up at the prime time and keep you from feeling drowsy. What you have the next day is a bunch of statistics that show you how well you sleep, if you woke up at all, and it even records how many times you've snored (you can even listen to them).
After using the app for over a year now, I can tell you that the average number of hours of sleep I've slept per night is a whopping 4.7. Now, before you think I'm trying to brag about how little sleep I need in order to function, think again. This number is actually quite frightening. A few weeks ago, I came across a podcast by Sean McCabe where he gives commentary on another podcast he had recently listened to about sleep. This other podcast featured an in-depth interview with sleep expert Matthew Walker. After listening to both of these podcasts and hearing some of the devastating side affects of getting less than 7 hours of sleep, I was led into what can only be described as "a deep dive" on everything by Matthew Walker. I'm going to link some of the best resources I found at the bottom of this post. But, if you want to save yourself the time investment and just get the basic Cliff Notes version – look no further.
Here's the major take-away from Matt's book, interviews, and resource: You need a minimum of 7 hours of sleep every single night in order to maintain your health. If you get less than 7 hours - that means 6 hours and of course my 4.7 - everything starts falling apart. Here are some important highlights of the affected areas.
Safety
It's unsafe for you and those around you when you're deprived of sleep. Studies show that every 30 seconds there is an accident related to drowsy driving and that more accidents are cause by drowsiness than alcohol and drugs combined. 20 percent of all fatal car crashes are caused by drowsy driving. If you are about to drive, especially for a long period of time, it is recommended that you have no less than 7 hours of sleep in the last 24 hours.
We've all been there before, driving down the highway when our eyes start getting heavy, and we feel ourselves getting tired and we start fighting the urge to fall asleep. Interesting fact - when you are under slept, your brain will actually go into this mode called "micro sleep." In micro sleep your eyes will not fully close, but your brain actually shuts down and goes to sleep for a short period of time. Once you have been awake for 20 hours, you are as impaired both cognitively and physically as someone who is legally intoxicated. So the next time you're driving and feeling your eyes getting heavy, it's very possible that you're moving down the road at 70 mph with no one in control.
Health
This is probably the most surprising and shocking of all the impacted areas. Here are a few bullet points of how your health is impacted as soon as you get less than 7 hours of sleep:
Men who sleep less 7 hours per night have a testosterone level of someone 10 years older than them.
Sleeping less than 7 hours significantly reduces production of cancer fighting cells. We all produce the cells that form into cancer, but our bodies also produce cancer killing cells. Sleeping 4 hours per night reduces the production of these cancer killing cells by 70%.
In the spring (when we lose an hour with daylight savings time), there is a 24% increase in heart attacks nationwide.
Your brain builds up a "plaque" of toxins throughout the day which are made up of beta amyloid. Every night while you're sleeping your brain goes to work emptying out all of these toxins. When you don't get more than 7 hours of sleep, your brain isn't able to complete a full cycle of cleansing. Completing a full cycle if important because the build up beta amyloid plaque is directly connected to Alzheimer disease.
People who sleep 4-5 hours per night will on average eat 200-300 more calories per day (which translates to 10-15 lbs per year). This is because leptin levels are supressed which cause the brain to think it is hungry.
If you’re getting 6 hours of sleep or less, your time to physical exhaustion drops by up to 30%.
And this is just a sampling of how not getting enough sleep will have an adverse impact on your health. There are a bunch of other really important reasons to fight for 7 hours of sleep each night.
You may be reading this and thinking to yourself, I know my body and know exactly how much sleep I need in order to function. Listen to what Matthew Walker says:
"If you think you can survive on less than 7 to 8 hours of sleep per night think again. You are more likely to be struck by lightning in your lifetime than to possess the ultra-rare gene that allows you to sleep less than 7 hours without mental impairment, increased risk of cardiovascular disease, and cancer." - Matthew Walker
This is just the tip of the iceberg – for sure. If you are interested in learning more about the importance of sleep you can follow some of the links at the bottom of this post.
How to Start Good Sleeping Habits
If you want to start sleeping better and improving your health, here are three things that Matthew Walker recommends to begin doing right away:
Build Regularity - Go to bed and wake up the at the same time every day.
Turn Off the Lights - Your body responds to lights. Start turning off bright lights 2-3 hours before you intend to go to bed. This also means not looking at your phone right before bed - establish a good cutoff time.
Keep it Cool - Your brain needs to drop in temperature by 2-3 degrees in order to sleep. Keeping your room cool will help assist with this process.
Resources:
Here are few resources to learn more about sleep and why it's important.
This blog was originally featured on CalvinPayne.com
| Credits: Author: Calvin Payne; Photography: Ali Marsh |