Isn’t bedtime the worst?
You’ve finally gotten all your work done for the day and you can finally relax and
do something you like and then wham!
Bedtime.
Do you really need so much sleep anyway?
Surely your body could function with a little less.
How long could you possibly stay up?
And what would happen if you stayed up for a week straight?
The longest recorded time someone has gone without sleep is about 264 hours or 11 days
straight.
It was a high school student doing an experiment for his school science fair.
He went through some pretty extreme side effects without sleep but didn’t suffer any serious
consequences…
Other’s haven’t been so lucky.
Going without sleep for 24 hours or one full day isn’t that uncommon.
Sometimes you stay up all night cramming for a test, or maybe you’re up playing video
games, new parents commonly go without sleep because they are taking care of a newborn…
Although any new parent would tell you, they would prefer to get some shut eye!
The effects of mild sleep deprivation can be seen almost immediately after a 24 hour
period.
Symptoms include: Sensitivity to light, irritability, impaired decision making, memory deficits,
vision and hearing impairments, increased risk of accidents and of course drowsiness!
But as soon as you get some sleep these symptoms go away.
Ok well what about a bit more?
Say 2-3 days of no sleep?!
Even though it’s only a couple of days, your sleep cycle will quickly get out of whack.
This system controls a lot of your body’s basic functions.
When you aren't following a regular sleep and wake cycle, the hormones in your body
become deregulated.
These hormones include: cortisol, insulin and human growth hormone.
As these hormones get off kilter due to your lack of Z’s, you’re going to notice some
very intense side effects.
Several bodily functions will start to fluctuate wildly like your appetite, your body temperature,
and of course your mood.
You’ll be totally unmotivated to do anything, your attention span will be shot, reasoning
and cognitive ability plummet and your friends and family will notice speech impairment starting
to kick in.
Also your immune system will be totally altered and you can become very sick.
Needless to say, you’re going to have trouble staying awake and you might experience periods
of light sleep that only last around 30 seconds called “microsleep”.
During these “microsleeps” the brain is essentially “offline” turning you into
a kind of zombie.
You will be totally out of control and unaware of when these microsleeps happen leaving you
very confused and disoriented.
After day three it will be very difficult to stay awake on your own and you will need
external stimuli to keep you awake.
By this time most people have a really hard time with cognitive functioning.
Multitasking, remembering, paying attention and any decision making are highly impaired.
It is extremely difficult for people with this much sleep deprivation to complete even
simple tasks.
By this time your emotions will be totally out of control.
You’ll become easily irritated and may even suffer a severe depressive mood, anxiety,
or paranoia.
After day four you may begin hallucinating, losing your vision and having trouble walking.
And by this time, you are now putting yourself in danger of having a stroke or a severe seizure
which could be deadly.
In 2014 a soccer fan died after staying awake for 48 hours straight so he could watch all
of the world cup games.
He suffered from a stroke brought on by sleep deprivation.
And it isn’t just staying up late one time that can impact your health.
Chronically sleeping less than 6 hours a night increases your risk of stroke by 4.5 times!
During the day our brain and body uses up energy and the breakdown of that energy creates
certain byproducts.
One of these byproducts is called adenosine and over the course of the day it builds up
in our brains making us sleepy.
The only way to get rid of adenosine is by sleeping.
During sleep, the brain activates the Glymphatic system, a mechanism that flushes out the adenosine
with cerebrospinal fluid.
This system also gets rid of any toxic byproducts in between your cells that were created during
the day.
Your body needs sleep to clean up and refresh the body.
Think of it as the late night cleaning crew who can only appear when all the lights are
off and everyone’s out of the office.
The longer you go without sleep, the more these toxic byproducts build up in your body,
and the lousier you feel.
And believe us when we tell you, you’re not the only one feeling bad, the people around
you will notice your crabby mood, your various impairments, and they’ll definitely be worried
about your safety.
So while staying up late and maybe even through the entire night might be tempting, remember
that you won’t enjoy it for long because there’s really no way to avoid the side
effects.
So get into a comfortable bed, eliminate distractions, clear your mind, and get those Z’s in - everything
can wait till the morning.