The importance of sleep

Sleep plays a vital role in good health and well-bright throughout your life, getting a quality sleep at night and waking up at the right times can be difference between a good day and a bad day. Not only so, getting adequate sleep also protects your mental, physical and emotional health.

However. Sleep appears to be most YWS members Achilles heels, and the most unholy sleeping schedules I've encountered. I've heard of sleeping schedules that range from 5am - 8pm, or members speaking of going to bed a 3am and waking up at 6 or 7am on a daily basis.

What's the big deal, people ask. Sleep is for the weak, who needs sleep. I have too many exciting things to do at night. What if I'm not tired and I can't sleep? I can function fine on 5 - 6 hours of sleep. Relax.

Here's some tough love for you all.

How much sleep do you really need?

According to the National Sleep Foundation, the average needs 7-9 hours of sleep each night. Teenagers on the other hand needs at least 8-10 hours each night. Let's settle on 7 hours, it's a nice solid number for both age groups.
To better understand the importance of sleep, there is no harm in knowing basic sleep architecture.

Stages of sleep:

(Source: http://www.overstock.com/The-Science-of ... 2/blogpost)

Sleep architecture follows an alternating pattern between REM (rapid eye movement) this is when most dreams occur and NREM (non-rapid eye movement). In a normal night, this cycle repeats itself about every 90 minutes.

REM: It's the stage in which dreaming happens and where our brain activity resembles the waking brain. As its name implies, our breathing becomes more rapid, irregular and shallow. Our eyes jerk in various direction and limb muscles become temporarily paralyzed. However, REM sleep is essential as it provides the body with energy and stimulates the brain regions used in learning.

Stage 1: Light sleep

During stage 1 sleep, we can awakened easily, eyes and muscle activity slows. People awakened from stage 1 sleep often get that 'jump' (hypno myoclonia) accompanied with the sensation of falling off a cliff.

Stage 2: Medium sleep

Breathing and heart rate are regular, body temperature drops (note that sleeping in a cool room will help)

Stages 3 and 4: Deep Sleep

This is the deepest and most restorative sleep, blood pressure drops, muscles are relaxed, blood supply to muscles increase, tissue growth and repair occurs, energy is restored, hormones are released to ad growth and development. There is no eye movement here, and this is the stage where it's the most difficult to wake someone up.

Effects of sleep deprivation:

Sleep deprivation is a phrase that gets thrown around a lot at my school, it's almost as if people are competing to see who could function on the least amount of sleep. However, this is an incredibly common occurrence across most high schools. A Brown University study showed that 73% of students reported sleep problems and only 11% reported good sleep. Not getting enough sleep can impact a student's concentration and memory, two essentials for university.

Here are some interesting facts about sleep deprivation in high school:

Sleep deprivation has been linked to lower GPAs.

Students who get A's and B's sleep 35 minutes more each night than those who get D's and F's.

When you lack sufficient sleep in just one week. There is disruption of the circadian rhythm clock which weakens our physical stress response. Lack of sleep also cause a decrease in neurotransmitters that regulate your mood, there is a higher risk of stroke and hypertension. It also decrease your ability to focus and think clearly. If you're craving sugar or fries after a sleepless night, then that's because sleep maintains a healthy balance of the hormones that make you feel hungry (ghrelin) or full (leptin). Lack of sleep causes ghrelin levels to increase and leptin to decrease.

If you get less than 5 hours of sleep, than that is equivalent to someone with a BAC (blood alcohol content) of .05. (The subject experiences mild euphoria and feels more sociable. Their ability to concentrate will decline.)If you're a driver, The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that fatigue is a cause in 100,00 auto crashes and 1,550 crash-related a year in the U.S. This problem is also the greatest among people under the age of 25.

If that's not enough, sleeping an average of less than 6 hours increases lifetime heart attack risk by 50%. I don't know about you, but I don't want to die young. Sleeping 6 hours instead of 7 can cause you to feel up to 25% hungrier, adding the equivalent of a cheeseburger a day to your diet.

Think about jeans shopping.

Scores dropping? Nodding off in class?

Sleep plays a critical role in thinking and learning, lack of sleep impairs attention, alertness, concentration,reasoning and problem solving. As seen from above, if you don't go through the deep sleep cycles and REM your body is unable to repair itself, and you won't be able to remember and consolidate the knowledge you've learnt during the day.

Fun fact: Sleep deprivation also decreases sex drive.

Mirror, Mirror, on the wall. Who is sleepiest of them all?

It's common fact that sleepless night will transform us into the monster from hell. Keep it up and your skin starts to lose its luster and elasticity, dark circles will appear under your eyes. The human growth hormone is released during deep sleep, so if you want to maintain that youthful look. Get some sleep.

Judgement
Lack of sleep can affect our interpretation of events, it affects our ability to make sound judgement. Especially about sleep.

"Awww, but come on. I'm used to sleeping five to six hours, what's the problem."
If I got a dollar every time I heard that from someone, I'd own half the world by now. ~~Not quite.~~

Studies show that over time, people who are getting six hours of sleep, instead of seven or eight, begin to feel that they’ve adapted to that sleep deprivation -- they’ve gotten used to it,” Gehrman says. “But if you look at how they actually do on tests of mental alertness and performance, they continue to go downhill. So there’s a point in sleep deprivation when we lose touch with how impaired we are.”

Tips on sleeping better:

Stop using electronic devices 45 minutes before bed, blue blight doesn't stimulates wakefulness. If this is too long for you, start with 15 minutes. Or just turn off the wiki and pick up a good book.

Stick to a sleep schedule of the same bedtime and wake up time, even on the weekends (ideally, but let's face it who doesn't want to sleep In. One hour of difference is acceptable. Any more than that, your circadian clock is going to yell at you.) It will also help you cope if there is a disruption to your schedule.

Exercise daily. I mean this, aerobic exercise is definitely the best. 30- 60 minutes of running, cycling, playing tennis or vigorous sport. But even light exercise is better than no exercise.

No alcohol or caffeine before that. Chamomile tea is ok.

Choose a comfortable mattress and pillow.

Check your room, your body's melatonin level drops as you sleep. Your room should be at a cool temperature, not too hot, not too cold. It should be free from many bright lights or loud noises.

Sleep until sunlight, wake up with the sun, or use bright lights in the morning. Sunlight helps the body's internal biological clock reset itself each day. Use a sleep cycle calculator to determine the optimum time to sleep and wake.
Don't lie in bed awake

Now, I get this almost as often as the, 'sleep is overkilled'. Most often the excuse is 'but I don't feel tired at all.' If you can't get to sleep, don't just lie in bed. Do something else, like reading, watching television, or listening to music, until you feel tired. The anxiety of being unable to fall asleep can actually contribute to insomnia.

Additional note: What if, school is being nasty?

On some days, sleeping late isn't a choice. Because it's exam time and the pile of homework and assignments threatens to strangle you alive. On these days, where pulling an all-nighter is the only way to get everything in on time. Or because there is an exam tomorrow that you're totally not prepared for and you need the night to study.

Here are a few tips:

Learn, sleep, repeat: Learn the material in advance and then sleep on it—sleep builds memory, so if you pull an all-nighter before the test, you probably won't recall those lectures or knowledge you're frantically trying to memorize. Get the requisite seven to eight hours of sleep the night before too, to optimize alertness on the test.

Early to bed, early to rise: For the inevitable late night studying, it's better to get to sleep at a reasonable hour and wake up early than to stay up for that extra hour. Which hour is better for studying, 1am-2am? Or 7am?

Tune your body clock: Try to get on a sleeping pattern that has you waking up around test time every day for a week or so in advance so that your biological clock can adjust to test timetables.

Effective time management: Plan your time effectively, allocate time slots to study with breaks. No power naps. Fill out the slots with things you want to do then fit your studying around it. No, I don't want to hear tales of procrastinating till midnight and not studying because the internet is fascinating ~~it is~~. But what's more important, your body and mind or something you can read the next day?

Here is a follow up article with more tips and explanation.

And to leave you all with a final reminder: