Guys. Do you find yourself up late watching those NBA playoffs? There’s just no way to get to bed on time when something that cool is on till midnight and they don’t cancel work the next morning. Want to know what happens when you give your sleep short shrift?
Just when you thought you could skate by on five or six hours of sleep, comes news from the National Institute of Health that an unexpected phenomenon was found in animal research that very likely applies to humans as well. The animals were sleep-deprived to five or six hours per night, as many of us try to get by with in our very busy world when our responsibilities mount.
What the researchers learned quite by accident was that while appearing to be fully awake the next day, certain brain cells were selectively turned off throughout the next day, so that brief periods of non-functioning occurred.
While we knew that lack of sleep, especially on a consistent basis, had its consequences for cognitive functioning, we did not suspect before this study that specific brain cells ”fell asleep” or ceased to function while research subjects appeared to be (on EEG) and remained fully awake. Ever have the feeling that your brain just wasn’t working right after a poor night’s sleep? Now you know you were right. NIH, our most prestigious and well-funded body of health research, was so excited about the news that they issued a press release, which you can read here about what the NIH calls “sleeping neurons” . To quote the researcher who did the study, “Such tired neurons in an awake brain may be responsible for the attention lapses, poor judgment, mistake-proneness and irritability that we experience when we haven’t had enough sleep, yet don’t feel particularly sleepy.”
This study again underlines not only the need for adequate sleep (7-8 hours for the vast majority of us), but some of the important consequences to our work and daytime performance relative to sleep deprivation. Have you noticed “attention lapses, poor judgment, mistake-proneness and irritability” in yourself and is it time to get serious about getting more sleep more regularly? Can you and your work afford these next day lapses?
Since we can’t truly make up missed sleep, we just lose what we lose during the playoffs, but the biggest risk is that you may get the idea that you made it through the next day after each game, and you can do this as a regular thing. Think again. The evidence is not really in your favor. For more information and specific help, contact http://thesleepdiva.com.
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The old saying that “you can’t fool Mother Nature” may be true in some places we never expected. Long ago, before electricity became universal, we used to get up when the sun came up and go to bed when the sun went down. Then we had an era in which everyone had electric lights, and eventually television. Now in our modern era, we are nearly a 24-7 culture. Not only can your banking and Ipod downloads be carried out in the middle of the night, but the boundaries of time have blurred to the point where almost anything electronic or computerized can be done in the middle of the night.
