Sleep Deprivation Effects
Small sleep losses, built up day after day, can be cumulative and lead to sleep deprivation effects. Soon, the chronic loss of sleep can cause lapse of attention, inability to respond, slow thinking, impaired memory, erratic behavior, and irritability.
Mental functions decline and judgment fades, with results serious enough to be a danger to the person-and to society, especially when critical decisions are being made, vehicles are being driven, or dangerous machinery is being used. In the sleep centers, we often find people who think they have some serious mental or physical disease when they simply do not allow themselves enough time to sleep.
Sometimes, you have to give up sleep out of sheer necessity-to complete a job that must be done. But don’t do it on a regular basis without letting yourself catch up. You don’t have to catch up, by the way, on all the sleep that you have missed. If you have been totally deprived of sleep for about ten days, you will have sleep deprivation effects and you will probably sleep for 14 or 18 hours per day for about three days and then go back to your normal schedule.
Over the last ten years, we have gradually come to realize that chronic insomnia is much different from voluntary sleep deprivation for a few nights. Patients with chronic insomnia have a chronically increased metabolism-but when we disturb the sleep of normal sleepers by frequent awakenings, their metabolism slows down. Similarly chronic insomniacs often experience increased anxiety and agitation, but when we disturb the sleep of normal sleepers for a few nights, they become more lethargic and nonresponsive.
Normal sleepers have an easier time falling asleep after sleep deprivation; insomniacs still have difficulties falling asleep during daytime naps, even after nights when they have slept extremely poorly.
People often think that insomniacs feel like good sleepers do after a night or two of sleep deprivation. This is not so. As the noted sleep researcher Dr. Michael Bonnet said at the national meeting in Nashville in 1995, “Insomnia is much more than losing a few nights’ sleep.”
Sleep deprivation effects can be very traumatic and when you suffer from it you need an overall program to help you get the natural sleep you need.
Get some sleep tonight! There is an all natural cure program for overcoming insomnia or any other sleep disorder. Get the restful, peaceful, full nights sleep you deserve so you can get back to living a normal, happy life!