Studies have shown that sleeping too little effectively puts the body on “high alert,” creating increased stress hormones and chemicals associated with inflammation.
Some crazy facts
- It’s impossible to tell if someone is really awake without close medical supervision. People can take cat naps with their eyes open without even being aware of it.
- Anything less than five minutes to fall asleep at night means you’re sleep deprived. The ideal is between 10 and 15 minutes, meaning you’re still tired enough to sleep deeply, but not so exhausted you feel sleepy by day.A new baby typically results in 400-750 hours lost sleep for parents in the first year
- One of the best predictors of insomnia later in life is the development of bad habits from having sleep disturbed by young childrenThe record for the longest period without sleep is 18 days, 21 hours, 40 minutes during a rocking chair marathon. The record holder reported hallucinations, paranoia, blurred vision, slurred speech and memory and concentration lapse
- REM sleep occurs in bursts totalling about 2 hours a night, usually beginning about 90 minutes after falling asleep.
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Dreams, once thought to occur only during REM sleep, also occur (but to a lesser extent) in non-REM sleep phases. It’s possible there may not be a single moment of our sleep when we are actually dreamless.
Check out the infographics to know more!
