Everything you need to know about Sleep!

Sleep…

It is just a naturally recurring state of your mind, body, and soul, but we already knew that. We also know the fact that during sleep all the parts of our rest and recover from the day’s work. If we already know everything that we need to know for a general conversation about sleep why did I choose this topic, well because there’s still a lot left (Imagine this being said in the most intriguing fashion).

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There have been some wild theories regarding what causes sleep, the first man ever to talk about sleep was someone called Alcmaeon, a Greek physician around 450 BC. He said that sleep was a spell of unconsciousness brought by the lack of blood supply to the brain ??, if that were true I would be sleeping through half of my days.

Well Alcmaeon was not completely off, even though lack of blood in your noggin will not outrightly put you to sleep but for sure will make you feel drowsy, and sleep does help provide the brain with enough oxygen for maintenance so that’s something.

Of course, this is just a handpicked example, there is many more where that came from...

The first real contribution to sleep study came in 1845, by John Davy a British doctor, he studied the connection between body temperatures and sleep patterns.

He and his students were correct there did exist a relation as when we go to sleep our body temperature falls 1 to 2 degrees.

Dr. Nathaniel Kleitman (referred to as the “Father of American sleep research”) opened the first sleep lab at the University of Chicago, where he studied the circadian rhythm (Fun Fact #1 - did you know that the longest word without vowels is RHYTHMS). Circadian rhythm is the 24-hour cycle of physical, mental, and behavioral changes that occur in a person and because these primarily respond to light and dark, it has been closely linked to sleep.

Quick little detour … Do lullabies work - In fact, they do, studies have proven lullabies help them sleep and also improve the emotional bond between the parent and child. Therefore children who grew up listening to a lullaby that they have heard over and over also work when they are an adult.

Sleep can really get complicated once we surpass the threshold so Imma keep it simple, it has two types, Non-REM sleep, and REM sleep. Non-REM sleep has 3 stages, it encompasses light sleeping followed by periods of muscle contraction and relaxation and then deep sleep.

REM is the more interesting because it contains DREAMS… (oh my god, Adii control yourself, topic - another time). Brain activity no doubt increases, the activity weirdly is at the same level when you are awake.

We need enough sleep for understanding the complex information thrown at us every day, not just understand but also retain. We need sleep but the trouble starts during the time of year when we have important deadlines to meet, that’s when we start working late into the night limiting our time of sleep and sometimes not getting any sleep at all. This is a great segway into Sleep Deprivation and Sleep Debt.

Sleep Debt is when you are not fulfilling the daily quota of needed sleep, this piles up, and once your body gets the chance it fulfills the required hours. The drowsy and tired times after not getting any sleep is called Sleep Deprivation. Sleep Deprivation when you just can't sleep at night is called Insomnia. Sleep is a real mysterious occurrence, research is continually going on for sleep.

Here are some really interesting research:

• Sleep is affected by climate change
• Can humans hibernate? (Spoiler alert: We cannot)
• Covid-19 has highly disturbed people’s sleep
• Insomnia: The Latest Research

This is #adiscoveryinsideimmortalized signing off...