Does “not being able to catch up on lost sleep” mean that every night of lost sleep accumulates to a shorter life span, more illness, or something of the sort?
In: Biology
I’ve answered this question before. But here goes.
Don’t muddle together long term sleep deprivation with short term. That’s where the confusion sets in.
We don’t truly understand exactly why we need sleep. But we know that sleep is important for clearing out metabolic waste in the brain and hormone regulation, one of the most important being cortisol, or for the purpose of this discussion, stress.
In the short term, say a single poor nights sleep, you’ll be tired the next day as your body is attempting to tell you to “fix” the problem. Sleeping extra the next night will correct the problem. Maybe even just a normal full nights rest will fix it without extra sleep.
Now say it’s been a year and you have slept 5 hours a night ever day. This does permanent damage down to the cellular level. Your body has been unable to properly regulate itself because you have disrupted a key process. No amount of extra sleep will fix it. We have found studies relate this type of behavior with early dementia and various chronic diseases.
True ELI5: in the short term you can make up for sleep loss, in the long term the damage is already done and is beyond just sleeping more.
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