Eli5 What are the long term consequences of drugs that suppress REM sleep?

Question

It’s well known that drugs such as antidepressants (particularly SSRIs) and benzodiazepines suppress REM sleep,it’s also well known that REM sleep is crucial for memory,cognition,consolidation of memory and many other important functions,my question is what are the long term outcomes of drugs that suppress REM?

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Answer 1

Difficult ELI5.

We don’t know anywhere nearly enough about REM sleep as it is. Nor the brain very well as it is. They all would impact REM in different ways.

Sleep works kind of like this:

**NR1 Sleep (non-REM 1)** – Very light sleep. You will feel like you just nodded off. When you awake from it, it doesn’t even feel as though you slept. Very low demand sleep. This is what you aim for in a quick nap – under 15 minutes.

**NR2 Sleep (non-REM 2)** – Lighter sleep that comprises most of your time slept. Feels like more than nodding off, but still not too deep in sleep to be awakened. Good for long naps – under 45 mins.

**NR3 sleep (non-REM 3; also known as Delta Sleep)** – Deep sleep. Difficult to be awakened at this time. Most restful portion of sleep. This is when the body and brain repair themselves.

**REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement Sleep)** – This is when you dream. It is the most demanding part of sleep. Your heart rate increases and becomes variable. Your brain activity flies through the roof. This part of sleep is believed to be responsible in processing emotions and cementing memories.

**My weird little opinion on REM sleep, which is by know means factual:* We need to experience things to learn. Our dreams are our way of simulating these things into a way we can experience them, process them, and cement them. Again, *by no means factual*.

After REM it circles back and continues in layers: NR3, NR2, NR1, repeat. (NR1, NR2, NR3, REM, NR3, NR2, NR1, NR2, etc.)

A common REM suppressor, cannabis, impacts REM cycles by shortening them. With shortened REM cycles, though, comes with more non-REM sleep (NR1/2/3) in a similiar period to someone with regular length REM cycles.

So a person who uses cannabis and sleeps the same amount of time as somebody who doesn’t use cannabis would theoretically get a more restful sleep than the latter, based on cannabis’ impact on REM sleep, alone (not taking into account physiological effects). But the cannabis user would have gotten less REM sleep and time to cement their memories.