what is physiologically happening when my brain feels “heavy” at the end of a long, busy work day?
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Your brain is composed of neurons that send little jolts of ‘electricity’ to function. I say ‘electricity’ as it’s not, but usually the differences don’t matter, in this case it does.
Your neurons send their jolts of electricity by moving charged atoms across their membrane (inside to outside or the other way). They need to take time to set up a balance of these atoms so that when they’re triggered they can rapidly respond. If you make a neuron fire repetitively it will unbalance these atoms faster than it can balance and will reach a point it can’t fire. You can see this effect easily with semantic sanitation whereby you say or read a word a lot in a short amount of time and it becomes temporarily meaningless. The neurons in charge of adding meaning to that word are unbalanced and can’t fire so you lose that function. There are things your body can do to make them able to fire more often but regardless every neuron needs some rest.
In addition to the unbalanced neurons, sleep removes a large amount of toxins that your brain naturally produces, so you build up toxins while you’re awake then clear (hopefully) them all while you sleep. The combination of unbalanced neurons and toxin build up is interpreted as a heavy sluggish feeling to discourage you from thinking as much and encourage you to start resting to fix both of these
Brain fills up with bad sauce the only cure is the sleepy time robots that remove the bad sauce.
Your brain like all organs and muscles does expel waste, these build up and start to block neural pathways.
Your body has special vessels in it similar to blood vessels that are called lymphatics. A fun fact is that your blood vessels leak fluid and *stuff* out into the tissues all day, but they do an ok job of reabsorbing it but not 100%, so approx 20L of blood gets pumped from your heart to the tissues each day, but only 17L of blood gets returned to the heart by your veins. Well how does the body collect that extra fluid and *stuff* and get it back to the heart? Lymphatic vessels. Well when these vessels suck up leaked fluid and stuff, they also suck up any surrounding free waste products, or damaged tissue and *stuff* in the tissue. Well your brain has special lymphatics that are different and not considered apart of the lymphatic system, and they are creatively named “glymphatics”. Weirdly, scientists have discovered the g-vessels only work when the body is asleep, and there still not 100% certain why, as the discovery of glymphatics is a very recent finding so I personally don’t know much more to talk about the topic but pretty much these glymphatics only work when you’re sleeping, and therefore after a long day of being awake and thinking , your brain is gonna produce a lot of waste products, tissue damage and *stuff*, not to mention all that extra leaky fluid, which all of which hasn’t been able to be sucked up while you’re awake, hence leaving your head feeling heavy at the end of the day
When you feel “heavy” at the end of a long, busy work day, it could be because your brain is tired. The brain is an organ that works very hard all day long, helping you think, remember things, and make decisions. When you have had a long, busy day, your brain might be feeling drained and overwhelmed, which can cause you to feel tired and heavy.
One reason your brain might feel heavy is because it has used up a lot of energy. The brain needs a constant supply of oxygen and glucose (a type of sugar) to function properly, and when you are working hard, your brain uses up these energy sources more quickly. When you have been working hard for a long time, your brain might not have enough energy left to function as efficiently as usual, which can cause you to feel tired and heavy.
Another reason your brain might feel heavy is because it is processing a lot of information. The brain is constantly taking in new information and trying to make sense of it, and when you have had a long, busy day, your brain might be trying to process more information than it can handle. This can cause you to feel overwhelmed and tired, and might make it difficult for you to concentrate or think clearly.
If you are feeling heavy at the end of a long, busy work day, it is a good idea to give your brain a rest by taking a break, getting some sleep, or doing something relaxing. This will give your brain a chance to recharge and recover, so that it can be ready to work hard again tomorrow.
Wow this is actually really interesting I never thought about this but thank you people for taking the time to explain this
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