Sometimes I try to go to sleep and just can’t get into it, then an hour or two later I’m exhausted and sleep for eight hours. Why isn’t it a more continuous process where the less tired I am the less time I need to sleep? Instead it seems to be that I need to hit some threshold for tiredness before I can sleep at all.
In: Biology
I don’t know the reason, but I think it kinda does work that way.
So about 10 years ago I was going through a really bad point in my life.
I started seeing a psychologist, who recommended a psychiatrist.
The psychiatrist said I must be on the bipolar spectrum and put me on depakote.
500 mg, 2xdaily.
The thing about that drug is that it keeps your brain from switching gears.
So I wasn’t having any psychotic episodes, but I also wasn’t in a good mood, or a bad mood, wasn’t anxious, wasn’t depressed,
All I felt was boredom.
Eternal boredom.
So the funny thing is depakote kept me from sleeping.
For days. And days.
Usually I would be up for 5 days without sleep, sometimes 7days.
I was extremely delirious and I could feel shadows creeping all around me.
But I wasn’t tired, just bored.
Then eventually I’d fall unconscious.
If I was up for 5 days I’d usually sleep for about 17 hours, then get up and start the cycle again.
If I was up for 7 days I’d usually sleep for 23 hours.
I’m happily unmedicated at this point in my life, but i do still suffer from insomnia from time to time
Sleep isn’t really just a period of time where your body shuts off or refuels. It’s a process that goes through 90 minute cycles throughout the duration of sleep. It involves NREM (non-rapid eye movement) and REM (rapid eye movement) stages.
NREM 1 is the first part of sleep. You’re still close to awake at this time, but breathing, heart rate, and muscle movements start to slow down.
NREM 2 is the most common stage throughout the night. It’s deeper than NREM 1 and features a further drop in breathing and heart rate as well as body temperature. However, it’s not the deepest part of sleep.
NREM 3 is the point where your brain actively suppresses your responses to sounds, making it hard to wake up. It’s a stage that is most frequent during your first few hours. HR and breathing hit their lowest point here. Children spend more time in this stage than any other age group and the elderly spend the least.
REM is the most famous stage as it’s credited with being the dream stage. Here, your brain is almost as active as when you’re awake. Your heart rate increases to almost the same rate as when awake and breathing becomes irregular. Most REM occurs as sort of brief peaks before you dip back into NREM 2 later in the night. During REM, your brain is sifting through what you did the day before and cutting out any information that’s not needed, while further cementing important info in your memory. That’s why ample sleep before a test is really important.
I believe it’s during the first 4 to 6 hours of sleep that your body does self-repair of muscles and other parts. If you wake up feeling sore after too little sleep, it could be because your body hasn’t had enough time to properly repair. Sleep is vital to your physical health because of this.
Now let’s address the sleepiness threshold; yes, you do need to pass sort of a threshold. There are multiple Circadian rhythms that occur in your brain and body that all involve sleep. Certain neurochemicals and hormones like adrenaline, melatonin, and others go through daily production peaks and dropoffs throughout the day and night, affecting when you’re tired and how tired you are. These rhythms are heavily affected by your own daily routine as well. If you always go to bed around 10, then your body could have issues preparing for sleep if you suddenly go to bed at 8 one night.
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