Being asked about the easiest task of human life, most of us would surely agree over “SLEEPING”. But, is it really that easy as we take it to be?
Are you a person whose thinking resonates with any one of the statements- “I sleep only for 4-5 hours per night”; “I barely get time to sleep”; “Sleep? What’s that?” If yes, then you are not the only one in your category. As per a study, 93% of Indians are sleep deprived. And a recent survey by FITBIT Company shows India to be the second most sleep-deprived country in the world. This is just half of the bad news. The sadder part is that people don’t even realize that they are sleep-deprived.
People are not aware of the fact that there are age-specific sleep hours which goes something like- children and teenagers require 9-10 hours of sleep, adults need to sleep for 7-9 hours and senior people (65+) need to sleep for 7-8 hours per day.
Why do people take sleep for granted? Simply because they don’t know what are the negatives of sleep deprivation.
Not for adding to your worries but to your curiosity, “impaired memory” is the worst effect that cutting short your sleep hours can do to you. You may tend to forget things quickly because of your fewer hours of sleep. This condition can get worse and can lead to Alzheimer’s disease. This is because a lack of sleep will increase the amount of a toxic protein named Beta-amyloid which is washed away by the brain during your deep sleep time.
Sleep deprivation increases the risk of developing dementia at later stages of life and this is not just it; your brain may stop storing new memories at all. So, if you think waking up till late at night to learn your lessons for internals, think again it might not be a good idea at all.
Not only your mind but your body is also vulnerable to get weaker night by night because of your disturbed sleep patterns. Waking up till late hours kills immunity cells that have a lot to do with your wellness.
Your chances of developing various types of cancers in your life increase just because you skip your sleeping duty of the day. Not just to your inner body health impacts are visible on your face too.
Dark spots under your eyes are symptoms of early stages of sleep-deprivation that anyone can point out. Your face looks sleepy, tired, out of energy, it loses its charm and becomes repellent if you get such perceptible signs of lack of sleep on the face.
Unexpected comes here. Have you ever thought that your sleep can decide your age? Well, not literally but in a certain way. I am sure you’ve known someone in your life that looks like a decade older than his actual age? Here, not his looks but his sleep hours need to be blamed.
Lack of sleep impacts the virility and age factors of a person to a great extent. It can make a man look like a person who is nearly 10-years older than him. The news is worse for females because a lack of beauty sleep increases wrinkles, lines, and pigmentation on facial skin. Now, does that scare you?
To make it more worrisome, your cardiovascular system (system of heart, blood vessels, and blood) too, gets old because of your ignorance about sleep. Your blood pressure comes down during deep sleep hours and so your heart relaxes. But just the opposite happens if you sleep for only 5-6 hours. Your heart never gets relaxed, your blood pressure doesn’t come down and if this continues for a long period of time, you have higher chances of getting a fatal heart attack.
How many nights have you wakened thinking about the ways to improve your social life? I know many. But instead, if you had slept for all those nights, you would’ve actually improved your social life. Sleep relaxes your body and mind and hence, it is an effective way to beat stress. And a mind free of pressure produces feel-good hormones that stimulate mood apart from energizing you. At this point questioning how to get a complete sleep is obvious.
To help you complete 7-8 hours of sleep, the following points will prove useful:
- Avoid having high-dose of caffeine during the daytime (especially near your “go-to-bed” time)
- Remember your bed only when you are truly tired. Lying on your bed even when you are not feeling sleepy will affect your sleep.
- Follow a particular routine that includes waking up and sleeping at a particular time.
- Fix your working hours. Try to complete all your work during day-time only, working at night to meet the deadline of an assignment or a presentation is not that good idea.
- Setting right your room temperature, light and aroma can boost you to fall asleep faster.
- Going as per new trend, sleeping with your pet in bed is also considered a way-out to beat sleep deprivation.
In fact, above don’t make you resolute enough to devote at least 8 hours to your sleep every night, then nothing can. Researchers believe this is high time that we prioritize our sleep over the office or school work deadlines, over attending any phone call, over watching a series on TV, over getting involved in any unproductive activity at night because health supersedes every other thing.
