It’s ironic that I’m sitting here about to write a blog on how important sleep is while i’m loosing vital hours of sleep. It is common knowledge that sleep is highly important to our health, but it sleep that important that we should be prioritizing it above stuff like school work or a job?
While you sleep your body works to support your physical and mental health. Lack of sleep motherly known as sleep deficiency can eventually leave people with chronic health problems if not taken care of. In addition lack of sleep can negatively affect how one interacts with others, learns, thinks, and reacts. The brain is severely affected because while one rests the brain is able to heal itself and renew itself for the next day. Without sleep almost every aspect of one’s well being is negatively affected.
Sleeping not only heals and repairs your brain but it also does this to one’s vital organs like the heart and blood vessels. Due to sleep’s effect on our bodies vital organs like the heart lack of sleep can eventually be a result of many heart related issues like high blood pressure, heart disease, and kidney disease. In addition to heart health lack of sleep is a major cause of weight gain. One study conducted on people demonstrated that for every hour of sleep an individual lost their chances of eventually becoming obese increased. This is because sleep balances hormones and specifically the hormones that make people hungry and full which are called gherlin and leptin. When one loses sleep they become more hungry because the hormone gherlin increases and the hormone leptin decreases leaving one very hungry. If these negative effects of sleep don’t convince you of sleep’s importance than the benefits definitely will.
If one is able to get a good nights sleep every night the benefits are plentiful. One benefit of sleep is a better sex life according to the Nation Sleep Foundation, “According to a poll conducted by the National Sleep Foundation, up to 26% of people say that their sex lives tend to suffer because they’re just too tired. There’s evidence that in men, impaired sleep can be associated with lower testosterone levels — although the exact nature of the link isn’t clear.” In addition to a better sex life sleep can also help people who experience chronic pain, or just general pain which is most likely the result of sleeps ability to repair the body mentally and physically. The bodies immune system is stronger when the body is well rested which enables the body to fight off colds and flus.
The negative affects were enough to encourage me to prioritize sleep a little bit more, but learning about the benefits has me heading up to bed right about now.
http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/sdd/why
http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/features/9-reasons-to-sleep-more?page=2
You made some great points about why sleep is so good for you and I believe strongly that sleep is the most important thing you can do for your body! I just dont feel like myself when I’m tired and haven’t slept in a while. Here are some other things that you can do that are important to your health! https://sleepfoundation.org/sleep-topics/diet-exercise-and-sleep
I’m going to be seeing the effects of not enough sleep tomorrow because of my serious procrastination. I don’t think I ever appreciated good sleep and taking naps as much as I do now. I think it’s crucial to performance on tests/schoolwork too, which makes staying up to study less worth it as you go. An article from Business Insideractually had a good amount to say on why sleep is important, like it gives your body time to naturally repair its organs, muscles and bones and also keeps the immune system healthy.
I remember when I came to school a few years ago as a freshman and my parents stressed that I needed to find the right balance to be successful between getting enough sleep, a healthy diet and a good exercise schedule. Looks like they were right! I value sleep so much, although like you, I feel a bit hypocritical scene as how I am up this late still. On a good night however, I like getting 8-12 hours of sleep. I wrote an article earlier tonight about how positivity has been shown to increase longevity. Looks like people are happier when they have more sleep too! http://www.apa.org/action/resources/research-in-action/sleep-deprivation.aspx
I agree I think sleep is extremely important. Without sleep the body can’t properly function and can’t process things the way it should. There are so many reasons why humans need sleep. As ironic as it may be, without sleep nothing productive would be done.
Well I’m glad we’re on the same page here, sleep is crucial to mental health, and that is actually going to be one of my six blog topics for tonight. I’ll let you know how my sanity holds up but thanks for letting me know all those great health benefits I’m missing. Of course, the CDC also advises us on the necessity of sleep.