Thread by @uberstuber

.@sleepdiplomat 's "Why We Sleep", summarized in a twitter thread 👇

1/ Lack of sleep is bad for your physical health, your mental health, your longevity, your ability to learn, your creativity, your emotional control, and more.

1.1/ Shorter sleep was associated with a 45 percent increased risk of developing coronary heart disease

1.2/ sleeping six hours or less was associated with a 40 percent increased risk of developing cancer

1.3/ getting too little sleep across the adult life span will significantly raise your risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

1.4/ On a diet? Lack of sleep increases your cravings for carby snack foods. Also, more of the weight lost will come from lean body tissue instead of fat.

2/ Our modern environment is terrible for getting good sleep. Bright lights, electronic devices, late-night weekends and drinking all impair your ability to sleep well.

2.1/ Reading on an iPad before bed can delay the onset of your natural Melatonin rise by 3 hours

2.2/ "Social Jet Lag" caused by sleeping at different times on weekdays vs weekends makes it harder for you develop a stable sleep schedule

3/ Vehicle accidents caused by drowsy driving exceed those caused by alcohol and drugs combined. Worse yet, a person who experiences a microsleep or who has fallen asleep at the wheel does not brake at all, nor do they make any attempt to avoid the accident.

3.1/ You do not know how sleep-deprived you are when you are sleep-deprived!

4/ Every single part of your body is enhanced by sleep.

5/ Two forces drive how sleepy you feel:
1. Circadian Rhythm
2. Sleep Pressure (adenosine)

5.1/ Circadian Rhythm
* A cycling day-night rhythm that makes you tired or alert depending on time of day
* Is internally generated, but affected by exposure to light, activity, and meals
* Melatonin is generated in darkness

5.2/ Sleep Pressure (Adenosine)
* Adenosine builds up throughout the day, making you sleepier the longer you stay awake
* Caffeine blocks adenosine receptors in the brain, but does not prevent adenosine buildup
* Adenosine levels can only be lowered by sleeping

6/ Two types of sleep:
1. Non-Rapid-Eye-Movement (NREM)
2. Rapid-Eye-Movement (REM)

6.1/ NREM
* Dominates the first half of the night
* Helps shuttle information to long term memory
* Helps turn new physical skills into unconscious motor memory

6.2/ REM
* Dominates the later half of the night
* Connects valuable new experiences to existing knowledge. This builds creativity and understanding
* Helps forget painful emotions surrounding difficult memories

7/ Alcohol suppresses REM sleep, and causes sedation, not natural sleep.

8/ Stop taking sleeping pills: "No past or current sleeping medications on the legal (or illegal) market induce natural sleep."

9/ If you only take one thing away from this book:
"Stick to a sleep schedule. Go to bed and wake up at the same time each day."

10/ "Why We Sleep" is a damning case against the "I'll sleep when I'm dead crowd".

The book goes into much more detail, and has fascinating sections on what your brain does while it dreams. Highly recommend.

END/ If you care *at all* about learning, about creativity, about your physical and mental health, about your longevity: please, please take your sleep seriously.

"some committed individuals will even wear yellow-tinted glasses to help filter out the most harmful blue light that suppresses melatonin" 😎