Sleep

The How & Why of Sleep is a field of medicine that is being increasingly emphasized.

Sleep has a direct relationship to physical and mental health

Deprive a person of proper sleep & physical symptoms invariably develop.
- Research at Harvard University Medical School has identified links between the lack of proper sleep and assorted medical conditions ranging from cardiac conditions to cancer.
Proper sleep is now recognized as a physical necessity.
Sleep works as a restorative function for the brain and body.
- It is thought that deep sleep allows for a period of brain chemical / neurotransmitter replenishment. Are we smarter in the morning?
Lack of proper sleep can be responsible for an assortment of medical conditions.

& healthy sleep is comprised of 90 minute sleep cycles. Each 90 minute cycle consisting of the 5 stages of sleep.

University of Chicago Researchers found that the first stage of age-related deterioration of sleep quality in men occurs between the ages of 25 and 45.

They found that the proportion of deep sleep drops from nearly 20% of a normal night's sleep for men under 25 to less than 5% for those over 35.
By age 45, few men spend much time in deep sleep.
Our ability to sleep, rather than our need for sleep, decreases as we enter middle age.
Melatonin produced by the pineal gland is involved in our sleep cycle. Melatonin is another natural hormone whose production decreases as we mature.

MIT study confirms melatonin's value as sleep aid

When was the last time you had a vivid dream?

The nutrient GABA definitely improves REM / Dream Sleep.

You can be in my dream, if I can be in yours ~ Bob Dylan, circa 1963

Narcotic / prescription sleep meds are detrimental to proper sleep.

Appropriate exercise, proper rest & planned nutrition ( intelligent lifestyle? ) are required for personal optimization

Amazon.com Nutrition Make Your Own Nutritional Stack.

University of Chicago Researchers found that the first stage of age-related deterioration of sleep quality in men occurs between the ages of 25 and 45
- They're sleeping as long as younger men, but they're spending less time in restorative deep sleep, the scientists write in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
- The scientists studied 149 healthy men ages 16 to 83.
- Sleeping less deeply doesn't just mean that thirty something men might be more likely to be awakened by street noise outside the window. (This study did not find that more frequent awakenings during the night accompanied declines in deep sleep.)
- It also means that their bodies are secreting less growth hormone, the study found. In recent years, studies in the elderly have linked growth hormone deficiency to increased obesity, loss of muscle mass and reduced exercise capacity.

This 1st stage is characterized by a drowsy feeling rather than 'sleep'. It is definitely an integral part of the sleep process.

Stage 1 is the gateway between waking consciousness and sleeping unconsciousness. As we fall asleep, yawn.
1. In the second stage of sleep ones awareness of the external environment slips away.
2. Stage 2 occupies 45-55% of total sleep.
Stage Three is a transition into Stage 4's delta deep sleep.
1. Heart rate slows, respirations slow, brain waves slow.
2. Less than 10% of total sleep.
Stage Four Delta Sleep is deep sleep, it is difficult to quickly awaken from Delta sleep. .
1. Delta sleeps dominates the first third of the night and makes up about 10-15% of total sleep time.
2. This is a period of intense but slow brain waves. Brain waves significantly slow
3. Heart rate & respirations slow, the body becomes mostly immobile.
4. It is during stages 3 and 4, or slow brain wave sleep, that growth hormone levels increase and changes in immune function occur.
5. Delta Sleep could be considered the anabolic part of sleep. Delta Sleep is when growth and rejuvenation occurs. A period of rejuvenation for our muscular, immune, nervous and skeletal systems.
6. This pre-dream state stage of sleep is the time when sleep walking occurs. In REM sleep skeletal muscles are frozen.
Rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, associated with dreaming. REM sleep is most prevalent in the final third of a sleep period. The nutrient GABA definitely increases REM Sleep.
1. Predominates the late stages of sleep and can comprise up to 50% of the final 90 minute cycles.
2. A period of very active brain activity, pulse rate increases & we lose the ability to use our skeletal muscles.
3. REM sleep helps with the organization of memory.
  1. When you awaken with 'a problem solved' thank REM sleep's memory optimization process.
4. REM sleep is the center piece of 20th century western psychiatry. Sigmund Freud's 'school of psychoanalysis' contends that dreams represent our frustrated desire

Another University of Chicago study in 1999 by Dr. Eve Cauter limited a test group of men to only four hours of sleep per night for 2 weeks.