Sleep disorders are a serious health problem, much more than most people think. Little sleep has a great impact on the body and even on mental health, much stronger than fasting.
Many believe that they can live their life peacefully by sleeping only a few hours each night. And with the lifestyle that is led today, increasingly hectic and with less time available, sometimes it becomes an obligation. However, doctors recommend getting 7-9 hours of sleep each night.
Discover the 10 worst things that can happen to you if you sleep little .
10 terrible things that happen when you sleep little
1. Impairment of short-term memory
When we don't sleep, the part of our brain that manipulates short-term memory slows down. It is a natural occurrence, a mental response to our lack of energy. Therefore, we will have more problems remembering things that we have done or have happened to us, which can be prolonged if we maintain bad sleeping habits .
2. Irritability
Lack of sleep causes discomfort throughout our body. We are tired and the body screams for a little sleep. This situation automatically causes a change in our mood and increases our irritability, so anything can bother us and affect our day to day.
3. Weight gain
During sleep, the body performs many functions in terms of managing energy and keeping our body at its best. If we take sleep away from the body , we also take away many of these functions, therefore our metabolism slows down, directly causing greater assimilation in food. At the same time, this causes us to eat more to calm the body, both of which result in weight gain.
4. Problems in the immune system
As in the previous point, by sleeping little we deprive the organism of its moment to recover energy and put everything in its place.
In general, everything related to our defenses will decrease, including of course the strength of our immune system, which makes us more susceptible to contagious diseases and infections.
5. Decision making
As we've explained, lack of sleep clouds our judgment . The mind is tired and does not process information correctly. We will be conditioned by lack of sleep and all our decisions will be affected.
There is a high probability that all the important decisions that you make while you have little sleep are terrible, since they will have been conditioned by your state, and in full normality you would surely have thought otherwise.
6. Muscle atrophy
If you have ever heard about muscle development, you know that after exercising it is recommended to rest, and that a good sleep is a fundamental part of any exercise routine. This is because while we sleep, the body regenerates muscle tissue . If we do not sleep, we will be depriving the body of this function, so we will directly create a muscle atrophy.
7. Decreased sexual libido
Testosterone is the hormone that stimulates the sex drive, both in men and women and is released while we sleep. By sleeping little, we will develop little testosterone and this will affect our libido. In addition, our energy decreases and, although we want to have relationships, we are probably too tired to do so.
8. Unhappiness and depression
By now, you may have noticed that not sleeping wreaks havoc on our bodies and minds. Therefore, the most normal thing is that our self-esteem is hit and our mind does not see things clearly, in addition to a constant state of drowsiness. All of this will cause feelings of unhappiness and even, if it continues over time, lead to depression.
9. Headaches
Extreme fatigue and the desire to rest will directly cause headaches. Depending on the intensity, these pains could even turn into migraines.
10. Gastrointestinal problems
It has been proven that little sleep affects the gastrointestinal system , which can translate into pain and problems in fulfilling our physiological needs.
conclusion
We can see that maintaining a bad sleep regimen will cause problems of all kinds, not only to our body, but also to our mind. In fact, it has been studied that due to all the problems that little sleep causes , those who do not sleep the respective hours, statistically, live less.
Reference
- Loria, K. 27 horrible things that happen if you don't get enough sleep. For Business Insider. [Revised September 2017].
