Sleep is one of the essentials of our lives, because through sleeping our bodies restore the necessary level of energy and our nerve systems can get relieved from daytime stress and tension. Thus, ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question is not a matter of curiosity, but rather is a matter of balancing your sleep and adjusting it in such a way, that you can lead longer, healthier and more satisfying life. Therefore, let us try to obtain an answer to ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question and to learn how the excess as well as lack of sleep can affect your life and health. During the last decades there has been carried out a great number of sleep researches. The results of some of them plainly contradict to each other. However, others provide quite convincing data and arguments as to finding an answer to ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question. Let us take a look at some of these discoveries.
The majority of us have been taught that 8 hours sleep makes an average sleeping standard. However, some of the latest researches, which involved over one million of Americans, showed that it is not true. Moreover, this research indicated that 7 hours sleep is the best for an average person and that oversleeping can be even more dangerous and harmful than under sleeping. That indeed provides certain alternative answer to ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question and forces us to revising our conceptions about sleep. According to this research 6 hours sleep is better than 8 or 9 hours sleep. For, people who under sleep an hour or two on regular basis, run lower risks of shorter life span, than those, who over sleep the same amount of time. The research also indicated that people who regularly have 10 hours of sleep a day run 34 % risk of early death versus 17 % among the people with only 5 hours of sleep. A sleep more than 7-8 hours leaves you feel lethargic throughout the day.
Nevertheless, the same research has indicated that constant significant shortage of sleep can also resolve in some health problems. This lack of sleep not only affects your health but indirectly it brings down your concentration level and your work efficiency level as a result. For, in this case, your body may not feel completely renewed and your brain may send signals for refilling energy by other means, such as consuming extra food. Thus, if you have certain overeating or extra weight problems, you may consider it useful to find proper answer to ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question. Maybe couple of extra hours of sleep will only help your body to maintain proper energy balance.
In any case, scientists agree that people have to get enough sleep, so that they would not feel sleepy during the day time and their work efficiency and output is affected. This could be an easy rule to go by in answering ‘Are you sleeping enough?’ question.
Copyright March 2003 Womenlink
