How Long Can a Person Endure Without Sleep? A Severe Effect Of Insomnia

The importance of sleeping and resting well every day

We need sleep, and it’s not just that we like it, it’s that our own body asks us to. People due to noise, annoying neighbors, emotional problems, and an excess of worries, cannot sleep. With a single night of lack of sleep, you can see how insomnia is harmful to your life, but if the problem also lengthens, we enter a situation of significant risk to health. We are wondering how long a person can sleep without, although we are not willing to do the test.

The Need for Sleep and the Importance of Rest to Avoid Insomnia

Sleeping is essential to our life. When sleeping, the body and brain enter into rest, and it is the only way that our body has to recover the energy lost during the day and to do a kind of restart as if it were a computer. We sleep to rest, to regenerate our functions, to get rid of what we have leftover, and to make room for what is essential.

We have to sleep, and the idea is to do it every night for about 8 hours, but each person has different needs. Either by obligation, because their professions force them to work at night or stay awake in the guards for a long time or due to their own physiological needs, some people sleep 8 hours of rigor, but others wake up in shape with fewer hours, getting up early. More or getting up later.

Sleep needs also change with age. While babies and children need many hours of sleep, adults are governed by those 8 hours on average. For its part, as we get older, the hours and quality of sleep decrease. In any case, and with our differences, we all need sleep. And we all need restful sleep.

What Occurs to the Body if You don’t Sleep?

Because if sleep does not come or if we do not have a good quality of sleep, we notice it right away. It is something that we cannot avoid that discomfort after having had a bad night. We don’t give up, we feel sad, tired, unmotivated, we can’t concentrate, and we wonder where our energy has been.

People who have insomnia know well what its serious effects are and how lack of sleep impacts their quality of life. And both physical and mental health suffer. Some of the top common concerns of not sleeping are dizziness, headache, muscle aches, blurred vision, weakness, nausea, or trembling of the hands.

For example more dangerous are some diseases derived from lack of sleep: ” heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, gastrointestinal, urinary or respiratory problems, ” as stated by Julio Fernández Mendoza’s thesis on Chronic Insomnia for the Complutense University of Madrid. And we cannot forget about the psychological complications caused by not sleeping well, such as lack of concentration, lack of motivation, sadness, mental confusion, nervousness, or irritability. A significant lack of sleep can lead to depersonalization and also hallucinations.

How Long is Someone able to Function without Sleeping?

By proxy, you can go without sleep for a long time. It is from 78 hours when the body begins to suffer, but in this period, the consequences of lack of sleep are reversible. Sleep deprivation is part of those tortures that we have read and heard, and there are also many soldiers who in war situations have gone 4 days without sleep.

The risks increase as the time you go without sleep increases. We have told of a 17-year-old student who holds the record for hours without sleep. In 1965 Randy Gardner spent 264 hours awake, that is, 11 days. According to the University of California, which investigated the case, the student presented a picture of cognitive deficiencies, vision and speech problems, and hallucinations.

We better not do the test because a lack of sleep can be fatal. This is the case of people who suffer from the so-called Fatal Family Insomnia, a strange hereditary disease presented by 40 families in the world. The disease appears around the age of 50 or 60 and begins with insomnia, which could be habitual, which progresses to weight loss, halluPcinations, dementia, and, finally, death.

Lack of sleep causes irreparable damage to the brain, but we are talking about extreme and prolonged situations. In general, our body has an excellent capacity for recovery, although we will not deny that suffering from insomnia dramatically reduces the quality of life.

Why do You Need Good Sleep Hygiene to Get Rid of Insomnia?

People who consider sleeping is a waste of time, we promote : if you sleep well, you live better. That is why we always insist on scrupulous sleep hygiene without waiting for insomnia problems to appear. Do you want to know what this sleep hygiene consists of?

• You have to have a regular time to go to bed and get up. Not from Monday to Friday, but from Monday to Monday. This will eventually lead to the body itself, claiming the time to go to sleep when it needs it.
• Avoid stimulant drinks and coffee about 6 hours before bed.
• If you can avoid a nap, the better. If you can’t avoid it, try reducing it to 20 minutes.
• Have a light dinner is avoiding fats, spicy and sugar, and, if possible, about 2 hours before going to bed.
• The exercise helps you sleep, but not if you do it right before bed.
• The pajamas or clothing you wear to sleep must be comfortable.
• Also pay attention to the bedding, wash the sheets frequently, and  even color influences the quality of sleep. Opt for pastel shades and avoid bright or very bright colors in bed.
• Controls noise from outside. If you can’t avoid it, the classic option is earplugs.
• Although some people like to sleep with light or clarity, total darkness provides more rest.
• The temperature of the room is also critical; remember that virtue is in the middle point. And you have to ventilate or ventilate the bedroom every day.
• Reduce daily activity as the hours’ progress.  The stress of work in the morning,  physical exercise in the afternoon, and relaxation for the final hours of the day. Reading falls within the recommended activities to slow down.
• The bed is for sleeping, but not for watching TV, working, eating, or any other activity you can think of. If you relate the bed only for sleeping, you will have fewer possibilities of suffering from insomnia in the future.
• We have a recommendation that your sleep hygiene is almost perfect, although it is the most challenging guideline to meet. No social media in bed the mobile phone should stay out of the bedroom. Will you be able to do it?