myth of the eight hour sleep

We have spent quite a bit of time on sleep issues and how hard it seems to be to get enough rest each night.

We ran across the article about interrupted sleep by Stephanie Hegarty on the BBC website and it is really interesting. Not sure if we agree with everything it says, but it is well worth reading. There is a link to the original article at the bottom of the article. Enjoy!

We often worry about lying awake in the middle of the night – but it could be good for you. A growing body of evidence from both science and history suggests that the eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

In the early 1990s, psychiatrist Thomas Wehr conducted an experiment in which a group of people were plunged into darkness for 14 hours every day for a month.

It took some time for their sleep to regulate but by the fourth week the subjects had settled into a very distinct sleeping pattern. They slept first for four hours, then woke for one or two hours before falling into a second four-hour sleep.

Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists.

In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a seminal paper, drawn from 16 years of research, revealing a wealth of historical evidence that humans used to sleep in two distinct chunks.

His book At Day’s Close: Night in Times Past, published four years later, unearths more than 500 references to a segmented sleeping pattern – in diaries, court records, medical books and literature, from Homer’s Odyssey to an anthropological account of modern tribes in Nigeria.

Much like the experience of Wehr’s subjects, these references describe a first sleep which began about two hours after dusk, followed by waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.

“It’s not just the number of references – it is the way they refer to it, as if it was common knowledge,” Ekirch says.

During this waking period people were quite active. They often got up, went to the toilet or smoked tobacco and some even visited neighbours. Most people stayed in bed, read, wrote and often prayed. Countless prayer manuals from the late 15th Century offered special prayers for the hours in between sleeps.

And these hours weren’t entirely solitary – people often chatted to bed-fellows or had sex.

A doctor’s manual from 16th Century France even advised couples that the best time to conceive was not at the end of a long day’s labour but “after the first sleep”, when “they have more enjoyment” and “do it better”.

Ekirch found that references to the first and second sleep started to disappear during the late 17th Century. This started among the urban upper classes in northern Europe and over the course of the next 200 years filtered down to the rest of Western society.

By the 1920s the idea of a first and second sleep had receded entirely from our social consciousness.

He attributes the initial shift to improvements in street lighting, domestic lighting and a surge in coffee houses – which were sometimes open all night. As the night became a place for legitimate activity and as that activity increased, the length of time people could dedicate to rest dwindled.

In his new book, Evening’s Empire, historian Craig Koslofsky puts forward an account of how this happened.

“Associations with night before the 17th Century were not good,” he says. The night was a place populated by people of disrepute – criminals, prostitutes and drunks.

“Even the wealthy, who could afford candlelight, had better things to spend their money on. There was no prestige or social value associated with staying up all night.”

That changed in the wake of the Reformation and the counter-Reformation. Protestants and Catholics became accustomed to holding secret services at night, during periods of persecution. If earlier the night had belonged to reprobates, now respectable people became accustomed to exploiting the hours of darkness.

This trend migrated to the social sphere too, but only for those who could afford to live by candlelight. With the advent of street lighting, however, socialising at night began to filter down through the classes.

In 1667, Paris became the first city in the world to light its streets, using wax candles in glass lamps. It was followed by Lille in the same year and Amsterdam two years later, where a much more efficient oil-powered lamp was developed.

London didn’t join their ranks until 1684 but by the end of the century, more than 50 of Europe’s major towns and cities were lit at night.

Night became fashionable and spending hours lying in bed was considered a waste of time.

A small city like Leipzig in central Germany employed 100 men to tend to 700 lamps
“People were becoming increasingly time-conscious and sensitive to efficiency, certainly before the 19th Century,” says Roger Ekirch. “But the industrial revolution intensified that attitude by leaps and bounds.”

Strong evidence of this shifting attitude is contained in a medical journal from 1829 which urged parents to force their children out of a pattern of first and second sleep.

“If no disease or accident there intervene, they will need no further repose than that obtained in their first sleep, which custom will have caused to terminate by itself just at the usual hour.

“And then, if they turn upon their ear to take a second nap, they will be taught to look upon it as an intemperance not at all redounding to their credit.”

Today, most people seem to have adapted quite well to the eight-hour sleep, but Ekirch believes many sleeping problems may have roots in the human body’s natural preference for segmented sleep as well as the ubiquity of artificial light.

This could be the root of a condition called sleep maintenance insomnia, where people wake during the night and have trouble getting back to sleep, he suggests.

The condition first appears in literature at the end of the 19th Century, at the same time as accounts of segmented sleep disappear.

“For most of evolution we slept a certain way,” says sleep psychologist Gregg Jacobs. “Waking up during the night is part of normal human physiology.”

The idea that we must sleep in a consolidated block could be damaging, he says, if it makes people who wake up at night anxious, as this anxiety can itself prohibit sleeps and is likely to seep into waking life too.

Russell Foster, a professor of circadian [body clock] neuroscience at Oxford, shares this point of view.

“Many people wake up at night and panic,” he says. “I tell them that what they are experiencing is a throwback to the bi-modal sleep pattern.”

But the majority of doctors still fail to acknowledge that a consolidated eight-hour sleep may be unnatural.

“Over 30% of the medical problems that doctors are faced with stem directly or indirectly from sleep. But sleep has been ignored in medical training and there are very few centres where sleep is studied,” he says.

Jacobs suggests that the waking period between sleeps, when people were forced into periods of rest and relaxation, could have played an important part in the human capacity to regulate stress naturally.

In many historic accounts, Ekirch found that people used the time to meditate on their dreams.

“Today we spend less time doing those things,” says Dr Jacobs. “It’s not a coincidence that, in modern life, the number of people who report anxiety, stress, depression, alcoholism and drug abuse has gone up.”

So the next time you wake up in the middle of the night, think of your pre-industrial ancestors and relax. Lying awake could be good for you.

A link to the original article is HERE

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Problems Sleeping

For many of us it is hard enough to enjoy a decent night’s sleep without adding to the problems sleeping by our own actions. Here are a few of the most frequent sleep wreckers and how to avoid them.
However, if your inability to get to sleep, or stay asleep, lasts for more than 30 days your insomnia might be simply a symptom of another problem. Common ailments such as arthritis, acid reflux, and asthma can all cause problems with sleep. And, of course, depression is well known for causing insomnia. If you have been battling sleep issues for a month or more it is past time to see your doctor.

• Banish blue light from the bedroom. The reason is because the short waves of blue light can disrupt sleep. Sounds fishy but several years ago I bought a new TV for the bedroom and the power button was illuminated with a very bright blue LED. Within a few days of setting it up I noticed I was having problems sleeping and was waking up during the night staring at that stupid light. Eventually I put a piece of black electrician’s tape over it and the problem was solved. But I was always curious why that one light could cause me problems sleeping. This is why.

• Keep the bedroom reserved for sleep and sex only. No TV (although I admit I still have one), no phone calls, no working on the bills in bed. Do away with anything not related to rest or relaxing. And keep the temperature down. Studies show that most of us sleep best at 68 to 72 degrees.

• Resist caffeine after about noon. And this isn’t just coffee but all foods that have caffeine like chocolate. Even some of the popular OTC pain relievers have caffeine so read the labels.

• Don’t eat heavy meals later in the day. If you do, your digestive system has to work all that much harder to do its thing and that can make for problems sleeping. Make dinner a light meal and no snacks at all for at least an hour before turning off the lights.

• And speaking of lights start to dim the house lights about two or three hours ahead of bed time. When you lower the lights the reduced illumination sends a signal to the brain to start producing melatonin which is a natural sleep inducing substance.


• If you smoke you know you should quit don’t you? Great, but until you do, cut back on how much you smoke for at least four hours before bed time. Why? Nicotine is a stimulant much the same as caffeine and causes as many problems sleeping.

• Keep the pets in their own bed. It’s hard enough to sleep with a human partner but adding a pet makes sleep that much more difficult. They will move around during the night just like a person does plus they can trigger allergies. Fido needs his own bed!

• Be careful with medications. On a night when you can’t get to sleep nothing is more tempting than a sleeping pill. But they must be used only under a doctor’s care and direction. The chemicals in most sleeping pills are very addictive and can also have unpleasant side effects.

So there are eight suggestions on how to deal with your problems sleeping. Hopefully you will find that one or more of them will work for you because nothing is worse than not being able to sleep.

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Sunshine

The two most significant things in overcoming depression rapidly and naturally, without drugs, are working out, and natural light. Seems too simple? Well, yes and no. You see, anytime a person is getting depressed, something as basic as getting up to answer the phone can be a problem. The commitment is just not there. You just don’t seem to have the energy or desire to make yourself move. But a little sunlight and a bit of exercise can work wonders.

Overcoming Depression with power of the sun

First of all, whatever it takes, force yourself to get up and get out of the house. Do it even if its cold, wear a coat if you have to, but get outside. Exposing yourself to sunlight boosts the bodies levels of serotonin. Serotonin acts like a neurotransmitter and one of its functions is elevation of mood. The nice thing about this is that its all free. All you have to do is get to where you can feel the sun and nature will take over. Its all natural and you are going to feel better very soon.

Overcoming Depression with the power of the human body

Now let’s move on to the other thing you must do to feel better and that is exercise. Some people consider this a dirty word and don’t want to talk about it at all. In fact, it appears that there are two very different camps when it comes to exercise. One camp has the people that can’t stand it, think it is highly over rated and don’t want to talk about it. These folks practically have to be tricked into any exercise more strenuous than walking from their car to the door. These are also the same folks who hunt endlessly for the parking space closest to the mall entrance.


On the other hand, the folks in the other camp can’t ever get enough exercise. These are the ones that have one of the secrets of happiness, even if they don’t realize it. Exercise releases another type of neurotransmitter called endorphins. Endorphins are responsible for the “runner’s high” you may have heard about. The best description of what endorphins do is to say that they act a lot like opiates in that they produce a feeling of wonderful well being. Endorphins are nature’s way to make us feel better and, again, they are free!

The bottom line is this: If you are depressed you can feel better within minutes. Overcoming depression is not a sentence. You’ve got all the power, and all of the control. Do not be too hard on yourself. Enjoy yourself. You are worthy of it, honestly you are, regardless of how you may feel at the moment. Now, get into gear, put on a jacket if you need one, and head outdoors for a walk around the block. You will be feeling better shortly.

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Depression

When it comes to the two genders, depression symptoms in women are much different than the symptoms for men. To begin with the female of the species is just more prone to depression than are the males, and the causes of depression in women are frequently different as are even the resulting patterns of symptoms.

There are numerous factors contributing to the pattern of depression symptoms in women including factors like reproductive hormones, the way a women responds to stress, and social pressures. Understand what these factors are and learning about them is a very good start to helping you reduce your overall risk of depression, and to be able to treat it effectively if it does occur.

Understanding Depression Symptoms in Women

Depression is not just a “bad mood” or a “case of the blues”. On the contrary depression is very often a serious condition that affects every aspect of your daily life. Depression can easily disrupt your social life, interpersonal relationships, career prospects, and, probably worst of all, your sense of your own self-worth. The National Mental Health Association estimates that roughly one in every eight women will develop symptoms of depression at one point or another during her lifetime. This is roughly twice the rate of depression in men.

But the good news is that depression, even severe depression, is treatable. The more understanding you have about the implications of depression symptoms in women, and the impact depression can visit on your life the better prepared you are to deal with depression symptoms head on should they take place.

Signs and symptoms of depression in women

The signs of depression in women are not hard to determine when you understand what to look for. Common complaints include:


 Long term bad mood
 Lack of interest in activities you previously enjoyed
 Persistent feelings of guilt, or hopelessness
 Thoughts of suicide or constant thoughts of death
 Changes in sleeping habits (sleeping less or more)
 Changes in appetite; rapid weight gain or loss
 Unable to concentrate
 Low energy, quickly fatigued

Differences between depression symptoms in women and those in men

While the warning signs and symptoms of depression are the pretty much the same for both men and women, overall women experience some specific symptoms more frequently than do men. One example of this is what is known as “seasonal affective disorder’, the depression brought on by the lower levels of sunlight in the winter months, is far more common in women than men. Women are also far more susceptible to “atypical depression”.

The symptoms of atypical depression, are sleeping more, eating more (especially carbohydrate heavy “comfort” food) and rapid weight gain. Rather than sleeping less, eating less, and losing weight, additionally, women suffer guilt feeling at a much higher rate than do men.
Women also suffer thyroid problems much more than men. Because the disease hypothyroidism can cause depression, all women should consult with their doctor to assess this possibility before committing to a therapy regimen.

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Hallucination

Hypnagogic hallucinations are what occurs when a person is asleep but sees, hears or feels things and experiences them as real although they’re asleep. These dreams can be very terrifying, which explains why the most widespread hypnagogic hallucinations are a jerk awake when a person feels they are falling right before they fall asleep. Though these hallucinations appear like dreams, they’re, in reality, not true dreams. A large number of outside effects such as Insomnia, illness, overdose of medicine, or irregular sleep behaviour could cause them.

Hypnagogia is really a sleep problem and a lot of people might have this sleep issue for a long time without being aware that they’ve been experiencing hypnagogic hallucinations. For many, these hallucinations may seem like bad dreams, or signs of a psychiatric or psychological condition however, these hallucinations won’t be indications of mental or emotional difficulties.


Hypnagogic hallucinations are generally not mentally related in the least, but are a sleep/wake cycle dilemma. They are the consequence of a misfiring inside the brain and are completely organic and natural. If you suspect you are addressing hypnagogic hallucinations your best strategy would be to seek the advice of a sleep specialist. Understanding that specialist would probably have you stay in overnight in a sleep center in order to effectively identify your symptoms.

And you can help yourself also. Listed here are six suggestions to help reduce the impact of hypnagogic hallucinations:

1. Have a regular sleep schedule and get enough sleep (6-8 hours) nightly.
2. Work to control stress. Having time for pleasure activities such as meditation, deep breathing, yoga and so on can be very useful to controlling stress.
3. Talk with your doctor to be sure your prescription drugs are not responsible for causing hallucinations.
4. Discuss with your personal doctor should you think about talking to a sleep specialist and having a sleep study done.
5. Always remember that hypnagogic hallucinations are quite common and not a sign of a more serious mental or psychological issue
6. Record a sleep diary to keep track of your symptoms to recognize any possible patterns.

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