How important is sleep?

Second only to breathing and eating, sleep is proprietary to life. Science has proven that there’s a direct link between quality and length of life, and quality of sleep. In other words, the better you sleep ... the better you live.

Rats normally live 2 to 3 years. If rats are totally deprived of sleep, they only live 2 to 3 weeks, a time frame similar to death by starvation. Although not as severe in humans, the amount of sleep we get does affect our lives. In fact when it comes to longevity, nothing is more important than sleep, not even exercise.

In 1910 people slept an average of 9 hours a night. Today, nearly one third of North Americans sleep as little as 6 hours a night. Studies show that people that sleep less than 7 hours a night, have a 70% higher mortality rate. Prolonged sleep deprivation and accumulated sleep debt is as detrimental to health, as poor nutrition and a sedentary lifestyle.

As we age nerve endings and little capillary blood vessels move closer to the skin’s surface, circulation decreases, and pressure points like the shoulders and hips become more sensitive to a firm sleep surface, restricting blood flow and causing discomfort. As a result our sleep becomes more fragile and easily disrupted.

Growing evidence shows that poor sleep, or lack of sleep, contributes to immune deficiencies, reduced recovery time from illness, increased susceptibility to colds and flus, and increased risk of developing obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and infections. Due to significant surges in blood pressure, heart attacks occur more frequently after a night of tossing and turning.

A good night’s sleep energises your body, improves memory and concentration, and affects your alertness, creativity, energy, mood, perception, productivity, reaction time, safety, thinking, and weight. While you sleep, the body repairs itself. Body temperature drops, and your body rebuilds energy. Tissue repair and growth is initiated as blood supply to your muscles increases, and your oxygen levels improve.

A good night’s sleep helps burn fat and calories more efficiently, reducing glucose escalation during sleep (excess glucose gets converted to fat). Sleep gives your heart and vascular system a much needed rest. When you’re sleep deprived, the hormones that regulate your appetite and blood sugar get out of whack. Good sleep helps you lose or maintain your weight more effectively.

A good night’s sleep is important to our oxygen levels. Lack of oxygen is the number one reason for depression, headaches and migraines. Low oxygen levels in body tissue is a sure indicator for disease, and the fundamental cause of all degenerative disease. It’s interesting to note that cancer cells cannot proliferate in an oxygen rich environment. Mattresses that take pressure off pressure points improve blood circulation, which results in improved oxygen flow to all parts of the body. The richer the oxygen content of your blood, the better your body functions, and the more your immune system strengthens, improving resistance to colds, flus, and infections.

Sleep disruptions affect the quantity and quality of sleep you receive. An unforgiving mattress can push the hip and torso upward, compacting, pinching and squeezing discs in the spine and vertebrae, creating spinal lordosis. A too firm mattress provides no support to the neck, lower back and knees, causing nerve entrapment in the shoulders, hips and elbows. Lower back pain and a reduction in sleep quality can be the result.

A too firm sleep surface aggravates pressure points causing fragmented sleep. It can restrict blood flow resulting in discomfort, causing the body to send messages to the brain to change the sleep position. The resulting tossing and turning can decrease the amount of “REM Deep Sleep” required for a good night’s sleep. Frequent trips to the bathroom at night are often the result of a fragmented sleep. Fragmented sleep can be as devastating as no sleep at all.

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