When I think of sleeping, it irritates me. I know that when I get into my bed, I won’t go to sleep. It’s almost like I fear sleeping. I hate sleeping. No I don’t, but I hate the falling asleep part of it because I can’t. When I go to bed, I think of all the reasons why I should fall asleep until I actually am asleep. The time I spend doing that until the time I actually fall asleep varies tremendously. Sometimes it will take me hours and sometimes I won’t even remember when or how I got myself to sleep. And sometimes, I just stay up all night because don’t want to fight with myself and I just wait until I am tired enough to fall asleep. According to the New York Times, “all nighters is an exploration of insomnia, sleep and the nocturnal life.” I am way beyond exploration. Yes, I consider myself an insomniac.
Most of us spend half our lives sleeping away, some more than others. But did you know that on average we are supposed to sleep only six and a half to seven and a half hours every night? No more, no less. According to Blue who wrote How Much Sleep Do We Really Need? from TIME, the people who slept between six and a half to seven and a half hours every night live the longest compared to the rest of us who sleeps more or less of that amount. They have not discovered a reason why, but that is just the way it is. Who would have ever thought that sleeping less could be good for you? Not me until now, but that still doesn’t mean not going to sleep at all is good.
Thomas Bartlett who wrote the Stay Awake Men for the New York Times made it clear that not sleeping for a long amount of time could have its lasting effects on you. In his blog, he wrote about the men who stayed awake for incredibly long hours to break ridiculous records for being awake. Back in 1959, Peter Tripp started the record for staying awake the longest while hosting his radio station and setting the first record at 201 hours. This was twice the time of studies being done at the time because keeping someone awake to 100 hours, according to the studies, caused minor hallucinations and paranoia. This wake-a-thon might sound really cool, but Tripp did have his share of hallucinations.
He saw mice and kittens scampering around the makeshift studio. He was convinced that his shoes were full of spiders. He thought a desk drawer was on fire. When a man in a dark overcoat showed up, Tripp imagined him to be an undertaker and ran terrified into the street. He had to be dragged back inside. (Bartlett)
Despite the effects, the wake-a-thon was a hit and many other DJs started doing it for ratings. The one to ultimately break the record was a high school teenager named Randy Gardner. He didn’t want to do it for fame or ratings, but instead a science fair project. He too had hallucinations while he reached the record breaker of 264 hours without sleep.
At one point, he saw a path leading to a quiet forest, even though he was indoors at the time. The white teenager also believed himself to be the black running back for the San Diego Chargers. (Bartlett)
Later on in Randy’s life, he had to fight with himself for sleep. It’s like a curse to him. He said, “‘Maybe it’s karma…like the universe saying ‘Oh, you don’t want to sleep? Well, there you go!’”
I thought this was helpful to anyone who would like to try not sleeping for days. Who would want to stay up anymore knowing that they will have to fight for sleep? I already do fight for sleep, so I couldn’t imagine how devastating it is for him to fight with it every night until three in the morning “slamming doors and screaming with frustration.” I wouldn’t want to go there.
But then if sleep is so good for us, why don’t we do it more often and more peacefully? What is sleep, really? Yes there have been many beneficial purposes but there have not been any scientific reasons as to why we have been “programmed” to just do it since the day we were born. It must be really important if we have just been “programmed” to do it, right? And defying it, like the people I mentioned above, will come with consequences. In What is Sleep? by Siri Hustvedt, she claims to have been awake, but experience life like dreams that she knows to be untrue, yet she is experiencing it. I know I have experienced this many times before also. For example, I will be lying on the bed just day dreaming, but then I will experience an almost hazy crossover to notice that my husband is in the room with me, talking to me. At this realization, I remember that he is on campus and cannot be home. If he is on campus, then who is this other person standing in my room? I suddenly stand up to find that there is no one in my room but myself. This happens to me often, with other people of course in different settings all the time. So then was I sleeping, or was I awake? Could this be Hustvedt and my punishment for not wanting to sleep like Tripp and Gardner, the record breakers, or is there something else that scientists have not figured out yet?
Something else scientists did figure out is that insomnia isn’t all bad. According to In Sleepless Nights, a Hope for Treating Depression by Terry Sejnowski, insomnia could be quite relieving for someone who is depressed. If the person who is depressed stays up the night before or at least for the last half of their night, their depression level will be much lower by the next morning. This sounds great, but it is not a lasting effect and cannot be supported for the effect of insomnia. Now, this is not suggesting anyone with stress and depression deprive themselves of sleep to lower their depression levels. It is only saying that the study of sleep deprivation could lead to a cure for depression. I think there is a great new start here. The only problem is scientists don’t want to promote insomnia. They don’t have to.
Modern times give every reason for young adults and adults to stay up all night now. Anything you do in the day time, anyone can do during the night, if their age permits. It’s not like is it back then anymore; every shop closed down for the night so that its employees can go home to their families and sleep. Now, there are bars, clubs, Wal-Mart, fast food restaurants, restaurants that open 24/7 like IHOP and Denny’s, etc. It’s impossible now to keep the night life away. So is it possible that we might not need sleep at all? Because it seems like we are given options here to do so. And if we could be programmed to not need sleep, would you? For every night that you stay up later than usual, you are exploring insomnia. The more you do it, the more you will become immune to it and you will have to ability to stay up later than the night before, or so in my experience. I love the night life. It’s calming and beautiful. There aren’t as many people and less cars, depending on where you are. I am more relaxed and the drives around town are so soothing. The view of the moon and the stars are too beautiful to pass up. I would stay up forever if it was possible.
--Nalee Xiong
No comments:
Post a Comment