Catching up on/storing up sleep...?

[filmguy123]

So I've heard all of these studies or people that say you can't store up sleep or can't catch up on sleep, but I find this not to really be true from my own experience. But maybe there is another explanation?

If I get a couple really good nights of sleep in a row, and then get 1-2 hours the next night, I'm usually ok for the day after. And then if I do that again, I get very tired. But if I've consistenly been getting not very good or just normal nights sleep, and sleep 1-2 hours one night, I'm usually much more tired.

Also, if I just switch from being very overtired to a "normal" night sleep, it doesn't help as much as getting even more sleep.

This just seems common sense, so where does this fit with studies saying otherwise?

 

[Thomas J. O'Hara]

I don't know, my brother always insisted that he had this thing called a "sleep debt".

like if he didn't get enough sleep the night before, he had to sleep extra to make up for it. Personally, I thought it was a load o' crap. I always argued with him about it, because for me, I can pull an all nighter with no sleep, and then sleep for 6 hours and be fine when i wake up. or if i have plenty of sleep but I have a long hard day of work, I might sleep 10 hours that night.

I think it depends on the person and the circumstances for how much sleep we need, but i don't believe in the "sleep debt".

 

[thartley]

Personally, I find that a sudden lack of sleep, an acute difference from the normal amount I would usually get, I dont feel it so much the next day as I do the second day. Like being in a car accident...you feel it worse two days after. And it seems like I have to get tons of sleep to make up for the small amount I missed.

But I am 43 yrs old....and bitchy as hell when my sleep is messed with. Sleep is good.

 

[Batutta]

Childhood ends when you start looking forward to sleep.

 

[HBlack]

Thank god I haven't reached that yet.

Looking forward to sleeping in on the other hand...

 

[JasonFox]

Childhood ends when you start looking forward to sleep.

But your second childhood begins when your kids start sleeping through the night. I hope.

 

[thartley]

Childhood ends when you start looking forward to sleep.

R. I. P.

 

[Wild Imagination Films]

I've been a paramedic so long I've forgotten what sleep is all about. Someone told me the other day "sleep is the period of time between calls."

 

[MattinSTL]

Childhood ends when you start looking forward to sleep.

I'll bet you could make about 6 such sentences that would define a person's life cycle, from birth to death.

Your statement feels mournfully profound... like I must be in stage 3.



As for storing up sleep? I doubt it... again, depends on the person, but a little extra seems to do it for me. I get my absolute best sleep when I'm dead tired, and then it doesn't seem to take as much to make me feel rested.

I think it also depends on what you have to look forward to when you wake up... anytime I go out of town I can make it easily on 5 or so hours of sleep and feel rested. When I'm doing work that I hate... I never feel rested, even with 8 hours.

I think the amount of sleep a person needs is tied to how much they're enjoying their waking life.

 

[Capt Quirk]

A big part of the picture, is whether or not you sleep at night or day. Without the Sun and it's vitamin D, you will feel more tired. But, if you wake up and get some sunlight, it will energize you- something night shift people miss out on.

As for me, I won't swear for or against banking sleep, but if I only get 6 hours one night, I am more than ready to get 9 the next night. I have kids, so any sort of sleep after sun up is pretty well out of the question. What is wrong with them? Don't they understand I'm old and wore out?