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One factor that determines when we sleep is the circadian rhythm, which is determined by when the person usually feels ready for bed and how early they rise in the morning. Although each human has a unique circadian rhythm, young children tend to be early risers, teenagers are often night owls, adults go both ways, and the elderly return to being early risers. Another factor, independent of the circadian rhythm, is the level of the chemical adenosine secreted by the brain. From the time a person rises, this brain secretion builds up, and when it reaches a certain level, the body is signaled to sleep. This natural process can be disrupted by the addition of caffeine or simply fighting sleep through sheer will.
What happens while you sleep depends on where you are in the sleep cycle. The architecture of sleep is a predictable pattern of 90-minute cycles of sleep that repeat throughout the night. For the minimum of 7.5 hours, a person must complete five such cycles. Each cycle includes REM sleep, named for the consistent rapid eye movements seen during this sleep time, and also NREM sleep, non-REM or deep sleep, which features no such eye movements and is divided into four levels. During the early night sleep, or early cycles, deep sleep dominates, but during the morning hours of sleep, REM sleep takes the larger portion of the 90-minute cycle. As the night progresses, the different health-promoting functions change in quality and quantity, reflecting sleep’s wisdom.
In the daytime, our brain waves are active and chaotic, reflecting all the centers of the brain that are being used. The thalamus, the sensory gate to the brain, is open during this time as well, allowing all the sensory input to be taken in.
During deep sleep, however, the electric brain waves are slow and fairly regular, as they travel in syncopation from the frontal cortex to the back of the brain. In order for this cleansing to remain undisturbed, the thalamus closes and blocks any input, sensory or internal. These slow waves wash away any unnecessary neural connections made during the day and transfer the more valued memories from short-term to long-term storage. The deep sleep reflects on these experiences, cleaning the mind and selecting and storing memories.
The REM sleep brain wave pattern looks just like the brain waves of the person who is fully awake: highly active and chaotic as, again, all parts of the brain are involved. The thalamus gate is open—not to the outside world of the senses, but rather to the emotions, motivations, and memories that were activated during that day. This REM active brain prevents physical activity, as a state of atonia is achieved by a disabling signal that is sent down the length of the spinal cord. This essentially stops the voluntary muscles from moving. REM sleep integrates all the experiences—emotional, learning, physical—to give them context and meaning. It adds to and orders the new information to meld into the perceptual and experiential framework of the person. By this, appropriate memories and perceptions are added to the biographical memory. Dreams are also a part of REM sleep; they perform two functions: nursing and healing our emotional and mental health through nighttime therapy, and problem-solving and creativity.
During my time working with Dr. Bassam Awwa at Connecticut Behavioral Health Associates in New London, I’ve noticed that among the things that often hinder a person’s most authentic and healthy self are depression, anxiety, past trauma, and other disorders. And one thing that can trigger and exacerbate these mental health issues is a lack of solid sleep.
esearch shows just how important a good night’s sleep—defined as at least
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REM sleep resets and recalibrates the regions of the brain that read and decode meaning and emotional signals.
The proscription is that we need at least 7.5 hours of sleep so that we get enough of both NREM and REM sleep to complete the refreshing, resetting, revitalizing functions of the brain. The results of not getting this required dosage of sleep are loss of attention and concentration, emotional irrationality and volatility, depression, anxiety, and forgetfulness. So, for your greater mental health, please sleep!
If you have further questions about the importance of sleep or how to improve the quality of your sleep, visit our website at www.ctbehavioralhealthassociates.com or call our New London practice at (860) 437-6914.
By Ann Sawyer, LCSW
Connecticut Behavioral Health Associates
7.5 to 9 hours each night—is to mental and physical health. The impact of sleep’s quality and quantity is multifaceted and profound. As a therapist with a degree in psychology from the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in social work with a clinical specialty from the University of Chicago, I work to help my clients find and free their best selves.
References
Walker, Matther, PhD. “Why We Sleep” Scribner, New York, 2017.
How do dreams help our emotional and mental health? In dream REM sleep, the emotional and memory centers are activated but, unlike in awake time, no stress hormone is present. This way, the emotional charge, or load, associated with the experience can be removed. At the same time, what is valuable to learn or remember is processed and integrated into the memory and understanding that makes up the person’s beliefs, rules of behaviors, and definition of self. This removal of the pain, distress, and trauma of the experience serves as a soothing balm, allowing the person to wake up the next day feeling at peace. If REM sleep can’t accomplish this, greater anxiety, depression, and discomfort are carried over from one day into the next, contributing to mental health disorders. REM sleep also resets and recalibrates the regions of the brain that read and decode meaning and emotional signals, again helping the person to start each day fresh.
The second function is problem-solving and creativity, both of which need to be studied further. There are some interesting anecdotes from the likes of Albert Einstein and others who report that their discoveries came to them in dreams. Thomas Edison consciously used this phenomenon, which he called the “genius gap,” by taking naps when he had an unsolved question and then upon waking recording the inspirations that came to him in his sleep.
Sponsored by Connecticut Behavioral Health Associates, P.C.
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