Do we really need 7-8 hours of sleep ? Does low stress/faster metabolism lower the time our body's require to rest ?

[JamesGatz]

I noticed that when my health was bad or when I had a stressful job I could sleep 10 hours a day probably - I know that if I had a long day at work and only got 6 hours of sleep I would wake up very tired and with adrenaline pumping - did not feel well rested at all - I would get so tired from my job that I would take a nap during my lunch break sometimes or even nap as soon as I got home

Stressed-out worms hit the snooze button

When you catch a nasty cold, curling up in bed to sleep may be the only activity you can manage. Sleeping in response to stress isn't a uniquely human behavior: many other animals have the same reaction, and it's not clear why. While the circadian sleep that follows the pattern of the clock has...

www.sciencedaily.com

"When you catch a nasty cold, curling up in bed to sleep may be the only activity you can manage. Sleeping in response to stress isn't a uniquely human behavior: many other animals have the same reaction, and it's not clear why"

Stressed Rats Cast Doubt on Sleep's Ability to Produce New Neurons

www.scientificamerican.com

"Prior studies had found that sleep-deprived rodents grow fewer new neurons than well-rested animals, suggesting that sleep somehow promotes the birth of brain cells, called neurogenesis. But that might not be the case: researchers report instead that lack of sleep likely cuts into neurogenesis by triggering a harmful stress response."

scientificamerican.com/article/stressed-rats-cast-doubt/

"Psychological stressors have a prominent effect on sleep in general, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep in particular. Disruptions in sleep are a prominent feature, and potentially even the hallmark, of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Ross et al., 1989). Animal models are critical in understanding both the causes and potential treatments of psychiatric disorders."


Lately I've been experimenting with interesting sleep factors - I notice that now that I am very low-stress throughout the day and that if I sleep with a heat lamp on near my bed - I wake up after 5.5-6 hours feeling well rested - this had never happened to me before this

Is there a lot more to sleep than this or is this most of what the body needs to do ?

I have recently viewed sleep as the way of the body healing of everything we do throughout the day and I do think that one knows when their sleep is adequate when they feel "well rested" rather than counting the number of hours- I was thinking It's interesting that one feels inclined to nap or sleep after a physically exhausting activity maybe when their thyroid isn't supporting them and they are running on stress hormones - does the body induce the sleepiness to then heal from the damage done by the stress hormones ?

If our sleep environment is metabolically encouraging (i.e. sleeping with a small light on that is on the warm-color spectrum or something similar) does that reduce the time needed for our bodies to sleep ?​

 

[TheSir]

The extent of one's need for sleep seems to be mostly determined by how much, in layman's terms, repair and cleaning work the body has to routinely carry out, as well as how deep and uninterrupted their sleep is. To generalize, the hours you sleep before naturally waking up feeling refreshed (if ever) directly correlate with your state of health. In Buteyko circles it is said that by being at a level of breathing volume that could be considered physiologically optimal (=60sec control pause), one would only need to sleep 4-6 hours each night. Yogis have pushed this even further through the millennia of their own empirical scientific research, having learned to create circumstances that allow them to forgo sleeping altogether for multiple days with no ill effects.

The same factors that determine how much you need to sleep also majorly contribute to how much you need to eat. The (sub-clinically) sick person needs a lot of quality food in order to function (and ideally in order to eventually get better). Not only does this need come from the significant damage their ineffective metabolism is causing to their bodies through the daily metabolic processes, but even their digestion is less efficient at extracting value from the food they ingest.

Thus when you get to a level of health where you need to sleep very little, you will also be at a level where you need to eat very little. You could thrive on a bit of bread and vegetables, or a couple of glasses of milk. If you had to, you could digest even bone. At this point, macronutrient ratios and micronutrient RDA's would no more mean much.

 

[JamesGatz]

The extent of one's need for sleep seems to be mostly determined by how much, in layman's terms, repair and cleaning work the body has to routinely carry out, as well as how deep and uninterrupted their sleep is. To generalize, the hours you sleep before naturally waking up feeling refreshed (if ever) directly correlate with your state of health. In Buteyko circles it is said that by being at a level of breathing volume that could be considered physiologically optimal (=60sec control pause), one would only need to sleep 4-6 hours each night. Yogis have pushed this even further through the millennia of their own empirical scientific research, having learned to create circumstances that allow them to forgo sleeping altogether for multiple days with no ill effects.

The same factors that determine how much you need to sleep also majorly contribute to how much you need to eat. The (sub-clinically) sick person needs a lot of quality food in order to function (and ideally in order to eventually get better). Not only does this need come from the significant damage their ineffective metabolism is causing to their bodies through the daily metabolic processes, but even their digestion is less efficient at extracting value from the food they ingest.

Thus when you get to a level of health where you need to sleep very little, you will also be at a level where you need to eat very little. You could thrive on a bit of bread and vegetables, or a couple of glasses of milk. If you had to, you could digest even bone. At this point, macronutrient ratios and micronutrient RDA's would no more mean much.

Very interesting - I notice that when I had a stressful job I felt like I could just "run through" food - as if I could just eat a large meal on my lunch break and it would go through my body so fast when working - now that I am low-stress I feel like my body really "enjoys" the food for a lack of a better food - like it is really taking the time to digest and process and when I was stressed I felt like the body was in a rush to get things done and it felt a lot more uncomfortable

 

[Dr. B]

The extent of one's need for sleep seems to be mostly determined by how much, in layman's terms, repair and cleaning work the body has to routinely carry out, as well as how deep and uninterrupted their sleep is. To generalize, the hours you sleep before naturally waking up feeling refreshed (if ever) directly correlate with your state of health. In Buteyko circles it is said that by being at a level of breathing volume that could be considered physiologically optimal (=60sec control pause), one would only need to sleep 4-6 hours each night. Yogis have pushed this even further through the millennia of their own empirical scientific research, having learned to create circumstances that allow them to forgo sleeping altogether for multiple days with no ill effects.

The same factors that determine how much you need to sleep also majorly contribute to how much you need to eat. The (sub-clinically) sick person needs a lot of quality food in order to function (and ideally in order to eventually get better). Not only does this need come from the significant damage their ineffective metabolism is causing to their bodies through the daily metabolic processes, but even their digestion is less efficient at extracting value from the food they ingest.

Thus when you get to a level of health where you need to sleep very little, you will also be at a level where you need to eat very little. You could thrive on a bit of bread and vegetables, or a couple of glasses of milk. If you had to, you could digest even bone. At this point, macronutrient ratios and micronutrient RDA's would no more mean much.

when youre at that level of health do you mean you can still build muscle, perform sexually, have hair and all those things, yet need to eat very little?
didnt Ray mention something about needing less calories on thyroid, the body becoming more efficient or something at digesting absorbing food... although i wonder if that only applies to people who had a wasteful metabolism where calories are wasted...

the food, water is so toxic these days, simply limiting intake would automatically cause massive improvements, not necessarily from consuming less calories but just from ingesting less toxins. there's a lot of food out there that is so bad it's probably better to starve. i dont mean just pufa but things like carrageenan, gums, all those odd chemicals and fillers which are toxic even in milligram and microgram dosages...

 

[redsun]

I noticed that when my health was bad or when I had a stressful job I could sleep 10 hours a day probably - I know that if I had a long day at work and only got 6 hours of sleep I would wake up very tired and with adrenaline pumping - did not feel well rested at all - I would get so tired from my job that I would take a nap during my lunch break sometimes or even nap as soon as I got home

View attachment 30263

Stressed-out worms hit the snooze button

When you catch a nasty cold, curling up in bed to sleep may be the only activity you can manage. Sleeping in response to stress isn't a uniquely human behavior: many other animals have the same reaction, and it's not clear why. While the circadian sleep that follows the pattern of the clock has...

www.sciencedaily.com

"When you catch a nasty cold, curling up in bed to sleep may be the only activity you can manage. Sleeping in response to stress isn't a uniquely human behavior: many other animals have the same reaction, and it's not clear why"

Stressed Rats Cast Doubt on Sleep's Ability to Produce New Neurons

www.scientificamerican.com

"Prior studies had found that sleep-deprived rodents grow fewer new neurons than well-rested animals, suggesting that sleep somehow promotes the birth of brain cells, called neurogenesis. But that might not be the case: researchers report instead that lack of sleep likely cuts into neurogenesis by triggering a harmful stress response."

scientificamerican.com/article/stressed-rats-cast-doubt/

"Psychological stressors have a prominent effect on sleep in general, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep in particular. Disruptions in sleep are a prominent feature, and potentially even the hallmark, of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Ross et al., 1989). Animal models are critical in understanding both the causes and potential treatments of psychiatric disorders."


Lately I've been experimenting with interesting sleep factors - I notice that now that I am very low-stress throughout the day and that if I sleep with a heat lamp on near my bed - I wake up after 5.5-6 hours feeling well rested - this had never happened to me before this

Is there a lot more to sleep than this or is this most of what the body needs to do ?

I have recently viewed sleep as the way of the body healing of everything we do throughout the day and I do think that one knows when their sleep is adequate when they feel "well rested" rather than counting the number of hours- I was thinking It's interesting that one feels inclined to nap or sleep after a physically exhausting activity maybe when their thyroid isn't supporting them and they are running on stress hormones - does the body induce the sleepiness to then heal from the damage done by the stress hormones ?

If our sleep environment is metabolically encouraging (i.e. sleeping with a small light on that is on the warm-color spectrum or something similar) does that reduce the time needed for our bodies to sleep ?​

If you dont get at around 8 hours of sleep or more regularly and make a habit of not sleeping enough, your androgens will be suboptimal and can easily go below range. Not only that, but the CNS gets damaged and your experience of pleasure and enjoyment will diminish because the brain shuts itself down. Serotonin climbs to keep you sedentary and demotivate you from further straining your tired brain, so productivity falls as well. All around bad idea, sleep is too important.

 

[Dr. B]

If you dont get at around 8 hours of sleep or more regularly and make a habit of not sleeping enough, your androgens will be suboptimal and can easily go below range. Not only that, but the CNS gets damaged and your experience of pleasure and enjoyment will diminish because the brain shuts itself down. Serotonin climbs to keep you sedentary and demotivate you from further straining your tired brain, so productivity falls as well. All around bad idea, sleep is too important.

10 hours seems optimal especially to make up for past lost sleep i heard you can always make up sleep even if it was missed years prior

 

[redsun]

10 hours seems optimal especially to make up for past lost sleep i heard you can always make up sleep even if it was missed years prior

Maybe for a little bit you may feel the need for 10 hours to catch up on sleep, repair tissues and help the body regenerate. But eventually you won't feel the need to sleep that long. If you do even after awhile need 10 hours of sleep to feel optimal and dont feel optimal with 8 hours or so, then you would suspect hypersomnia.

 

[TheSir]

when youre at that level of health do you mean you can still build muscle, perform sexually, have hair and all those things, yet need to eat very little?

Yes exactly that. There was a professional boxer whose name I can't recall right now who did hundreds of pushups and situps each day on top of competitions, he slept for 3 hours and only ate once a day a meal of bread and salad.

 

[Androsclerosis]

You can also sleep more than regular when you eat a high number of calories during the day and before you get to bed. The effects of groginess and oversleeping were strong, mostly because food itself decreases cortisol levels during the night and wakening is delayed.

In some way, while having a high metabolic rate, the need of sleep is lower, especially because the quality of it is way higher than having a medium-low metabolic rate.
It´s known that taking T3 and T4 right before bad increases by a lot the quality of sleep.

 

[Lokzo]

I feel my absolute best energy wise if I sleep only 7 hours.
This also must be accompanied with POOR dream recall. Usually you’d think good recall of dreams = better sleep… not for me.
If my dreams are super intense and vivid, I wake up fatigued.
If I need to sleep longer than 8 hours - I know something is off.
When I was iron deficient- I was sleeping 8.5 hours consistently, which was not good.

 

[Dr. B]

Yes exactly that. There was a professional boxer whose name I can't recall right now who did hundreds of pushups and situps each day on top of competitions, he slept for 3 hours and only ate once a day a meal of bread and salad.

wow that's basically no protein or carbs or fats?! how

 

[BodhiBlues]

Anecdotally, when I used to meditate for 45 mins - 1.5 hours every day, I did very well on 5 - 6 hours of sleep a night. Now that I don't meditate consistently, I need 7 - 8 hours. Maybe it is stress related as meditating that much reduced my stress levels a lot or maybe it is because deep meditation is a very restful state.

 

[Michael Mohn]

Ray said that sleeping is an adaptation to darkness. The question is would we still need sleep under optimal light conditions? Peat experimented with red light during sleeping but the results were not satisfying. A few years ago I had no heating in my apartment for a few weeks in winter, which wasn't very cold at the time but still uncomfortable. My only heating was a 400W halogen lamp that I bought in a supply store for 15 bucks. I got used to sleeping in intense light really quickly and wasn't affected negatively but I had to spent 2-3 nights per week from home for professional reasons so I wasn't permanently sleeping under light. I think ambient light is better then direct light, meaning you want the light to be reflected from surfaces instead of light coming directly from the light source. Light being more red than blueish should be more beneficial for rest, obviously I think.

 

[Michael Mohn]

There was a British guy who tried to beat the record of being awake uninterrupted. He thought his raw food fruterian diet would make sleep dispensable as sleep was only required for detoxification and fruits are obviously toxin free, pure, clean, yada yada...
He beat the record but it was pure torture

 

[Dr. B]

Ray said that sleeping is an adaptation to darkness. The question is would we still need sleep under optimal light conditions? Peat experimented with red light during sleeping but the results were not satisfying. A few years ago I had no heating in my apartment for a few weeks in winter, which wasn't very cold at the time but still uncomfortable. My only heating was a 400W halogen lamp that I bought in a supply store for 15 bucks. I got used to sleeping in intense light really quickly and wasn't affected negatively but I had to spent 2-3 nights per week from home for professional reasons so I wasn't permanently sleeping under light. I think ambient light is better then direct light, meaning you want the light to be reflected from surfaces instead of light coming directly from the light source. Light being more red than blueish should be more beneficial for rest, obviously I think.

what do you mean by that?

 

[Michael Mohn]

what do you mean by that?

I mean that I slept for 2-3 weeks under a 400w halogen lamp which was my only heating source at night during that time and I slept well and rested.

 

[Dr. B]

I mean that I slept for 2-3 weeks under a 400w halogen lamp which was my only heating source at night during that time and I slept well and rested.

whyd you have to spend 2-3 nights per week from home for professional reasons
you mean 2-3 nights at home or away!

 

[JamesGatz]

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Ray said that sleeping is an adaptation to darkness. The question is would we still need sleep under optimal light conditions? Peat experimented with red light during sleeping but the results were not satisfying.

That is very interesting - I notice I have never felt sleepy during the day unless my metabolism wasn't optimal and I was dealing with stress - I do wonder as well what sleep would be like if there was sunlight 24/7

 

[Michael Mohn]

I always wanted to experience a Nordic summer, when the sun never goes down under the horizon. It must be magical, if the weather is good.

That is very interesting - I notice I have never felt sleepy during the day unless my metabolism wasn't optimal and I was dealing with stress - I do wonder as well what sleep would be like if there was sunlight 24/7

 

[Michael Mohn]

whyd you have to spend 2-3 nights per week from home for professional reasons
you mean 2-3 nights at home or away!

Away from home. I was working for clients and sleeping in hotels in different towns during the week.