6 Harmful Effects Of Lack Of Sleep

One sleepless night can make you feel grumpy, tired, and irritated. Now imagine how prolonged sleep deprivation can affect your body. It can affect your well-being and your ability to do everyday activities and have an adverse effect on your overall health. The recommended sleep hours are between 7 to 9 hours.

Apart from lack of focus and bad mood lack of sleep can cost you a lot. Here are 6 harmful effects of sleep deprivation.

Obesity:

Lack of sleep can make you hungry as it is related to an increase in appetite and hunger and possibly lead to obesity. Lack of sleep can even stimulate cravings for high carbohydrate and high-fat foods.

According to a 2004 study, people who sleep less than six hours a day were almost 30 percent more likely to become obese than those who slept seven to nine hours.

Increase the risk of chronic diseases:

Long-term disruption of sleep can increase the risk of many chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, or high blood pressure.

Drain your mental health:

It can drain your mental health and affect both your physical and mental health. It can even lead to memory issues. Sleep plays a role in learning and thinking, lack of sleep can hurt these cognitive processes in many ways. It can impair attention, concentration, alertness, and reasoning. Since lack of sleep leave your brain exhausted, it can make it difficult to perform, thus finds it difficult to even learn new things.

Chances of accidents:

Feeling grumpy, tired while you are doing something can divert your attention which can lead to different kinds of accidents. Lack of concentration and focus due to sleep deprivation can slow your reaction time which can also be a reason for many accidents.

Studies show that sleep loss and poor-quality sleep also lead to accidents and injuries on the job.

Ages your skin:

Many people have experienced puffy eyes and pale skin after missing a few nights of proper sleep. It not only has a short-term effect but it turns out that chronic sleep loss can lead to dark circles, fine lines, and lack luster skin. If you don't get enough sleep, your body releases the stress hormone, cortisol and when it is in excess amount, it can break down skin collagen, a protein that helps to keep your skin smooth. This can lead your skin to age early.

Anxiety and depression:

Lack of sleep can contribute to the symptoms of depression. They are interlinked as lack of sleep can lead to anxiety and anxiety can lead to insomnia. It seems like they feed on each other.

In a 2007 study of 10,000 people, those with insomnia were five times as likely to develop depression as those without. In fact, insomnia is often one of the first symptoms of depression.

Lack of sleep can affect the way we interpret events. It can hurt our ability to make sound judgments. Thus it has a number of harmful effects.

Results, published in 2007, showed that those who had cut their sleep from seven to five hours or fewer a night nearly doubled their risk of death from all causes.

If you are suffering from any mental health issue seek help. You can contact a therapist.

Recommending Psychologists and Therapists are:

1. Life Coach Steffi Prasad - Psychologist & Therapists - Uptopia Life Coach in Siliguri, West Bengal, India.

www.steffiprasad.com

2. Khusboo Tomar - Psychologist: Centre for Forensic & Clinical Psychology