Many people experience fatigue throughout the day, but it doesn’t always mean you’re suffering from sleep disorders. It just means that you need more sleep. Fortunately, you can improve your sleeping habits by making sure you have enough time at night to rest. Aside from the amount of time you need to sleep, there are many factors that can affect the quality of your sleep. Depending on your age, health, and lifestyle, you might need as much as 7-8 hours of sleep each night. If you are a teenager, however, you might need a shorter night’s sleep.
During sleep, our brain has a number of different functions. Among these are energy and metabolism regulation, immune system development, detoxification, brain maturation, and synaptic optimization. Although human beings inherited the ability to sleep from birds, it was not until the late 20th century that humans began to develop the ability to do the same. Our bodies evolved to regulate our wakefulness and sleep using a complex system of neurotransmitters and circadian rhythms. Our body’s REM sleep cycle can last up to 20 hours, depending on the type of sleep and the duration.
The basic structure of the sleeping process is quite simple. The body goes through five stages, from stage one to stage five, with the first one being non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM) and the last one, known as REM. Our brain also releases an anti-diuretic hormone under our circadian rhythm, which switches off the need to pee overnight. During this phase, we’re in the deepest, most lucid state of our lives.
