Sleep Deprivation Is More Dangerous Than You Think

Unless you lead the perfect life, odds are you've experienced at least one or two sleepless nights every once in awhile. Thankfully, as long as it only happens occasionally, there won't be any short or even long-term detrimental consequences to your health. Unfortunately though, most people aren't lucky enough to only suffer a sleepless night occasionally. Many of us, including the 20 million Americans on prescription sleep aids, deal with sleepless nights on a regular basis. Not only is sleep deprivation in general extremely hazardous to your health, but in certain cases, the cure can be worse than the disease. Below, we'll talk about what sleep deprivation can do to you, and how the treatment methods you may be using right now are potentially making it worse.

Short term sleep deprivation

For starters, let us be clear on one important point: there is a difference between short-term sleep deprivation and one or two sleepless nights every now and then. But the symptoms of each are deceptively similar. The difference, however, is the fact that just under 20% of American adults claim that they struggle to get enough sleep on a daily basis. If you are within the 20%, you may be experiencing the following symptoms of short term sleep deprivation already:

• Poor emotional regulation
• Dark undereye circles
• Impulsive actions
• Poor decision-making skills
• Increased food cravings, especially unhealthy food
• Frequent yawning
• Dull, blemished skin
• Problems with memory recollection

Most people don't know this, but a lack of quality sleep has a negative impact on every single cell in your body, as well as every single biological system. Your brain, obviously, is negatively affected. But your endocrine system and your hormone levels are also thrown out of balance. The longer you struggle to get the rest your body needs to stay optimally healthy, the more severe these negative consequences will become.

Signs of Long Term Sleep Deprivation

The longer you go without getting quality rest at night, the more severe the consequences will be for your health and longevity. After weeks, months, or even years of getting poor sleep most nights of the week, you can develop diseases which will lower your quality of life and shorten your lifespan. Below are the main health afflictions you need to watch out for:

Physical Brain Damage, Memory Problems, and Cognitive Function

Most people have a hard time wrapping their head around this, but the brain is a physical organ just like the kidneys or the liver or the spleen. Yes, it's also where our thoughts and dreams and our ability to perceive the world comes from; and because of this, we imagine it as some separate, magical entity that doesn't follow the same rules as the rest of the body. So how could a thing like a poor night's sleep damage the way our brain works?

The truth is that it can do a lot of damage, especially over the long-term. You see, something very important happens when we sleep: our brain basically undergoes a sort of "spring cleaning" process. Your brain cells shrink up to 60%, which allows more space for cerebrospinal fluid to flow between your cells. When they shrink, they squeeze most of their waste products into this interstitial fluid. These wastes are a normal part of daily use of your brain and, up to a certain point, cannot be avoided. But when you don't get good sleep, your brain cells don't go through this shrinking/waste expulsion process. And if there isn't enough space between your cells for the cerebrospinal fluid to flow and wash away these wastes, they will accumulate in your brain and its cells.

The more waste that accumulate, the more damage it does to your neurons. Eventually, this damage can result in the following negative health consequences:

• Poor memory, both short and long-term
• Degradation of motor skills, dexterity, and physical coordination
• Progressive worsening of your ability to fall asleep and get good, quality rest
• Poor decision-making and impairment of critical thinking skills
• Increased risk of injury or death (to both yourself and others) while driving or operating other heavy machinery
• Mood disorders, such as depression, anxiety, and psychosis (in extreme cases)
• Mood swings and impulsive thoughts/actions (which can damage your personal relationships)
• The development of diseases like Alzheimer's and Dementia - symptoms will show up earlier in your life span and be more severe than people who don't have trouble sleeping

Metabolic Syndrome, Irregular Hormones, and Unhealthy Weight Gain

The scary thing is that negative metabolic consequences can happen very quickly, even after one night of poor quality sleep. Thankfully, going back to good sleeping habits can counteract this process. But when you're poor sleep nights outnumber your good sleep nights, things start to break down. Your ability to make smart dietary choices and avoid binging on unhealthy foods will degrade over time. You will likely pack on some pounds from eating these unhealthy foods. This can slow your metabolism down, leading to even more weight gain, especially around the abdomen. Gaining extra weight in the form of abdominal fat will lead to metabolic syndrome, a disorder in which compromised metabolic function leads to diseases like type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and more. All of this will decrease your quality of life and drastically shorten your longevity.

How to Decrease Your Risk of Sleep Deprivation

If you want to reduce your risk of sleep deprivation, then you're going to want to try and get the most natural sleep possible. Forcing your body to sleep with prescription or over-the-counter sleep medications will not only degrade the quality of sleep you get in the short-term, but your brain can become so dependent that it loses the ability to fall asleep on its own.

If you really want to solve your sleep deprivation problems, you should make improvements to your sleep hygiene, diet, lifestyle, and incorporate an all natural sleep aid into your nightly regimen. Obviously, we have designed Avinol PM to be the best herbal sleep aid your money can buy. It contains natural ingredients that are non-habit-forming, and won't decrease your brain's ability to get quality sleep over time. You'll wake up refreshed every morning without experiencing the consequences of short or even long-term sleep deprivation. If you're ready to make sure you get the best quality sleep possible, give Avinol a try.