The feasibility of daytime sleep for adults. Is it possible to sleep during the day

Daytime sleep of an adult, unlike a child, is not as common. Many, even with the opportunity to take a siesta, rush to do more things, surf the Internet or do something else, but not sleep during the day.

Moreover, it is believed that the one who allows himself daily daily rest is a lazy person. But numerous modern studies and tests have proven that in most cases, a midday siesta has a positive effect on the psychological and physical indicators of the state of the body. So what actually brings daytime sleep - benefit or harm?

Among the benefits of daytime sleep, experts note the following:

• strengthening the nervous system and immunity;
• restoration of working capacity;
• return of cheerfulness and energy even after numerous activities in the morning;
• aggravation of the work of all sense organs, improvement of cognitive and mental capabilities;
• increase in endurance and stress resistance;
• acceleration of metabolic processes and removal of toxins;
• normalization of the work of all organs and systems, including the digestive, nervous, cardiovascular, endocrine;
• the emergence of inspiration and new ideas in creativity.

In addition, siesta serves as a good prevention of mental and physical overwork, helps to equalize the emotional background and eliminate depression.

Experts are sure that a person who allows himself to regularly have a short rest during the day becomes more productive and resilient, feels better. The reason is not only the ability to switch and put thoughts in order, but also the beneficial effect of sleep on the hormonal background. So, during a siesta, the level of stress and anxiety hormones in the blood decreases significantly, the synthesis of endorphins, the hormones of joy and happiness, increases.

How much can you sleep

How much sleep during the day or at night depends on many factors: age, nature of work and activity during the day, health status and other individual characteristics. It is better to calculate the duration of rest separately in each case, but there are general recommendations of specialists in this regard.

Doctors advise taking into account not only the individual characteristics of a person, but also the cyclical phases of sleep. In total, there are 4 phases, where fast and slow sleep have 2 phases each.

REM sleep phases do not last long - only 20 minutes. Awakening during this period, if caught, will be easy. But the rise during the slow phase threatens with difficulties. If you cut off the slow phase, then everything that daytime sleep is useful for will not be relevant, and rest will only bring harm. A person will feel tired and weak until night, may experience a headache and a temporary loss of working capacity.

Note. Is it good to sleep during the day, scientists from the University of California found out. They studied a group of people who practiced daytime sleep for a long time and compared their performance with a group of those who sleep only at night. The results are impressive: the group that sleeps during the day has significantly higher concentration and memory in the afternoon than the others.

These studies have proven that with the right duration and time of daytime sleep, siesta does not disturb biorhythms, does not lead to insomnia, and significantly improves well-being and performance.

Who and why can not sleep during the day

But not always a siesta is useful for a person. Sleeping during the day is harmful if done incorrectly. Experts note the following problems that you may encounter due to daytime sleep:

1. Long sleepers at lunchtime can disrupt their body's biorhythms, leading to insomnia and difficulty waking up in the morning.
2. Daytime naps can exacerbate depression. Therefore, suffering from it, it is better to reconsider your daily routine. It is advisable to consult a psychologist and try to avoid long daytime sleep.
3. In diseases of the heart and blood vessels, as well as in acute conditions, for example, in pre-stroke, sleep during the day is contraindicated. During such a rest and immediately after it, a jump in blood pressure can occur, which is fraught with a stroke, heart attack and other problems.
4. Many people wonder if it is harmful to sleep during the day for those who suffer from diabetes. Experts unanimously answer that such a rest will not benefit diabetics. Siesta can lead to a sharp increase in sugar after it, which is dangerous for health and life.

Also, a siesta can cause lethargy, drowsiness, laziness in the afternoon. Sometimes, instead of rest, it gives a feeling of weakness and fatigue, leads to the inability to concentrate and absent-mindedness. But these symptoms are most often associated with improperly chosen sleep time and its duration.

Important! Constant drowsiness and a desire to sleep at lunch for more than an hour and a half with a good night's rest can be a symptom of the disease. Such problems can arise due to high blood pressure, atherosclerosis, osteochondrosis, cardiovascular diseases, and hormonal imbalances. Psychological factors can also serve as a cause: stress, depression, apathy, unfavorable conditions at home or at work, fear.

What causes a lack of melatonin

Scientists have proven that during sleep, a very important substance for health and well-being is released in the human body - melatonin. This is the hormone of sleep, youth, longevity, beauty, which is produced by the pineal gland located in the brain. The main condition under which melatonin is synthesized is the absence of light. Therefore, it is produced at night, and during the day - in smaller quantities.

Numerous studies have proven that melatonin inhibits growth and serves as a good prevention of the development of cancerous tumors, prevents premature aging and triggers tissue regeneration processes.

Lack of sleep, violations of biological rhythms, lack of melatonin can lead to such negative consequences:

• decreased immunity;
• deterioration of potency and libido in men;
• decrease in working capacity, endurance, stress resistance;
• the appearance of apathy, increased anxiety, depression, insomnia;
• disruption of the hormonal system;
• fast weight gain or, conversely, weight loss;
• frequent headaches and muscle pain;
• memory loss and inability to concentrate.

Take care of your health - failures in biological rhythms are very difficult to recover even with professional help. The normalization of the state can take not only months, but also years.

How to learn to sleep during the day

Studies of daytime sleep have led scientists studying this phenomenon to unequivocal conclusions. For it to be useful, you need to adhere to the following simple rules:

1. Rest at lunch is best only 10-30 minutes.
2. If you are very tired, then it is worth extending sleep to 90 minutes, as this is the time needed to complete a full sleep cycle.
3. Resting for half an hour or an hour can make you feel even more tired after it than before the siesta. This is due to the fact that the cycle was not observed and the body is forced to work in extreme mode.
4. The best time for a siesta is from one to three in the afternoon.
5. While sleeping, cover yourself with a blanket for comfort. Try to ventilate the room where you decide to relax the day before. Shade the windows with thick curtains or put on a special blindfold. Make sure your clothes are comfortable.
6. It is better to get used to the midday siesta gradually. In the early days, it is advisable to use an alarm clock so as not to oversleep the right time and take into account the phases of sleep. Already after a week of training, you will sleep during the day for 20-30 minutes, and the “internal clock” will wake you up on time.
7. After rest, be sure to stretch, do a light workout for the muscles of the whole body. This will help you get back to work faster and feel better.

Many people prefer to spend their siesta on a sofa or couch rather than in bed. This avoids the temptation to extend the rest for some more time.

As you can see, short naps, when properly planned, are beneficial for most people. If you follow the recommendations of specialists and regularly take a siesta, you can avoid the negative consequences of such a dream, increase your productivity and stress resistance, get a charge of vivacity and positive for the rest of the day.

But if you find it difficult to fall asleep or suffer from insomnia or the diseases listed above, then skip the siesta and try to sleep only at night.

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Those who have the opportunity to sleep during the day are incredibly lucky. It is not only pleasant, but also very healthy. If you have the opportunity to relax during the day, but do not like to do this, try to introduce rest into the daily routine, or better, sleep after dinner. It has been observed that even a short nap in the afternoon is very useful - especially for those who get up early. If you don't believe this, let's take a closer look.

I welcome everyone! We already have a lot of topics about sleep, today there will be an interesting topic about daytime sleep - is it useful to sleep during the day, the conclusions of specialists from Germany, the secret of a short sleep and many more interesting things.

When do you want to sleep during the day?

Other famous day nappers are Albert Einstein, Johannes Brahms.

How does daytime sleep affect the state of the body?

Daytime sleep prevents "burnout". In the modern world, people run, run without stopping, striving to achieve their goals. And in this run without a break, a person is subject to stress, exhaustion of physical and mental strength, and disappointment. Daytime sleep restores the body, reduces stress, makes it possible to rethink the situation.

In a drowsy state, our contact with reality is broken, and with the subconscious the closest: we can visit new ideas, come up with solutions to difficult situations, we can see dreams-visions. If you wake up a person in this state, then he is unlikely to understand that he was sleeping.

The transitional state between wakefulness and sleep gives complete relaxation to the whole organism: soul, brain, body (if, of course, you are comfortably located).

Salvador Dali, a Spanish artist, was very fond of moments of daytime relaxation. The story describes his siesta in this way: sitting comfortably in an armchair, Salvador took a spoon in his hand, and put a metal tray on the floor.

When he fell asleep, the fingers of his hand unclenched, and the spoon fell with a crash onto the tray. The artist woke up from the noise. Those moments that he spent between deep sleep and activity were enough for him to get a burst of energy.

Many patients begin to worry about the information that these gadgets give out. For example, in one young, healthy person, according to the gadget, only half of the sleep was deep, and the other half was superficial. Here it should be noted again that we do not know what this gadget calls superficial sleep. Besides, it's normal not to sleep deeply all night. Usually twenty to twenty-five percent of our sleep duration is dream sleep. Deep slow-wave sleep lasts another twenty to twenty-five percent. In older people, its duration is reduced, and it may disappear completely. But the remaining fifty percent can occupy more superficial stages - they last quite a long time. If the user does not have an understanding of the processes behind these numbers, then he may decide that they are not up to par, and begin to worry about this.

But what is the norm? It only means that most people sleep like this. This is how norms are built in medicine and biology. If you are different from them, it is not at all necessary that you are ill with something - maybe you just did not fall into this percentage. To develop norms, you need to conduct a lot of research with each gadget.

Can we somehow prolong the phases of deep sleep, which, as is commonly believed, bring more benefits to the body?

In fact, we do not know much - we have an idea that deep slow-wave sleep restores the body better, that REM sleep is also necessary. But we don't know how important the first and second stages of superficial drowsiness are. And perhaps what we call superficial sleep has its own very important functions - related, for example, to memory. In addition, sleep has some architecture - we constantly move from one stage to another during the night. Perhaps it is not so much the duration of these stages that is of particular importance, but the transitions themselves - how frequent they are, how long and so on. Therefore, it is very difficult to talk about exactly how to change sleep.

On the other hand, there have always been attempts to make your sleep more efficient - and the first sleeping pills appeared precisely as a tool for optimal regulation of your sleep: to fall asleep at the right time and sleep without waking up. But all sleeping pills change the structure of sleep and lead to the fact that there is more superficial sleep. Even the most modern sleeping pills adversely affect the structure of sleep. Now they are actively trying - both abroad and in our country - a variety of physical effects that should deepen sleep. These may be tactile and audio signals of a certain frequency, which should lead to more slow-wave sleep. But we must not forget that we can influence our sleep much easier - by what we do while awake. Physical and mental activity during the daytime makes sleep deeper and helps you fall asleep more easily. Conversely, when we are nervous and experiencing some exciting events immediately before sleep, it becomes harder to fall asleep, and sleep can become more superficial.

What hours of the day are good for sleep

There is such a thing as light pollution. Let's say if you take a picture of the earth from space so that you can see the lights of the city, then where there are the most lights, the least people sleep. Let's say in the city of New York. Scientists made a map of the distribution of areas of concentration of tumor diseases and superimposed it on a map of light pollution, the results were simply stunning. The cards were almost absolutely identical... Yes... that's how things are, you have to finish your work at night, it's too harmful, it's better not to sleep and work during the day.

Second experiment.

Scientists took 16 students and for some time 8 of them led a daytime lifestyle, and the other 8 were nocturnal. Both groups felt great, but the diagnostic data showed that 8 students who led a nocturnal lifestyle changed a little. They could not untie tasks as quickly at night as daylight could do. That is, it has been proven that at night the brain works more slowly, regardless of whether you are used to sleeping at night or not.

Well, that's it, even if you don't know or don't feel it, your brain works slower at night, plus there is an increased chance of getting various diseases and a reduced standard of living.

P.s. Working at night has the other side of the coin - sleeping during the day, it turns out to be useful, I discovered this when I was already finishing writing this article, so stay tuned! I will write about the benefits of daytime sleep ... somehow off topic of the blog ... Let's do it ... if they ask me to write in the comments about daytime sleep, I will write, but if not, I will not

I hope the article taught you something new and made you think like me. To receive the same interesting and informative articles, subscribe to RSS blog or any other way convenient for you (see below). By the way, a section will be opened soon, which will be available only to RSS subscribers, so write off to subscribe so as not to miss it. Those who are not subscribed are unlikely to know when the section will be created

Many people say "I'm going to bed" meaning they're going to lie down. At the same time, lying in bed for a couple of hours, they watch TV shows, or play electronic games. Make it a rule that when you go to bed, you should first calculate the time spent in bed and spent on other things that you used to do in bed. The resulting total time is called net sleep time.

Among people of different ages, there are not many of those who have a great desire to take a nap in the afternoon. For most, after a daytime sleep, well-being improves, there is a surge of energy.

Many would not refuse to take a nap during the day, but due to work and other things, not everyone has such an opportunity. But there are also those to whom daytime sleep brings a feeling of weakness.

Let's try to figure it out - is sleep in the daytime useful or is there any harm from it?

Specialists in the field of physiology have found that the need for an afternoon nap appears due to changes in the biorhythms of our body. Such fluctuations occur due to changes in metabolic rate over a daily period.

This fact can be confirmed by simple measurements of body temperature: two intervals will be found per day in which the temperature will be the lowest:

• between 13.00 and 15.00 in the daytime;
• between 3 and 5 o'clock at night.

The decrease in temperature during the indicated periods is not affected by sleep or the foods that were eaten. At this time, there is a strong need for rest, involving immersion in sleep. Let's figure out why you are drawn to sleep during the day, is daytime sleep beneficial, and how much time is allowed to sleep during daylight hours?

How long should sleep last in the afternoon

The maximum duration of sleep in the afternoon is half an hour - only in this case, rest will be beneficial. In 30 minutes you will not have time to fall into a state of deep sleep, and this is of great importance. Daytime sleep times may vary according to job specifics, age and physical condition.

In most cases, half an hour of sleep and even a quarter of an hour's rest is enough for recovery. This is enough to improve mood, improve physical and emotional state.

Sleeping for more than half an hour will bring a feeling of weakness. A long rest, involving falling asleep, will cause lethargy. That is why most physiologists recommend sitting during the daytime, because in the prone position it is easy to fall into a long sleep. Take a nap for a few minutes during your break right at your desk and you will feel better.

Benefits of afternoon nap

Many have to overcome the feeling of sleepiness that appears after dinner - not everyone can afford the luxury of taking a nap in the afternoon. But if conditions allow, know that the benefits of sleeping in the afternoon for the body have been proven by scientific studies conducted in several countries.

Why does he fall asleep during the day, after dinner? The reasons are simple: in the afternoon, part of the brain cells that are responsible for wakefulness fall into a state of inhibition, and there is a desire to take a nap.

To combat drowsiness, in most cases they drink strong brewed coffee, but studies by scientists from England have shown that a short nap after dinner returns performance much better than coffee drinks. Afternoon sleep is part of the daily routine for residents of countries with tropical climatic conditions and subtropics.

A short siesta provides an opportunity to escape from the exhausting heat and contributes to the satisfaction of physiological needs. A short rest in the afternoon increases efficiency, gives a feeling of cheerfulness.

Benefits for the nervous system

Due to a short siesta, the amount of hormones that provoke stress decreases. An excess of such hormones is dangerous for the nervous system, adversely affects the psyche.

A short sleep allows you to get rid of stress, increases resistance to mental and emotional stress.

Benefits for the cardiovascular system

A short rest during the daytime reduces the likelihood of myocardial infarctions and strokes. Scientists from America have been experimenting in this area for several years. The results of these experiments showed that people who slept after dinner for half an hour at least three times a week, the likelihood of developing vascular disease decreased by 40 percent, compared with those who did not rest after twelve in the afternoon at all.

Benefits for the brain

The conducted studies have led to the conclusion that the brain during a short day's rest is actively restored, due to this, after waking up, its work improves, the departments responsible for making responsible decisions begin to function. A 15-minute nap during the day gives you the energy to take on new tasks.

The researchers argue that naps in the afternoon are necessary to "reboot" the brain, "clearing" it of unnecessary information. A tired brain can be compared to a mailbox filled with rejection, unable to receive new messages because there is no room in it.

Studies conducted by scientists from the United States have shown that the intensity of visual reactions in students participating in the experiment decreases several times in the evening. But those who took a short nap during the day perceive and remember information at a speed that was observed in them in the morning.

During a short daytime siesta, brain cells undergo the same effective recovery as during sleep at night. Sleeping during the day brings hormone levels back to normal, thus relieving stress that was generated before noon. After a short afternoon rest, the ability to concentrate increases, which is of great importance in mental work.

For adults

Many women try to make time for daytime sleep. After all, a short rest in the afternoon has a positive effect on appearance, gives a slight rejuvenating effect. Regular daytime sleep allows you to get rid of bags under the eyes, has a positive effect on the condition of the skin, hair and nails.

The tendency to daytime sleep is also observed in pregnant women, especially in the first trimester.

In men, a short nap in the afternoon improves the functioning of the reproductive system, in addition, it is a great way to recuperate after working the night shift.

It is authentically known that many popular people with high working capacity, including the former President of America John F. Kennedy, regularly rested during the day.

Harm from daytime sleep. Is it good for everyone to take a nap during the day

Daytime rest, which involves immersion in sleep, does not benefit everyone. In some cases, a strong desire to take a nap after dinner indicates both overwork and the need for recovery, as well as serious health problems.

Important! Do not ignore the strong feeling of sleepiness that appears during the daytime hours.

Sudden drowsiness may be a sign of an impending stroke. If you often experience drowsiness for no apparent reason, be sure to visit a doctor and examine your heart with blood vessels. Elderly people should be especially careful with daytime rest: they experience pressure drops during sleep in the afternoon, a sharp jump can cause hemorrhage.

In addition, a sudden desire to sleep during the day can be a sign of a rare condition called narcolepsy. In the presence of this disease, a person can fall asleep several times a day. Only a specialist can diagnose the disease and prescribe therapy in such a situation.

People who have been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes should also avoid daytime naps. Studies conducted by Australian scientists have shown that in diabetics, after sleeping in the afternoon, the amount of glucose in the blood rises greatly, so daytime sleep is harmful for diabetics.

If you begin to experience difficulty falling asleep at night, reduce the duration of daytime sleep or even refuse to rest during the day.

Are afternoon breaks good for kids?

Does a child need daytime sleep? Caution with daytime sleep should be exercised only by adults, and as for children, they need rest in the afternoon for full development.

The child's body is not able to stay awake for a long time; the brain of children cannot perceive the information coming during the day continuously.

The picture, when the children fell into a dream literally on the go, was observed by many. This happens due to a breakdown, because the body of children is not adapted to heavy loads. Daytime sleep gives the nervous system of children a respite from a large amount of incoming information.

Important! If young children do not sleep during the daytime, their natural biological rhythms go astray. Such failures can provoke a disruption in the work of the entire fragile organism of the child.

How much nap time do kids need?

There are approximate norms regulating the duration of sleep in the daytime in children. But in reality, the duration of the daytime rest for the kids is set individually, since each child has different sleep needs. The duration of sleep in the afternoon also depends on age.

Babies who have just been born sleep almost all the time. By the age of two months, they already distinguish day from night, and their daytime sleep takes about five hours at intervals.

Six-month-old babies spend an average of four hours on daytime sleep with two to three intervals.

Children aged one to one and a half years usually have two hours of daytime sleep.

For young children, it is important to lay the foundation for good health and mental development. Nutrition, exercise, the development of intelligence - all this is important for children's development, but you also need to properly organize a child's sleep. Parents should study the rules for organizing children's recreation.

The benefits of afternoon naps are scientifically proven; rest in the daytime serves as a prevention of a number of ailments. Consider the value of daytime rest, because we spend most of our lives on sleep, our well-being depends on its quality.

Video

To sleep or not to sleep during the day, if you want? How to sleep after dinner correctly? How not to disturb a night's sleep with a short day's rest? These questions are answered by Professor R. F. Buzunov in this video:

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The habit of taking a nap for an hour after dinner is not uncommon. Undoubtedly, sleep helps to renew strength, improve mood, increase attention and efficiency. However, the answer to the question about the usefulness of daytime sleep is not as clear as it might seem at first. There are studies that show that daytime rest can negatively affect well-being if it is not observed for a certain duration.

Do you need to sleep during the day?

Many scientists believe that daytime sleep has a positive effect on human health. It improves memory, reaction, assimilation of information. Other wellness highlights include:

• energy recovery;
• improvement of physical and mental abilities;
• increased attention and perception;
• reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease.

If you haven't been well enough rested at night, a nap during the day will relieve you of drowsiness and cheer you up. The optimal time for sleep is the period from 14 to 15 hours. Sleeping late in the evening can lead to the fact that then you will not be able to fall asleep for a long time.

Almost everything has its pros and cons. Scientists believe that if your night's rest was strong and long, then daytime sleep is not needed and even unnecessary. It can worsen your condition, leading to fatigue, lethargy, and even insomnia.

An interesting experiment with a group of aircraft pilots. During the day, they were allowed to sleep for 45 minutes, after which the scientists looked at the well-being of the experimental subjects. The result of the test showed that after such a dream, people felt the same as with lack of sleep: the reaction rate is reduced, and the mood is depressed. It was concluded that the duration of sleep has a great influence on well-being after daytime sleep.

It turned out that the ideal duration of daytime sleep is either no more than 20 minutes, or no less than an hour. At the same time, it is also undesirable to exceed two hours. Scientists believe that sleep phases are the cause of this phenomenon. The deep sleep phase begins just 20 minutes after falling asleep and lasts approximately 40 minutes. As with nocturnal sleep, when awakening during the deep phase of sleep, a person feels overwhelmed, and his mental abilities are reduced. There is a possibility of headaches.

How to organize daytime sleep?

Often adults have a problem: where and when to sleep during the day? After all, work does not always give us such an opportunity.

First, set aside part of your lunch time for sleep. It may be only 10 minutes, but they will give energy no less than a cup of coffee. Such a short break will positively affect your performance.

Second, find the right place. Some offices have lounges with cozy sofas. If this is not provided for at your work, use the car interior or purchase a funny “ostrich” pillow: it will allow you to relax right at the workplace.

Thirdly, create optimal conditions for relaxation. Use a sleep mask to protect your eyes from light and earplugs to block out noise.

To make the awakening even better, before going to bed, you can drink a cup of tea: tonic substances will act on the body in just 20 minutes and you will wake up.

Benefits of naps for kids

If for adults daytime sleep is useful, then for children it is necessary. The lack of daytime sleep in a one-year-old child negatively affects his mental development. The norm of daytime sleep at this age is at least three hours. By the age of two, the need for daytime rest gradually decreases to one hour.

At the same time, scientists recommend not to create complete darkness and silence in the room where the child sleeps. He must distinguish daytime sleep from night sleep. If the child refuses to sleep, do not force him, but put him to bed early in the evening.

Sound and healthy sleep is extremely important for the physical and mental well-being of the body. With regular insufficient sleep, a person invariably feels the consequences. If your night's sleep has been disturbed, try to make up for the need for rest during the day. Lack of sleep manifests itself in the form of fatigue, lethargy, depression and bad mood.

What is evening sleep?

Before considering the benefits and harms of evening sleep, you need to understand exactly what is evening sleep and what time frame does it include?

Meanwhile, the causes of evening sleep can be both physiological needs and characteristics of human genetics and its perception of natural changes, including weather changes, temperature fluctuations and magnetic waves.

Benefits of an evening nap

If you are physically leading a more or less healthy lifestyle, then an evening sleep for you can be a way to restore mental work and a reaction of thinking. Such a dream can be especially relevant for people of an intellectual mindset who are engaged in mental work. Tellingly, in this case, the evening sleep will not affect the night's sleep.

Evening sleep for children and teenagers will be a normal and useful phenomenon. Do not worry if the child immediately before going to bed at night will sleep for half an hour or an hour in the evening. During this period, the active formation of his nervous system takes place, the images of the subconscious are fixed, which help to determine the concepts of “good - bad”. Also, evening sleep is very useful at this age for faster and more effective assimilation of educational material.

Evening sleep will certainly be useful for people weakened by infectious diseases. In this case, this is a direct need of the body, which should not be resisted. Often such an evening dream gradually develops into a night dream.

Your body may also require an evening sleep if you ate a heavy meal for lunch or dinner, and also if you ate a lot of sweets during the day. Then the evening sleep is necessary for the body in order to process the incoming fats, proteins and carbohydrates in an accelerated mode. Do not resist if after a meal you want to lie down. Sometimes 15-20 minutes are enough for the body to start working again.

You may also need an evening sleep after a long walk in the fresh air. During the period of such sleep, all systems of your body are actively saturated with incoming oxygen, the work of the cardiovascular system and lungs is normalized.

Harm of evening sleep

The determining factor that speaks against evening sleep is your inability to fall asleep at night. If after an evening sleep you are faced with a similar problem, then you should think about what caused your desire to sleep in the evening.

First of all, this may indicate a violation of your natural biological rhythms. In this case, you will need to rethink your schedule and set a consistent bedtime. If it's not about biology or genetics, then maybe you should turn your attention to health.

The harm of evening sleep can also lie in the disorientation of a person in space and society after waking up, as well as in slowing down the reaction of thinking, mental activity and physical recovery.

At the same time, it should be noted that the harm of evening sleep should be considered only if after it a person cannot fall asleep at night!

Conclusion

It is equally important to consider, when determining the harmfulness or usefulness of evening sleep, how often you succumb to it. For example, if you sleep two or three times a month in the evening, this is quite normal for many people. If evening sleep makes itself felt much more often, the situation can become pathological and cause a lot of trouble.

And the last thing that must be taken into account is a person's predisposition to evening sleep. No matter how much we are told about sleep patterns, there are still people whose regimen does not fit in with the regimen of the majority, so for them evening sleep can be not only useful, but also normal from a biological point of view.

Thus, the harmfulness and usefulness of evening sleep is determined on the basis of the biological characteristics of a person, his physiological state at the moment, his age period and characteristics of life, as well as his predisposition to diseases and the ability to organize a full-fledged daily night's sleep.

A PHOTO Getty Images

Sometimes in the middle of the day the eyes get stuck together. We begin to nod off, but we struggle with sleep with all our might, even if there is an opportunity to lie down: after all, you need to sleep at night. At least that's how it is in our culture.

nature's demand

But the Chinese can afford to take a nap right at the workplace. Daytime sleep is a common thing for residents of many countries, from India to Spain. And perhaps they are closer to their nature in this sense. Jim Horne, director of the Institute for Sleep Research at Loughborough University (UK), believes that humans are evolutionarily programmed to sleep short during the day and long at night. “There is growing scientific evidence that naps, even very short ones, improve cognitive function,” continues Jonathan Friedman, director of the Texas Brain Institute. “Perhaps, over time, we will learn to consciously use it in order to make our brain work more productively.”

Better learn new things

“Daytime naps sort of clear short-term memory storage, after which the brain is again ready to receive and store new information,” says University of California psychologist Matthew Walker. Under his leadership, a study was conducted in which 39 healthy young people participated. They were divided into 2 groups: some had to take a nap during the day, while others were awake throughout the day. During the experiment, they had to complete tasks that required memorization of a large amount of information.

Daytime sleep affects the functioning of a part of the brain that plays an important role in moving information from short-term memory to long-term memory.

They received their first task at noon, then at 2 pm, participants from the first group went to bed for an hour and a half, and at 6 pm both groups received another task. It turned out that those who slept during the day, coped with the evening task better than those who were awake. Moreover, this group performed better in the evening than during the day.

Matthew Walker believes that daytime sleep affects the hippocampus, an area of ​​the brain that plays an important role in moving information from short-term memory to long-term memory. Walker likens it to an overflowing email inbox that can no longer receive new letters. Daytime sleep clears our “mailbox” for about an hour, after which we are again able to perceive new portions of information.

Andrey Medvedev, Associate Professor at Georgetown University, has shown that during naps, the activity of the right hemisphere, which is responsible for creativity, is significantly higher than that of the left. This happens to both lefties and righties. The right hemisphere takes on the role of "cleaner", sorting and storing information. Thus, a short daytime sleep helps us to better remember the information received.

How to "correctly" take a nap

Here's what a sleepwalker at the Salk Institute for Biological Research in California, author of Sleep During the Day, Changes Your Life! 1 Sara C. Mednick.

Be consistent. Choose the time that suits you for daytime sleep (optimally - from 13 to 15 hours) and stick to this regimen.

Don't sleep long. Set an alarm for a maximum of 30 minutes. If you sleep longer, you will feel overwhelmed.

Sleep in the dark. Close the curtains or put on a sleep mask to fall asleep faster.

Take cover. Even if the room is warm, just in case, put a blanket nearby to cover when you get cold. After all, during sleep, the body temperature drops.

For more details see lifehack.org

1 S. Mednick Take a Nap! Change Your Life" (Workman Publishing Company, 2006).

In a person's life, a situation very often arises when one cannot sleep at night and during the day one feels drowsiness with fatigue. In this regard, many of us are wondering if it is possible to sleep during the day, and when will daytime sleep benefit an adult or a child? Understanding these issues is very important, as many people are forced to rest during the day after a night shift. Separately, it is worth talking about daytime sleep in children, as pediatricians strongly recommend organizing a similar rest period for babies.

The benefits of daytime sleep are undeniable

Causes of daytime fatigue

The occurrence of drowsiness and increased fatigue during the day is associated with several factors, the key of which are two: meals and starvation of the brain. It is worth dwelling on these two reasons in more detail.

Most people note the fact that daytime sleep most often occurs after a lunch meal. This is due to the fact that the process of digestion itself causes the distribution of blood flow in the body so that a large amount of blood flows to the abdominal organs, and not to the brain. Such redistribution of blood leads to the fact that even a healthy person feels a desire to lie down and relax a little after eating. Therefore, sleeping after eating is quite natural, as this allows you to restore energy reserves very quickly. The main thing is not to overeat before such a rest.

Is it bad to sleep during the daytime? The answer is more no than yes. Such rest is contraindicated only for people with insomnia and diseases of the endocrine system.

The second reason for daytime fatigue may be related to the depletion of nutrients in the blood, which leads to starvation of the brain, and is manifested by a decrease in attention, decision-making abilities and memory. In this case, sleep during the day is not dangerous, but on the contrary can significantly help.

Based on these reasons, it is possible to determine the beneficial aspects of daytime sleep that allow a person to feel better.

What is the benefit of sleeping during the daytime?

Daytime sleepiness is a serious test for every person, while many people think that sleeping during the day is harmful and try to avoid such rest. However, sometimes napping during the daytime is necessary, as it allows the brain to recover and improve its ability to think. The benefits of daytime sleep are confirmed by a large number of scientific studies. The following positive aspects of such a holiday are distinguished.

• When a person allows himself to sleep during the day, this leads to a decrease in stress levels and emotional tension. In this regard, people who spend their day with such rest are better protected from chronic stress and demonstrate higher levels of life satisfaction.
• During the daytime, the level of cognitive skills increases: attention and concentration improve, the speed of thinking also returns to a normal level. Many people refuse to sleep during the daytime part of the day due to the fact that after such a rest, they feel overwhelmed and in the first minutes are heavily involved in work. However, this is a short-term phenomenon, after which the energy level rises significantly.
• The greatest effect is received by schoolchildren and students who sleep after a lunch break. Such a pause in intellectual pursuits can significantly increase the concentration of attention and the ability to think.

Daytime sleep has a positive effect on brain activity

• In scientific medicine, there are a number of studies that say that sleeping during the day is good for the cardiovascular system, and that such a rest leads to the prevention of its diseases.
• If a person engaged in creative activities sleeps well during the day, then this improves the connections between both hemispheres and increases the ability to find creative solutions, which is so important in painting, writing, etc.
• Many people just need to sleep at this time of day, because during the night they could not lie down, due to work, rest in nightlife, while caring for a sick child. If this is not done, then the ability to think is significantly reduced, which can lead to a number of unpleasant consequences (traffic accidents, marriage at work, etc.).

As you can see, the answer to the question of whether daytime sleep is useful for people is obvious. However, this is not always the case. There are situations in which it is best to refuse such a vacation.

• If a person experiences insomnia, then additional rest during daylight hours can lead to its weighting, due to the inability to quickly fall asleep the next evening.
• There is evidence that patients with diseases of the endocrine system should sleep to a minimum during the day, since such rest changes the level of secretion of certain hormones and can lead to complications.

Understanding the benefits and harms of "quiet time", it is important to note that recovery during the day must be properly organized.

Each child should have a "quiet hour" when his nervous system is restored and all the information received is remembered.

What is the best way to sleep during the day?

The benefits or harms of daytime sleep are often determined by how exactly the sleeping person rested. There are a number of simple recommendations that can significantly improve the quality of rest if you sleep during the day.

1. The main guarantee of a complete recovery of strength is the allocation of clear boundaries for this activity during daylight hours with the fixation of a certain duration of “quiet time”. The best time to go to bed is between 13:00 and 15:00.
2. If a person slept during the day and was awakened by a phone or any other external influence, then this will also lead to the appearance of the described negative symptoms. In this regard, before going to rest, it is necessary to exclude such factors.
3. It is best not to overeat, as the heaviness in the stomach will not allow you to fall asleep quickly and wake up easily.

The organization of recovery in the daytime allows you to improve its quality and prevent unpleasant symptoms that occur during a sudden awakening.

Following these tips will improve the quality of your recovery and ensure that your energy levels are replenished to continue work or study.

Can children sleep?

When pediatricians talk about daytime naps for children, they all adhere to the same point of view - it is not only harmless to sleep during the day, but also necessary. What are the benefits of daytime sleep for children? Such a “quiet hour” allows kids to reboot their nervous system and remember all the information received, since the amount of data they receive from the external environment is many times greater than the amount of data received by adults.

Children need daytime sleep

Also, children are prone to rapid fatigue during vigorous activity, and therefore need additional time for their recovery. In addition, it is during the period of dreams that hormones responsible for growth begin to be released in the body, therefore, when a child sleeps, he will certainly grow, and his internal organs will be restored.

When we hear that someone asks why we shouldn't sleep during the day, we should tell this person that such a rest is not only not harmful, but also has great benefits for the body of every adult or child. However, it is very important to approach the organization of rest with responsibility, since any external irritant or excessively long sleep can lead to a feeling of weakness or other negative manifestations.