Sleep and Your Health - Get a Better Night's Sleep. Now.

Why is good sleep essential to good health?
Sleep is necessary for our bodies to build up energy reserves and regenerate body cells and tissues. During sleep, your heartbeat and breathing slow, growth hormones peak, muscles relax, and your body temperature lowers. Sleep is a sophisticated process carefully regulated by our brain with valuable restorative properties for our physical and mental health.

What happens when you don't have enough sleep?
Short-term sleep deprivation usually causes little physical harm, since the body compensates for the lack of sleep by increasing its adrenaline levels during the day. A person may experience temporary feelings of pessimism or negativity. However, even short-term sleep deprivation can be dangerous if driving a car or operating machinery. Sleep deprivation is thought to cause half of all traffic fatalities on U.S. highways. In fact, studies have shown that being forced to stay awake 17 to 19 hours can cause the same impaired abilities as having a 0.05 percent blood alcohol content.

The Physical Consequences
Irregular sleep patterns and lack of sleep can bring on short attention span, memory and vocabulary loss, and other symptoms. Complication can include obesity, premature aging, fatigue and increased risk for diabetes, infection, cardiovascular disease and gastrointestinal disease. Chronic sleep deprivation can even lead to paranoia or hallucinations.