What Happens in Your Body When You're Sleep Deprived?

Many Americans don't get nearly enough sleep.

In the short term, the lack of sleep tends to have an immediate effect on your mental capabilities and your emotional state.

Over the long term, poor sleep can contribute to a variety of chronic health problems, from obesity and diabetes, to immune problems and an increased risk for cancer.

Sleep deprivation also raises your risk of accidents and work related errors.

There are many reasons why so many people are chronically sleep deprived. Part of the problem is our use of artificial lighting and electronics at night, in combination with getting insufficient exposure to full, bright and natural sunlight during the day.

This disconnect from the natural cycles of day and night, can turn into a chronic problem where you’re constantly struggling to sleep well.

A Single Night Without Sleep Can Have Severe Implications:

Going just one night without proper sleep starts to impair your physical movements and mental focus, which is comparable to having a blood alcohol level of 0.10%. So if you haven’t slept for a night, your level of impairment is on par with someone who is legally drunk.

What Happens To Your Body After Two or More Sleepless Nights?

After 48 hours without sleep, your oxygen intake is lessened and anaerobic power is impaired, which affects your athletic potential. You may also lose coordination and start to forget words when speaking.

After the 72 hour-mark of no sleep, concentration takes a major hit. Emotional agitation can occur with greater ease and your heart rate increases. Your chances of falling asleep during the day increase and along with it, your risk of having an accident.

In 2013, drowsy drivers caused 72,000 car accidents in which 800 Americans were killed and 44,000 were injured. Your problem-solving skills dwindle with each passing sleepless night and paranoia can become a problem.

In some cases, hallucinations and sleep deprivation psychosis can set in. You may find it difficult to interpret reality. Recent research suggests psychosis can occur after as little as 24 hours without sleep and can effectively mimic the symptoms observed in those with schizophrenia.

Sleep Deprivation Decreases Your Immune Function:

Research published in the journal Sleep reports that sleep deprivation has the same effect on your immune system as physical stress. Whether you’re physically stressed, sick, or sleep-deprived, your immune system becomes hyperactive and starts producing white blood cells, which is your body’s first line of defense against foreign invaders, such as an infectious agent. Elevated levels of white blood cells are typically a sign of disease. So your body reacts to sleep deprivation in much the same way it reacts to illness.

Sleeping Poorly Raises Your Risk of Type 2 Diabetes:

A number of studies have demonstrated that lack of sleep can play a significant role in insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. In earlier research, women who slept five hours or less every night, were 34% more likely to develop diabetes symptoms than women who slept for seven or eight hours each night.

The Many Health Hazards of Sleep Deprivation:

Aside from directly impacting your immune function, another explanation for why poor sleep can have such varied detrimental effects on your health is that your circadian system "drives" the rhythms of biological activity, even at the cellular level. We’ve really only begun to uncover the biological processes that take place during sleep.

During sleep your brain cells shrink by about 60%, which allows for more efficient waste removal. This nightly detoxification of your brain appears to be very important for the prevention of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Sleep is also intricately tied to important hormone levels, including melatonin, the production of which is disturbed by lack of sleep.

Lack of sleep also decreases levels of your fat-regulating hormone leptin while increasing the hunger hormone ghrelin. The resulting increase in hunger and appetite can easily lead to overeating and weight gain.

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