Poor sleep can make it much more difficult to cope with even relatively minor stressors and can even impact our ability to perceive the world accurately.
On World Sleep Day let’s find out what are different types of sleep disorders. (Image: Unsplash)
New Delhi: “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise,” an old adage that underscores the timeless wisdom of prioritising sleep for overall well-being. Sleep is a fundamental pillar of human health, essential for physical recovery, cognitive function, and emotional balance. The intricate relationship between sleep and mental health is a subject of growing interest and concern in the modern world. Poor sleep can contribute to the development and exacerbation of mental health issues, while existing mental health problems can lead to significant disruptions in sleep patterns. Understanding this bidirectional relationship is crucial for developing effective strategies to promote both healthy sleep and robust mental health.
Sleep is a natural, restorative process which impacts cognitive skills, such as attention, learning, and memory, such that poor sleep can make it much more difficult to cope with even relatively minor stressors and can even impact our ability to perceive the world accurately.
Impact of sleep on mental health
Mood Regulation: Lack of sleep can lead to enhanced negative reactions such as anger, frustration, irritability, and sadness. Chronic sleep deprivation is associated with an increase in complaints such as anxiety, depression, and paranoia.
Cognitive Functioning: Poor sleep impairs intellectual performance, creativity, and work productivity. It affects motor skills, speech, and safety, leading to drowsiness and microsleep. Long-term effects include cognitive decline, impaired memory, and increased Alzheimer’s risk. Emotional processing and judgment are also compromised.
Stress Response: A lack of sleep can cause the body to react as if it’s in distress, releasing more of the stress hormone, cortisol. Over time, this can lead to chronic stress and anxiety disorders.
Some risk factors associated
Insomnia: Characterised by difficulty in falling asleep or staying asleep, insomnia is strongly linked to anxiety, depression and increase in intensity of suicidal thoughts. Some mental health conditions may disrupt typical sleep patterns. Insomnia is often found to co-exist with mental health conditions.
Depression: Depression is a common mental health disorder defined by persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, and a lack of interest or pleasure in daily activities. Depression and sleep are closely linked, with each affecting the other. Poor sleep can worsen depressive symptoms, while depression can lead to insomnia or hypersomnia.
Anxiety: Anxiety is a feeling of worry and unease. While it’s normal to experience anxiety occasionally in response to fearful or stressful situations, in anxiety disorders, these fears are not proportional to the situation and remains for long periods of time. People with anxiety disorders often remain anxious in bed at night and this can keep them from falling asleep. Anxiety can also cause nightmares and disturbing dreams that cause sleep disturbances and reinforce fear of going to sleep.
Stress: Stress is the body’s response to any demand or external threat to your brain or physical body such as appearing for an exam or having an argument with your friend. Stress usually disappears once the situation is resolved. However, unrelenting stress in response to continual demands from job or family can cause sleep disturbances and eventually affecting your mental health.
Psychosis: Psychosis refers to loss of contact with reality. This may involve seeing or hearing things that other people cannot see or hear (hallucinations) and believing things that are not actually true (delusions). It may also involve disordered thinking and speaking. These hallucinations may be frightening or disturbing and make it difficult to sleep.
Strategies to improve Sleep
Sleep Hygiene: Maintain a regular sleep schedule, avoiding caffeine and electronics before bedtime, and creating a comfortable sleep setting.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I): CBT-I is a multi-component treatment for insomnia. It focuses on restructuring thoughts, feeling, and behaviours that are contributing to insomnia.
Mindfulness and Relaxation Techniques: Techniques such as mindful meditation, deep breathing exercises and progressive muscle relaxation can help reduce stress and promote relaxation, improving sleep quality and mental health.
Medication: In some cases, medication may be prescribed to address sleep disorders or underlying mental health conditions.
Regular exercise: Engaging in regular physical activity can improve sleep quality and reduce symptoms of anxiety and depression.
There exists an intricate relationship between sleep and mental health and under standing and managing this interplay is crucial to a comprehensive approach to mental health care.
(The author is Consultant Pulmonologist, SPARSH Hospital, Yeswanthpur)
Next Article
Follow us on social media
