How to cheer up if you haven't slept at all: ten ways to recover after a sleepless night

No one denies that even a slight lack of sleep negatively affects the body. Mood deteriorates, the brain works slower, metabolic processes are disrupted, and the risk of obesity and diabetes increases. Unfortunately, no amount of fighting spirit will help you make the right decisions if you don't get enough sleep. Even stimulants, such as coffee, will not allow you to think better.

But you can prepare for being awake at night as best as possible. How to stay awake and survive the night away from bed and recover as quickly as possible? So…

Do some exercise

15 minutes is enough. Perform basic exercises: running in place, squats, bending left and right, swinging your legs. If you know how to stand on your head, stand in shirshasana, this will help the blood flow and the brain will start working better. Or simply bend forward, holding the position upside down. The effect will be similar. Straighten up carefully so as not to lose your balance.

During the day, try to take breaks every hour and do the simplest exercises for two to three minutes: walk around the room, move your shoulders, wave your arms, turn your head.

If you don't sleep for 4 days

Not everyone knows what will happen to the brain if you don’t sleep for 4 days. And this is understandable, because such a test is very difficult for the body and not everyone has passed it. It is enough not to sleep for a day for cognitive abilities to temporarily decrease by 30%; after two days the decrease will be 60%. Considering such dynamics, it becomes clear that after 4 days of wakefulness, the consciousness will be quite confused, and the body will be exhausted. The person will be very irritable, his appearance will deteriorate significantly, and tremors of the limbs will appear . Outwardly, such a patient will look much older than his age.

Do breathing exercises

The simplest thing is to take a series of quick shallow breaths, then inhale and exhale for as long as possible. Try a yoga exercise: sit on the floor cross-legged and close your nostrils with the thumb and index finger of your right hand. Lift your fingers one by one and breathe like this: inhale through your left nostril and exhale through your right nostril (repeat five times). Then perform a series of inhaling through the right nostril and exhaling through the left. Stretch well. A surge of vivacity is guaranteed.

This exercise can be performed while sitting on a chair, the main thing is to make sure that your back is straight.

How to overcome insomnia?

Both medicinal and non-medicinal methods are used to treat insomnia:

• maintaining sleep hygiene;
• psychotherapy;
• physiotherapy, massage;
• relaxation techniques, breathing exercises, etc.

For acute insomnia, specific treatment is usually not required; removing the trigger that prevents you from falling asleep is sufficient. Chronic and short-term forms of insomnia are important to monitor together with your doctor. The specialist will determine the cause of insomnia and, if necessary, prescribe a course of sedative or hypnotic medications. These can be herbal medicines (Persen, Novo-Passit, etc.), melatonin-based medicines (Melaritm, Melaxen, etc.) or more serious prescription medications.

The drugs have contraindications. The attending physician should prescribe the drug and determine the dosage.

Take a contrast shower

By alternating cold and hot water, blood will circulate through the body faster, which means the lungs, heart and brain will receive more nutrition and oxygen. This promotes concentration and you will be able to work effectively for several hours.

Wash your hands well with cold water throughout the day. It's as refreshing as a full shower and can be easily done even in an office setting.

Eat complex carbohydrates

When the energy level in the body approaches zero or even goes into a frightening minus, you usually feel the urge to eat something “forbidden”. But a fatty burger, cookies or candy will cause a sharp jump in blood glucose, after which it will drop just as suddenly, and you will simply want to sleep unbearably. Then you will have to either continue to eat sweets, which is not healthy, or still postpone things until tomorrow and go to bed.

And if you eat porridge or a sandwich on whole grain bread or healthy sweets without sugar (for example, fruit chips), you will get a good boost of energy.

Consequences of 5 days of lack of sleep

If you don't sleep for 5 days, the patient will begin to suffer from paranoia and hallucinations.
Panic attacks for any reason are often observed. At the same time, the patient breaks out in a cold sweat and the heartbeat increases. Due to 5 days of wakefulness, the neural activity of the brain slows down significantly, which affects the functioning of the entire body.

Particularly affected by such experiments are the areas of the parietal zone responsible for logic and computational abilities. After a period of sleeplessness, a person cannot even carry out basic mathematical operations. His speech is also significantly deteriorating, which is associated with disorders in the temporal lobe. When it comes to hallucinations, they can be auditory, visual, or dream-like.

Find half an hour to sleep

Try to find time to sleep in the middle of the day. Microsleep for 15–20 minutes can work real miracles: the energy received is quite enough to remain focused and attentive until the evening.

The technique is very interesting: drink a cup of espresso (you can also eat a few slices of dark chocolate) and immediately go to bed or get comfortable in an office chair. Set the alarm clock for 20 minutes. This way, you will have time to wake up before the deep phase of sleep sets in, and it will be easier for you to get up than if you slept for several hours. In addition, it is at this time that the caffeine will begin to take effect, and you will really feel an impressive surge of energy.

What happens if you don't sleep for a week

Many people are interested in what will happen if you don’t sleep for 6 or 7 days. Will the body be able to withstand this load? Indeed, this is a very difficult task that not everyone can handle. The person looks somewhat like a drug addict, his speech is very difficult, and some symptoms of Alzheimer's disease appear.

If you don’t sleep for 7 days, hallucinations become a constant occurrence, and paranoia manifests itself strongly. A very strong tremor also develops.

Due to such a long period of lack of sleep, the body experiences great stress and a malfunction of all systems. The activity of brain neurons is greatly reduced, and this has a great impact on the heart - muscle tissue ages. The immune system is at great risk. T-lymphocytes become more passive, which leads to the appearance of various viral diseases. The liver also fails to cope with its tasks.

Use moisturizing eye drops

In addition to drowsiness, one of the unpleasant sensations after a sleepless night is “sand in the eyes.” To soothe the mucous membranes, drop any moisturizing drops into your eyes. Perform “palming” (from the English word palm, that is, “palm”). Place your elbows on the table and cover your eyes with your palms (thumbs touch your temples, the rest lie crosswise on the bridge of your nose). Stay in this position for a few minutes. This simple technique gives a powerful and quick boost of energy (even your vision becomes sharper).

Roll balls with your feet or walk on rocks

There are many active points on our feet that stimulate the functioning of internal organs and the brain. Any foot massage affects the condition of the whole body. In order to cheer up for an hour or two, it is quite enough to vigorously roll balls with your feet or walk on stones for a couple of minutes. Repeat several times during the day when drowsiness begins to set in again.

Sleep laboratory: how to trick the body and always feel cheerful

With the arrival of cold weather, you just want to go into hibernation, but no one canceled your daily routine. How to feel energetic even with a hectic schedule, how to get up easily in the morning, how to quickly adapt when changing time zones, and is it possible to work night shifts? The correspondent of the online publication m24.ru asked these and other questions to the President of the Russian Society of Somnologists, Head of the Sleep Medicine Center of the Barvikha Clinical Sanatorium of the Presidential Administration, Doctor of Medical Sciences Roman Buzunov. And we also learned how many dreams we see per night and how to remember them all.

Photo: YAY/TASS

How many hours should you sleep?

In 2015, American sleep specialists came to a consensus that normal sleep for an adult should last from 7 to 9 hours. Other scientists believe that the norm is purely individual,” Buzunov said. – There are short sleepers who sleep for four hours their entire lives, for example Napoleon or Margaret Thatcher. And Einstein slept for 10 hours and also felt great. The range of sleep norms is from 4 to 12 hours. There is a good rule: you need to sleep so much that you go to bed and fall asleep in 15 minutes, and in the morning you wake up and join the normal rhythm of life in 15 minutes.

Photo: YAY/TASS

How to choose an alarm clock and wake up easily: cutting a bill and the smell of fried bacon

There are many alarm clocks that make a person jump out of bed in terror. Some have to be caught throughout the apartment or thrown against the wall. Recently in the USA they developed an alarm clock in which you need to put a banknote in the evening. If the person does not get up after the first ring, the device will cut the bill into small pieces. Another original alarm clock fries a piece of bacon itself and wakes you up with an alluring smell.

The most comfortable alarm clocks are light alarm clocks and trackers on the wrists,” said the somnologist. – On the alarm clock, a lamp lights up half an hour before waking up and gradually increases the intensity of the glow, simulating dawn. Because of this, the body suppresses the production of melatonin, a sleep hormone that is produced in the dark, and a person wakes up more easily. It is most advisable to use alarm clocks in the fall and winter, when you have to wake up in complete darkness. Wrist trackers track sleep cycles and wake a person at the most appropriate moment. The fact is that sleep consists of several cycles, and each cycle has several stages. The first is dormancy, the most superficial stage; the second - basic, then deep, third and fourth - REM sleep - with rapid movements of the eyeballs, during which we see dreams. After it, the brain is awakened, and the whole cycle repeats again. Trackers wake a person immediately after REM sleep or during arousal. This makes it much easier to wake up.

Photo: AP/TASS/Bebeto Matthews

On average, one cycle takes 90 minutes, but for different people it can last an hour or two hours. Thus, a person experiences four to five cycles during the night. But trackers also have their drawbacks. If you need to get up at 7 a.m. maximum, you reserve the tracker from 6 to 7 so that it can “catch” the end of REM sleep. But he can wake you up at 6 o’clock, and a person is unlikely to refuse to sleep for another hour.

If you use an alarm clock on a smartphone, it is advisable to enable the gradual increase in volume function. Then the awakening will be soft and gradual.

To quickly get into the rhythm of life, you need to immediately open the curtains or turn on the lights, take a contrast shower, do physical exercise and drink tea or coffee, advised the somnologist.

Photo: YAY/TASS

How to have several dreams per night and remember everything

It is enough to sleep for 5-7 minutes after REM sleep for us to completely forget the dream, Buzunov said. – And if a person woke up directly during a dream, then the person will remember everything. People who say they never dream simply do not wake up during this REM stage. During the night we have 3-5 cycles, respectively, a person sees 3-5 dreams. It is very difficult to remember a dream from the first and second cycles in the morning, even if you woke up at night and remembered what you dreamed. We usually remember dreams from the last cycle before waking up.

Thus, if you want to remember more dreams, place a piece of paper and a pen next to you on your nightstand and write down a summary of the dream immediately after waking up.

Eating instead of sleeping or sleeping instead of eating

When we lack sleep, we want to somehow replenish our strength, and after a sleepless night we try to have an extra snack. A good night's rest will help you break this habit. It is best to eat your last meal four hours before bedtime. You shouldn't go to bed hungry. During REM sleep, when a person dreams, there is an increase in the secretion of gastric juice. If the stomach has nothing to digest, gastritis or peptic ulcers may develop.

What should coffee lovers do?

Products containing large amounts of caffeine - coffee, tea, cola, energy drinks and chocolate - can literally deprive you of sleep. Moreover, tea, especially green tea, has even more caffeine than natural coffee. What should coffee lovers do?

Photo: Solo Imaji/Barcroft Media

How to drink coffee without harming your sleep

• You need to drink coffee in the morning and afternoon, no later than six hours before bedtime;
• It is safe to drink no more than three cups of coffee (300 milligrams of caffeine) per day;
• Coffee with cream or milk is safer for sleep, since caffeine partially binds to milk fats and has a weaker effect on the nervous system;
• Arabica has less caffeine than Robusta;
• It is better to drink light and medium roast coffee;
• Bean coffee has less of an impact on sleep than instant coffee, which often has caffeine added. And it is better to drink freeze-dried instant coffee than granulated and powdered coffee. Freeze-dried food will most likely not contain harmful additives.

The fastest way to cheer up

There is a simple way to quickly recover after a sleepless night, even if you don’t have time for an hour’s sleep. It is enough to sleep for 20 minutes and drink a cup of coffee before going to bed. When you wake up, the coffee will just start to take effect. If you need to continue working for a long time, you can sleep for 10 minutes. Such a short nap will restore your performance for an hour.

Photo: YAY/TASS/Sergey Galushko

How to get ready for bed

Those who have difficulty falling asleep need to properly prepare for bed. It is very beneficial to exercise several times a week. The most effective aerobic exercises are running, cycling, swimming or dancing. In this case, classes should end no later than three hours before bedtime.

Don't sit at the computer until late at night. Instead, it's better to read a book, chat with family, or take a bath. You shouldn’t take gadgets to bed either (at least you shouldn’t look at the screen for a long time). The glow of the screen is similar in spectrum to sunlight; it suppresses the brain’s production of the sleep hormone melatonin, and sleep recedes. If you cannot do without devices, it is better to dim the screen brightness as much as possible.

How to quickly adapt when changing time zones

When traveling long distances, many find it difficult to adapt to time zone changes: during the day you always want to sleep, and at night you go to the refrigerator. This condition is called jet lag, or jet lag (from the English jet - jet plane and lag - delay).

Flights to the east are the hardest to endure. They seem to “shorten” the day, since at the place of arrival you need to wake up and go to bed earlier.

Photo: Zhang Naijie Zuma

How to prepare for jet lag

• If you do not tolerate jet lag well, you need to prepare for this before the flight. Four to five days in advance, wake up and go to sleep an hour earlier or later (depending on the time at your point of arrival). Change your dinner time in the same way;
• You should not drink alcohol for two or three days, as it increases the manifestations of the unpleasant syndrome;[
• It is better to arrive to the place a few days before the important event in order to fully adapt;
• Adaptation will be easier if you arrive in the evening local time;
• In the evening before departure, you can take an adaptogen that reduces the symptoms of jet lag;
• Before the flight, you need to get a good night's sleep, this will smooth out the time difference. Therefore, you should not buy tickets for early morning flights;
• It is better to arrive at the airport in advance. If you are late, you will experience stress, and against this background the change of belts will be felt more acutely;
• You should drink more water on the plane. Dehydration, in turn, disrupts the transport of oxygen into the blood and increases the resulting desynchronosis. Alcohol leads to dehydration. Two sips of alcohol on an airplane have the same negative effects as three sips on the ground.
• Half an hour before bedtime, during adaptation, you can take analogues of the “sleepy” hormone melatonin;[

Why do larks get up earlier than owls?

For early risers, the internal biological clock runs faster than the astronomical clock, while for night owls, it runs slower. If a person is placed in a room without time-setters (the same lighting, temperature, humidity throughout the day and no clock), the person will begin to live according to the internal biological clock,” said Roman Buzunov.

For early birds, a day can last 20-22 hours, and for night owls, it can last up to 30 hours. The "owl" will sleep for 10 hours and be awake for 20 hours, the internal clock will always lag. When the astronomical clock shows 12 o'clock at night, it will be 9 o'clock in the evening and she will not want to sleep. And the same thing in the morning: it’s 7 am, and it’s 3 am for her. An “owl” always wants to go to bed later and get up later, while a lark always wants to go to bed earlier, so it’s easier for larks to wake up.

Is it dangerous to work night shifts?

If you constantly work night shifts, the body can be deceived by the presence of artificial lighting, explained Roman Buzunov. – The spectrum of white light from energy-saving lamps is similar to that of the sun. And during the day you can curtain the windows and sleep in silence. True, you will still have to go to the solarium, because the body needs ultraviolet radiation to produce some vitamins.

Photo: YAY/TASS

It’s a completely different matter to work on a shift schedule, for example, every three or four days, like doctors, police officers and firefighters. 20 percent of the adult population of large cities work in shifts. These people constantly live in desynchronosis. The fact is that the body adapts to a change in time zones of just an hour for a day (respectively, for 2 hours - two days).

If a person needs to work tonight and sleep tomorrow, then the body does not have time to readjust. Problems also arise for employees of full-cycle enterprises working in three shifts. Every week the schedule shifts by eight hours and the human body constantly does not have time to adapt to the new regime. If a person works on a shift schedule for five years, the likelihood of developing insomnia increases five times. The risk of developing cardiovascular, endocrinological and nervous diseases also increases. Many experts agree that the risk of certain types of cancer increases.

Photo: YAY/TASS

Is it worth sleeping in on the weekend?

You shouldn't get up much later on weekends than on weekdays. Let’s imagine that all week a person wakes up at 6–7 am, goes to bed around midnight, and on Saturday sleeps until 9–10 am (in the best case). Then on Sunday night he will go to bed late at night and get up at 10-11 in the morning. Then he will try to go to bed early before work, but he will not be able to, and on Monday he will have a very hard time waking up early in the morning.

With this weekend “rest” scheme, the biological clock shifts by 3–4 hours in one direction, and then back. It's the same as flying to Krasnoyarsk for the weekend and returning back. And some manage to “fly to Vladivostok” in this way and then feel defeated.

When preparing the material, I used Roman Buzunov’s book “How to Improve Sleep. Recommendations for managers and businessmen."