The price of sleep ins
01-02-2013
Most of us have to get up earlier than we would like during the week to get to work and then sleep in during the weekend. This is often justified as we have a sleep debt to make up but while these sleep ins may seem like a harmless indulgence they are not consequence free.
The major problem with sleep ins is that the body craves routine. Our sleep cycles are governed by our body clock and any shift can cause a number of synchronisation problems. While sleeping in may feel nice at the time, often the result will be an increased lethargy and mental fuzziness. It also makes waking up on Monday morning a lot harder as the body clock has begun to be reset to the weekend time frame.
Rather than sleeping in on the weekend, most sleep scientists recommended that you take a siesta during the weekend in the middle of the day. These naps are an incredibly effective way of catching up on sleep missed during the week and do not affect our body clock in the same way that sleeping in does. Just remember that a siesta shouldn’t last longer than around 30 minutes as otherwise you will drift into a deeper sleep that is harder to wake up from.
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