Maybe it’s because I’m sleep deprived, but I find myself more and more fascinated with articles and studies about the benefits of sleep. As I mentioned in the ‘recovery’ post, sleep is one of Dan John’s 10 Commandments of Recovery. What I never knew, though was the particulars of the phases of sleep and which ones we need the most.

Mark’s Daily Apple recently featured a Definitive Guide to Sleep, and talked about how sleep is divided into non-REM and REM sleep. Non-REM sleep is divided into three phases: N1, N2 and N3. REM sleep follows, but usually in a N1, N2, N3, N2, REM pattern. The cycle repeats throughout the night.

If you’ve ever woken yourself up by a serious leg twitch or been jolted awake by your bedmate by a rogue elbow (like I have), it’s due to the N1 phase where the brain wave frequency first switches. You are barely conscious and your thoughts are foggy. It’s where your muscle tone relaxes and causes the drooling (ahem, for some of us).

Then N2 brings you to the point where you have no more awareness of your surroundings and N3 is where the deep, slow wave sleep begins. Mark says, “Those of you who walk or talk in your sleep tend to begin performing now.”

REM sleep is where we dream (good, bad, and just wacky). Where muscle tone was just relaxing in N2, REM sleep is devoid of any.  N2 dominates our nights and makes up half of our sleep.  REM takes up a quarter, and the last quarter is split between N1 and N3′s deep sleep.

Now here’s the kicker–you can die of sleep deprivation before you die of starvation.  The rest of the article is just as fascinating, so take a gander at it when you get a chance. So, I’m closing out the post so I can go catch some quality Z’s.

That means you do the same (yes you, Michelle).

WOD 03.30.31

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