Slashdot Mirror
The Brain's Secret For Sleeping Like a Log
An anonymous reader writes "Why can some people sleep through anything? According to this article in Wired Science, some lucky people have an extra helping of a certain kind of brain static that essentially blocks out noise and other stimuli. These 'sleep spindles' can be detected via EEG, and show up as brief bursts of high-frequency brain waves; some people naturally produce more than others. The researchers say these spindles are produced by the thalamus, the brain region that acts as a waystation for sensory information. If the thalamus is busy producing sleep spindles, sensory information can't make it through the thalamus to the cortex, the perceptive part of the brain."
Wouldn't being a sound sleeper be a liability in the Darwin game? I would think that waking up when there's unusual stimuli would be something helpful to keep from being lunch for a nocturnal predator.
Possibly, yes, but not everyone has this deep sleep ability, and humans are social animals. it is possible that a balance between deep sleepers and light sleepers offered other advantages. maybe the light sleepers would hear something, then wake the deep sleepers and they could all run away, while if it was a false alarm that woke the light sleepers in the tribe, the more rested heavy sleepers would still be up for a long days hunting...
(thats probably not even close to being right, but its just an example of what could have been the case - where variety benefits both sides.)
-I only code in BASIC.-
My memories of going to sleep as a child are of tossing and turning every night in bed.
My parents bought my brother a waterbed when he outgrew his twin bed. I thought I'd fall asleep quicker in a waterbed than my old mattress, so I pestered my parents endlessly until they relented and bought me a waterbed too. It didn't help.
I learned about self-hypnosis, lucid dreaming, and "mental imagery" when I was 17 years old. One style of self-hypnosis calls for relaxing the physical body, then relaxing the mind. I was fascinated by the prospects of "internal senses".
I tried to relax in chairs and on the bed (such as for a "nap") as best I could, but the only relaxation I experienced was fleeting. I'd feel good for a half a second, then I'd notice feeling good and I'd pop out of the relaxation and be stuck in my overly tense body once again.
Some of the web pages on dreaming (1999 or so) and books that I read talked about a "drifty-dreamy" hypnagogic state between sleep and wakefulness. I tried to relax as best I could in bed. I always passed out before I noticed anything.
I left for college the next year, and developed something like lupus (lots of inflammation). I thought I had an RSI, but the P.A. and M.D. at the campus health center said there was nothing wrong with me that a little exercise wouldn't fix. I didn't believe them, so I started my own search for answers.
Many years passed, and I eventually I ended up in the hands of a capable Osteopath who specialized in hands-on therapy. I told him my story: head trauma when I was 17 y.o., swelling and pain in forearms, etc. He did his thing, and over a course of about a year he gradually helped my body's structures move back into their proper place.
Other disciplines look at a bone that's out of place as if it's a problem. One maxim from early Osteopathy was that "muscles move bones, and nerves control muscles". So rather than directly popping a bone back into place, a skilled osteopath will evaluate a patient to see what causes a structure to be malpositioned.
The good doctor likened a case such as mine to peeling an onion: stored trauma comes off a layer at a time.
One night after a few months of regular treatments, I opened my mouth to brush my teeth and noticed that the constant clicking noise in my jaw (TMJ) was no longer present. I opened and closed my mouth a few times in disbelief. The clicking had been with me for about four years at that point...
I also noticed that I no longer had to "try" to relax in bed before I passed out - most nights I quickly fell asleep.
Good sleep comes from having a balanced body, and hands-on therapies are one way to restore balance. There are others that I've found useful, but that's a much longer post.
Attention Insomniacs: Watch for my replies in this thread & story - I'll try to get some more information online shortly. I just want to get this comment posted while the story is still fresh. :)
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
Rub one out and it'll help you sleep.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
Clown will eat me.
Have gnu, will travel.
Two words for your wife... cattle prod
"Yet, this doesn't explain why I can't sleep at 11:30pm when the house is dead quiet. {sigh}"
You haven't expended enough energy. I find that many people that can't sleep also don't exercise or have sedentary lifestyles. If you add exercise to your life you can bet you'll get tired eventually. You should really only go to sleep when you're tired, when you feel sleepy. I used to have trouble falling asleep until I added walking/exercising an hour or two a day.
Expending energy goes a long way to solving sleep problems.
Do. Or do not. There is no try.
On behalf of everyone here at Slashdot, I would like to personally thank you for putting Yoda and masturbation into one line of text.
:-(
This awful image in my head.. MAKE IT STOP!
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.