What is one of the most important components of our daily lives? It is sleep. Yes, you read that right. Not having enough sleep can ruin your day. According to medical science, every individual should have at least 6 to 8 hours of sleep. After a tiring day, all you feel like doing is coming back home and resting as much as possible. Why is sleep so important? Well, there are various reasons for this.
Sleep prepares your body and energizes you for the upcoming physical activity. Sleep gives you the adequate rest that every human being needs after a set of physical activities. Sleep helps the muscles and the tissues of the body to relax well. Sleep provides adequate rest to your brain. Well, the list of the benefits of sleep can go on and on. Many people will talk about the need for sleep. But as the maxim says, too much of anything is not good. Similarly, too much sleep can be hazardous for your body.
In this blog, we will share with you the ways by which you can treat excessive sleep effectively. Besides, we will also present a detailed account of the causes of excessive sleepiness along with sleep hygiene. Therefore, without further delay, let’s get started with the details of the blog.
Causes of excessive sleepiness
You must wonder why you sleep more or why you feel more sleepy than others. One of the potential causes of excessive sleepiness is a lack of adequate sleep at night. The nighttime is the most suited one for sleeping. When you do not get adequate sleep at night, you tend to fall sleepy throughout the day. When this continues for a long time, you get into the habit of excessive sleepiness. Some of the potential causes of excessive sleepiness during the daytime are as follows:
- Sleeping and breathing problems like sleep apnea
- Narcolepsy
- Insomnia and related other slip disorders
- Insufficient sleep during the daytime
- Restless legs syndrome
- Periodic limb movement disorder
- Circadian rhythm disorders
Sometimes when you have a bad mood or suffer from depression or schizophrenia, it can impact your sleep and lead to an excessive sleep disorder. Besides, some medical conditions can contribute to poor sleep. These medical conditions include renal failure, heart failure, obesity, and liver failure. Some food materials can also lead to inadequate sleep like caffeine and similar other stimulants, alcohol, and chronic drugs.
What sleep hygiene should you follow?
One of the best ways to get rid of excessive sleepiness is to bring a positive change in your sleeping pattern. When you have proper sleep hygiene, it can reduce the negative effects of sleep-related disorders and improve your overall health and well-being. If you are interested to have proper sleep hygiene, this is what you need to follow:
- Make sure to sleep in a calm, cool, dark, and noise-free place. The darkness of a room and the quiet atmosphere will make you fall asleep soon.
- Utilize your bed only to sleep and for sex. Laying down on the bed throughout the day will make you feel less exhausted. As a result, you will not feel like sleeping.
- Utilize the daytime to exercise at least for 40 minutes. This will make you feel more exhausted and you will sleep naturally.
- Before going to bed strictly avoid consuming caffeine, alcohol, and drugs. All of this can affect your sleep pattern.
- Figure out a relaxing and consistent bedtime routine. Make sure to stay away from electronic gadgets before you sleep especially your phones as they emit a bright light that includes blue radiations.
- In case you cannot sleep even after lying on the bed for 20 minutes get up and find a relaxing or coming activity until you yawn and feel sleepy.
How to treat excessive sleepiness?
If you want to treat excessive sleepiness first you have to figure out its causes. There are many medications that doctors prescribed to people suffering from excessive sleepiness. Generally, the doctors do not prescribe them alone but with some other medication or behavior modifications. Given below is a list of medications that doctors prescribe for excessive sleepiness.
- Modafinil
Modafinil is a common drug that doctors prescribe to patients suffering from excessive sleepiness caused due to residual sleepiness or narcolepsy. Sometimes, a doctor might prescribe this drug in case of sleep at me as well. The function of this drug is to produce an effect on the sleep-wake section of the brain. As a side effect, you can experience some dizziness and headache.
- Armodafinil
Like modafinil, armodafinil also induces a wake-promoting agent in people who feel extremely sleepy due to sleep at me or narcolepsy. Here too, you can suffer from littleness and headaches. Sometimes the side effect of this drug can reach up to depression and breathing problems.
- Sodium oxybate
If you are suffering from excessive sleepiness due to narcolepsy you can use sodium oxybate. This enhances the slow-wave sleep face and makes you alert during the daytime. During the night time, the sodium oxybate restricts its actions and makes you fall asleep quickly. Some of its drawbacks can include depression and confusion.
- Methylphenidate
Methylphenidate is used to treat narcolepsy. The function of this drug is to keep you stay alert and awake during the day. The doctors also prescribe this drug to people who suffer from ADHD. Sometimes, while using this drug, you can experience nervousness or irritability, or a little difficulty falling asleep at night.
- Benzodiazepine receptor agonists
These are hypnotic drugs that make you feel sleepy at night. These hypnotic drugs give you an adequate amount of sleep at night and improve both the quality and the quantity of sleep thereby reducing excessive sleepiness in the daytime. Some of the risks of using a hypnotic drug can be withdrawal, symptoms of dependency, and loss of effectiveness.
- Melatonin
Melatonin is the sleep hormone present in every human body, the release of which can make you fall asleep at night. When there is a lack of melatonin secretion you experience less sleep at night. You can take melatonin supplements before going to bed.
Conclusion
Therefore, sleep is an important component of everybody’s life that you should never sacrifice or compromise. If you want to live a healthy life, you have to enjoy 6 to 8 hours of sleep every day. If you are suffering with your sleep, you can go here and check out the easy medical solutions.
