Last updated on November 22, 2022
Are you drunk right now? According to New Mexico Tech’s report on “How Drunk Are You Without Sleep?” a person who has been awake for 19 hours is as cognitively impaired as a legally drunk person. That is the equivalent of sleeping only for five hours, which is the average night’s sleep for those who are busy with school or work. In recent years, sleep deprivation has become more prevalent; many are sleep deprived and do not get enough sleep to be healthy.
In fact, in the American Physical Therapy Association’s 2018 article, “Most Middle and High School Students Don’t Get Enough Sleep,” it is stated that 72.7 percent of high school students do not have sufficient sleep, with about 20 percent of them sleeping less than 6 hours a night. Similarly, sleeping 6 hours for ten days leads to impairment equivalent to a person who has been awake for 24 hours (New Mexico Tech). TWENTY-FOUR HOURS! Just recall the morning after you pulled your first all-nighter–you probably had that pulsing feeling that made you feel like your brain was about to explode. Now imagine having that be the norm for every day.
While constantly being sleep deprived leads to a steady increase in impairment, people under sleep deprivation can not accurately assess how sleep deprived they are. Some think that sleeping in on the weekends can help replenish your energy for the upcoming week. However, sleeping in on the weekends does not help as much as people think because if you sleep less than seven hours a week, it requires more than three nights of sleep to recover (New Mexico Tech).
Here is the takeaway: if you want to stop feeling tired, burnout, and other various feelings you get from being drunk, then you might want to establish a bedtime routine that satisfies the sleep requirement of 8 to 10 hours (American Physical Therapy Association, 2018). This way, you will function better during the daytime, avoid serious health issues down the line, and wake up feeling refreshed.
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