Sleep Disorders

Insufficient or interrupted sleep is a debilitating condition. Insomnia has a dramatic effect on our ability to think clearly and function properly during the day. Good sleep patterns are essential for our body to repair itself optimally and our mind to be refreshed.

There are 4 stages of sleep. The first stage, N1, is where we feel drowsy and start to fall into a light sleep where we can easily be woken. Our brain slows down and produces Alpha and Theta brain waves.

During this stage, you are not quite asleep, and you may experience vivid sensations called hypnagogic hallucinations. That’s that weird feeling of falling you sometimes have as you’re drifting off to sleep. Or a hypnic jerk, that sudden startle that jolts you awake for no discernible reason? This stage of sleep is quite short, lasting around seven minutes.
N2, the second sleep stage is also a light stage of sleep, but it becomes a harder to awaken from. In N2 your heart rate slows, eye movements stop, and your body temperature decreases. Stage N2 sleep is characterized by sudden bursts of rapid brainwaves called sleep spindles. Slower brainwaves resume after these brief bursts of brain activity. N2 lasts about 20 minutes for your first sleep cycle of the night and then increases in duration for each subsequent cycle. For most people, N2 comprises about half of adult sleep time.
The third stage, N3, is the beginning of deep sleep where the brain produces slower delta waves. In this stage you become much harder to awaken and are less responsive to external stimuli. N3 is very important to our health as this is when our body repairs muscles and tissues, boosts immune function, stimulates growth and development, and stores energy for the next day.

REM sleep commences in stage 4. This N4 stage occurs between 70 - 90 minutes after you fall asleep and lasts approximately 10 minutes. As we repeat each 70 - 90 minute cycle, REM Sleep lasts longer until the final one that may last for up to an hour. During the previous sleep stages, your brain powers down gradually until it falls into slow wave, deep sleep. This is with the exception of REM sleep. In REM sleep our brain suddenly becomes more active, producing brainwaves similar to those that occur when we are awake, beta brain waves.

These 4 stages of sleep, lasting about 90 minutes, are repeated throughout the night until we wake. If we use an alarm clock to get us up for work, we can awaken during any of our 4 stages. Hypnotherapy is very effective in dealing with sleep disorders.