Question about deep sleep: How much do you need?

Short Answer: 1.5 to 2 hours are what’s recommended by the CDC.

I don’t always follow what the CDC says because their recommendations are for a sick society.

Anyway…

Let’s talk about all the different “phases” or “cycles” of sleep and how we can get you to have more deep sleep each night.

There’s deep sleep, REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, nREM sleep (non REM sleep) and different cycles within them. You cycle through through these two stages (deep and REM) every 80 to 100 minutes.

Generally each night you go through 4 to 6 cycles.

The average adult 18-60 needs about 20-25% of their sleep to be “deep sleep” if you’re getting the recommended average hours of sleep which is 7.

I feel best when I get 8 or more hours per night. If I followed the CDC for recommended sleep time, I’d feel exhausted every day.

Let’s break down the sleep cycles.

Sleep Cycles Explained

1. Non-REM Sleep (3 Stages)

   During non REM sleep (where deep sleep happens) this is really where the body repairs itself. About 80% of your sleep each night is spent here in “deep sleep” or non REM sleep. Body temperature decreases (which is why it’s ideal to sleep cold) by around 1 degree. Your breathing and heart rate slow down significantly, which is why I recommend nasal breathing.

   In sleep studies they’ve shown brain waves become much slower, which helps the body restore ATP (energy) to neuronal cells. Your parasympathetic nervous system (one part of the autonomic nervous system) becomes dominant during this time. The parasympathetic is the rest and digest arm of your nervous system. The sympathetic arm is dominant during our wake cycles.

   During this deep sleep phase your body repairs damaged tissues, activates the glymphatic system to detoxify heavy metals from your brain. It restores key proteins and rebuilds red blood cells. New tissues and muscles are created. Your immune systems goes to work and your physical body is repaired.

   • Stage 1: The lightest quality of sleep. This is where you’re “transitioning” from being awake to falling asleep in twilight.
   • Stage 2: A deeper stage of sleep where people spend most of their sleep time. This is when you’re actually asleep.
   • Stage 3: Deep sleep, also known as slow-wave sleep. This can be measured looking at patterns of brain wave activity.

2. REM Sleep

   During REM sleep your eyes will twitch and move quite a lot. Have you ever watched your dog in REM sleep? It’s pretty hilarious. When they dream it can be pretty funny. During this time  your breathing actually increases vs decreases like in deep sleep. Think of deep sleep healing you physically and REM sleep healing  you spiritually, emotionally and psychologically. REM sleep is where you process thought and emotion. And it’s when you dream. Kinda makes sense.

   During these vivid dreams your muscles become slightly paralyzed so you don’t really act out your dreams. That would be really bad. 🙂 REM sleep is where you process emotional traumas, consolidate memories in your cortex and hippocampus. You can also learn to lucid dream here because REM sleep is where you file and store knowledge. This is probably why children sleep for so long because every day they’re learning so many new things.

   Generally each REM cycle lasts around 90 minutes and each cycle is progressively longer as you go through the night. I think it’s just amazing that our body does all this naturally. Side tangent but it’s hard to imagine how evolution could have accounted for the wonders of our biology.

   • Characterized by rapid eye movement, rising heart rate, and heavy breathing.
   • Associated with dreaming and brain activity.

3. Ultradian Sleep Cycle

   Many people know what a circadian rhythm is but not necessarily what the ultradian sleep cycle is. A circadian rhythm is based on light dark cycles in a 24 hour diurnal cycle. So your circadian rhythm really refers to all 24 hours in the day whereas the ultradian cycle refers just to the different phases and cycles within the sleep period. Going from being awake to sleeping to deep sleep and then to REM sleep is all a part of the ultradian sleep cycle.

   • Sleep occurs in 90-minute periods.
   • This cycle repeats 4-5 times throughout the night.

Deep Sleep: How Much Is Needed?

The general recommendations are 1.5 to 2 hours of deep sleep are necessary. I feel better when I get more. You can track this with an Oura Ring or a Whoop band. The general guidelines are just that general recommendations for a sick society. Here’s an example, the RDA for copper is less than 1 milligram. Yet we know 80 to 100 years ago we had much more copper in our soils and people consumed 3 to 4x the amount of copper daily.

The RDA for vitamin C is just enough to prevent somebody from getting scurvy but it’s not enough to actually thrive in your health.

The same is true for deep sleep. How much you need each night might be much more than what’s needed to barely keep you alive. 

/ #EndRant 🙂

What Affects Sleep Stages?

There are so many things that can affect sleep stages. They’re all the things we know about our health. Let’s talk about

Food

I follow the principles in chronobiotic nutrition and the Daylight Diet. Plus eating late has been associated with colon cancer. Nobody wants to deal with that. What it means is that I don’t eat after the sun sets. Eating too close to bed can affect digestion while sleeping. It also brings blood flow to your stomach, liver and colon to digest food instead of repairing tissue which should happen during deep sleep.

Screentime

Screens emit a color temperature of blue light rated at 6,500 kelvin. This disturbs melatonin release. Melatonin is what is the governor of your circadian rhythm. Your circadian rhythm is what controls your ultradian sleep cycles. No screens after sunset. The only exception is if you’re using Iris Tech with zero blue light AND (not or) wearing blue blocking glasses. Even then, limit looking directly at a light source. Humans were never meant to stare directly at a light source.

Morning Sun

I wrote an entire article about how important it is to watch the sunrise every morning. There are quantum physiological reasons for this. Getting UVA sun into the eyes helps set your circadian rhythm and produce melatonin for the day.

Light Environment

We know that blue light keeps you awake. So it does no good to use Iris Tech on your computer but then open you refrigerator at 9pm with an LED bulb in it. That dose of light, is going to prevent melatonin secretion. You must block all blue light starting at sunset until you lay down to fall asleep.

Alcohol, Tobacco & Caffeine

Studies show that these substances can cause issues with melatonin and disturb your sleep/wake cycles. Avoid all three for ideal sleep. If you must do caffeine (I drink coffee each morning with no sleep issues) have caffeine no later than 11am.

Lack of Exercise

You absolutely must get exercise (preferably outside and preferably at the same time) every single day. Our bodies were meant to move. If you exercise (either using weights for strength training or aerobic) doing it at the same time will help your body regulate its daily rhythms.

How Much Light Sleep Do You Need?

Light sleep is almost impossible to avoid. Light sleep is what happens on your way to getting deep sleep (nREM sleep) and REM sleep. It’s the doorway to both states of sleep.

How Much Deep Sleep Does A Child Need?

Children need more deep sleep than adults. Most likely this is because of all the new stimuli they’re being exposed to. Tissues are growing and repairing at the same time. New thoughts and new ideas need to be processed so it make sense.

Generally toddlers (Age 1 to 3) need about 11 hours per night while children (Age 3 to 9) need around 8 to 10 hours per night.

Conclusion

Deep sleep and how much you need each night to thrive with your health is going to be different for each person. I like to track things with technology but only rarely. I allow myself to follow my intuition and feelings. I check in with how I feel when I wake up. I know the things I need to do to get a good solid deep sleep each night. Tracking bodily functions with technology can become addicting.

Tracking is fun but we’ve lost ourselves in tracking data instead of going within and checking in on our feelings and intuition. Keep working on getting more deep sleep and you’ll start noticing your whole life will change.

Trust me. I’ve been on both sides.

Questions

• How do you sleep?
• Does it take you a long time to fall asleep?
• Do you wake up in the middle of the night?
• Why do you wake up?
• Can you fall back asleep after you wake up?
• Do you feel refreshed or groggy in the morning?

Comment below.