BDC #32 - Fragmented Sleep Disorder: woken up countless times is definitely not fun!

Do you sleep disorder? Let's say... insomnia, couldn't sleep until really late at night or nearly dawn? Well, you better treat it before too late. As you know lack of sleep will definitely, definitely, DEFINITELY effects you on the next morning.

HOWEVER, do you know that there are more and more variation of sleep disorders than just 'regular insomnia'. 

I have this really annoying sleep disorder. I am always woken up around 3 hours after the moment I fall asleep, and on my worse days, I will keep waking up every one hour after the first 'wake up call', until my alarm rings violently. It's bloody frustrating and sleeping for 5 hours straight sounds like a luxury for me.  

Well, ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to fragmented sleep disorder. As it's name, it is basically a sleep disorder where we are woken up during our sleep for several times. People with fragmented sleep disorder is, in contrast with people insomnia, actually could easily fallen asleep like normal people. However, they are woken up for several short times and fallen asleep again during the night. In the end, the total time of sleep they actually have is less than they thought. It's totally annoying and unsatisfying. Even if the effect isn't immediately felt by the patients, in the end they will experience the same agitation and terrible mood swing as insomniacs.  

Some people might say they experience fragmented sleep – in two periods of sleeping during the night, with a large gap in between. However, it isn't considered as fragmented sleep, but biphasic sleep, and it is very common. While a bi-phasic sleep pattern is something you can adjust to and live with, truly fragmented sleep with many short awakenings is simply terrible.

There are some causes of fragmented sleep disorder, and most of them are the same as insomnia; such as stress and mental problems. Caffeine addiction might also lead to the restless feeling during sleeping which effects the sleeping stage. One additional reason is due to sleep apnea. It is a cessation of breathing during sleep, and mostly happened on overweight or obese people. 

One important thing to point out is the fact that fragmented sleep could lead to memory problem, as we need to 'lock down' some memories of the day during our sleep but unfortunately enough the cycle is disrupted.     

So, don't just think about insomnia, we have more sleep disorders than we thought.

 

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