How does lack of sleep affect you?

I do not get on well at all. I can do one night (roughly 32 hours) and be alright, after that I go straight downhill. If you are completely opposed to caffeine: good luck. You’ll need it.

I don’t even notice, unless it has been more than two days. After that I start to go downhill fast. I can miss a night of sleep without skipping a beat, but I don’t necessarily consider it a good thing, because sleep is pretty good for you.

Depends. If I’m manic, it doesn’t bother me much. Otherwise, it makes me tired and irritable and unable to think.

I’m clearly not manic, now. I’m really tired and sleepy and it’s not even 10 pm yet.

@wundayatta I know how you feel.

It causes me to get sloppy in my writing and use “effect” when I mean to write “affect”.

I get impatient and cranky. I no longer watch 10PM television so I get the sleep I need. I don’t like myself when I’m cranky.

I went for 4 days without sleep a couple of times. I was cranky on the first and second day. Then I started to get a headache and a scratchy throat on the third day. On the forth day I lost all sense of the passing of time. I also couldn’t accurately track how fast anything was going. It was hellish.

I get a little snippy.

@tranquilsea What kept you up so long?

@ninja_man nightmares. I was going through a lot at the time.

I am given to understand that I get short tempered and cranky. What’s it to you anyway?

Depends on what I was doing that kept me up all night. On certain occasions, I will be quite energetic the next morning.

I get cranky to start. And when I’m angry with life, I find any way I can to avoid what I should be doing, even if the diversion is more work than the actual work.

Then I fall asleep. I very rarely make to aduio hallucinations any more.

But, as you can see, I still can’t spell properly. Oi.

I become a huge cranky asshole lol

I get very quiet. If I must stay awake, for me there is a threshold. When I pass the threshold of wanting to pass out anywhere that I could find, I become so energized and I can’t go to sleep. It’s quite odd.

If I’m raising hell and partying it doesn’t bother me a bit. Or at least I don’t notice it. If I’m trying to work or be professional my word skills go down hill fast.

Back in my teens I went a few times without sleep for extended periods of time. At times I used to go more than a week without sleep. Now days I can only really manage about 2 or maybe 3 days without sleep, then I collapse.

From past experience it goes something like this:

Day 1: Tired, could use a nap.

Day 2: Not tired anymore, but short tempered and irritable.

Day 3: Sporadic sensations of being drained, with irritability and higher stress levels, and now always tired.

Day 4: Full of energy, but stressed out and constantly paranoid and irrational.

Day 5: Stress, short temper, confused, mild hallucinations out the corner of the eye.

Day 6: You will now feel like the walking dead until you either join the dead or sleep. The world is in slow motion, you are stressed, worried, paranoid, and suffering mild hallucinations in general. ... (from black cats and bugs out of the corner of you eye, to objects just outside of focus becoming warped, some black spots that come and go.)

Day 7: For all other days refer to day 6.

Since I posted this to also find a plan of action to fight the awful feelings, a doctor friend of mine mentioned eating a lot of fish that day. Not sure why?

@Shippy Fish seems to do good stuff to the body. You could also try fish oil capsules.

@poisonedantidote Thanks for the informative answer, it seems to me you are clearly describing sleep deprivation over a period of time. I am wondering now even more, why I get those symptoms just after a day or so. Of Less sleep as opposed to no sleep. It’s just odd.

@Adirondackwannabe yes it does, and good point , maybe a lot of symptoms of lack of sleep could be alleviated in a small or big way by taking it.

Need more sleep but Freddie is such a bitch.

Everyman , child & animals stay far, ......... far away. I hate not getting enough sleep. If I could get far away from me I would .Up until 3yrs. ago I would have had trouble breathing with out a good nights sleep. Now I breathe fire….oops I mean fine ..

I feel really ill and after a few days of very little sleep I usually get ill. Seems to be horrible for my immune system. Also, I get really paranoid, I am already easily scared and panicky, but lack of sleep boosts my immagination of all horrible things to a maximum, as does watching TV or playing video games. Also, I get a headache.

I think “lack of sleep” has a different context for you than it would for most people. (Which, by the way, I am not one of.) The best coping method I’ve found is to remind myself of reasonable things. “I feel anxious because I’m tired” “I can sleep when I get home.” (Even though I never do, just the promise lets me get through the day.

Lack of sleep can destroy your body in the short term. Apart from making you feel tired, stressful and depressed. It can also affect your immune and central nervous system.