We distinguish four different phases of sleep, starting with the first light sleeping phase (stage 1) up to the fourth (stage 4), the so-called deep sleep. During the first 45 minutes of sleep the brain constantly gets slower, it is falling deeper and deeper and the eyes of the sleeping person stay relaxed. This also changes the frequencies and electrical activities of the brain from 8 to 10 Hertz (oscillation per second) to 0.5 Hertz during deep sleep. Than the process gets turned around, though the sleeper shortly stays in the first of normally five dream-(REM-)sleeping phases that only last a couple of minutes. This cycle from phase 1 to REM (rapid-eye-movement)-sleep is repeated every 90 minutes. During one night, a healthy sleeper is going through four or five of such cycles.
The sleeping-process under the aspect of the single sleeping phases
During the first half of the night we are having more deep sleep, during the second half of the night more REM-phases. Out of this reason, the sleep before midnight is called “the golden sleep”, because it is deepest and most regenerative before the first REM-phase. The deep sleep is important for the regeneration of the body, the REM-sleep for the regeneration of the psych. This can be gathered from scientific findings. Because, when someone gets prevented from falling into REM-sleep, the person will have heavy problems in finding a solution for complicated and new challenges compared to a person with uninterrupted REM-sleep. This also is a plausible reason why one should do without so called sleeping pills, if possible. These sedatives prevent from brain wave activity in beta wave range (13 – 30 Hz). But these are exactly the frequencies that occur and are measurable during REM-sleep. Scientific findings made very clear that REM-sleep is important for all learn- and save-processes during the day, and especially also during the night.
Leave a Reply