MONDAY MEDICINE

Yaayyy..its a beautiful Monday and I’m going to be sharing a very vital secret with you all.  make sure you read it through.

Why do we spend one-third of our lives doing NOTHING? Yes.  Virtually nothing but SLEEPING. The average person sleeps about 8 hours a day.  And if we put that in years,  that would be 25 years if you live up to 75. Really,  there must be “something important” to this “nothing”

But I’m not discussing today on the length of time you sleep in a lifetime. Nope..  I’m actually worried,  or should I say concerned, that YOU,  yes YOU, I mean YOU gangan (in my Yoruba voice), You are SLEEP DEPRIVED!

How do I know? Simple. When was the last time you

• felt like taking a nap while doing some serious work?
• slept for only (or less than) 7 hours a day?
• noticed you had bags under your eyes (peri-orbital fullness) because you hadn’t enough sleep?
• were yawning and yawning and trying hard to concentrate at a serious activity?
• had what you would call “my normal mood swing” (commoner in ladies though)
• had this one-sided headache and you sure knew it was as a result of not getting enough sleep?
• were rolling on your bed and couldn’t find sleep early enough?

If your answer to any of the above is “at least,  once in the last three months“, then I know you’re sleep deprived and I’m here to help you!

Now,  don’t get me wrong.

I’m not asking you to become a snail (who can sleep for 3 years straight) or a cat(who sleeps 70% of its life) but stop being a giraffe who needs only 5-30 minutes of sleep in a 24 hour period. And this goes especially to all you busy people reading this. I’ve been there too.  Reading for exams, working late nights and rushing to work the next morning, shuffling between 2 jobs,  being a single mom of three under-fives, the list is endless and somehow gets all of us on it.

The key is this.

Sleep is vital to survival and optimum functionality.

Yes.  Memories hold better during sleep and studies have shown that the ability of your brain to tell what’s important from what’s not is compromised by lack of sleep.

In fact,  sleep deprivation will kill faster than food deprivation.

Every machine needs servicing once and always… Your body’s factory reset button is SLEEP! I’m not going to try to scare you by saying that obesity, diabetes and ADHD amongst other diseases have been linked with poor sleep. No! You don’t need a scarecrow to know all those bad things that a good nap can prevent you from getting. But you know that saying, don’t you, “sleep is the best medication (or is it meditation…all join abeg) ”

Now someone is already asking me that “Dr. Femi, how do I find sleep despite my extremely busy schedule?“… it’s simple… Just sleep!

And I can hear another person saying “sleep doesn’t come easily until I use sleeping pills” Now hold it there! You might need to see a Sleep Therapist or in the minimum,  a doctor that knows his job well because those sleeping pills are doing more harm than good.
I’m going to end this here…  More than half of those reading this article are sleep deprived and there’s only one cure to Sleep deprivation…  And that is

SLEEEEEEEPPPPPPPP!  

obvious right?

PS: 

It’s quite ironic that I’m talking about sleep on a Monday morning…  Well,  let’s just say I know you need sleep. 

Please! Don’t forget to click on the Follow button down there…yes…down this page. Tomorrow,  I’d be sharing a wonderful story on this same page… It’s gonna be hot. Tales by Tuesday... Don’t miss it… Follow the blog!!!

Dr Osunlusi Olufemi

MBBS Lagos.