Marking Period 4 Week 2

http://www.youbeauty.com/sleep/columns/sleeping-beauty/sleep-deprivation-and-daily-living
In this column, James Maas explains how reoccurring sleep deprivation can cause health issues and struggles that we have learned to brush off in the hustle of the 21st century. The recommended needed sleep for an adult, Maas explains, is between seven and a half and nine hours each night, when realistically we get about six. This belief that running on six hours of sleep and feeling fatigued during the day is "normal" causes us to ignore signs (including anxiety, irritability, and reoccurring illness) that we are sleep deprived, which in turn harms our "quality of life". Other health threatening results include weight gain, increased likelihood of heart disease, cancer, and diabetes, which are triggered by imbalanced amounts of hormones or overworked nervous systems. Maas also describes another serious problem called "microsleeps" (short periods of sleeping during the day), which may seem less serious than other issues, but can in fact occur behind the wheel of a car or at work and cause more harm. Although lack of sleep may be over looked in current society, the level of harm and long term effects it can so easily cause should be better understood.