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> Lack of sleep changes how insulin operates in your body and how quickly your cells absorb sugar. After a week of short sleep nights (say, five or six hours),

> Lack of sleep changes how insulin operates in your body and how quickly your cells absorb sugar. After a week of short sleep nights (say, five or six hours), your doctor could diagnose you with pre-diabetes, Walker says. My father intentionally tried to sleep as little as possible in his 20s, 30s, and into his 40s - sleeping four hours a night was common - in order to get more done - and he ended up with diabetes. Chronic and extreme lack of sleep was his only risk factor. Don't screw around. Get your sleep.

ams6110 9y ago
He wasn't overweight, or living on pizza, candy and soda? I ask because people with that sort of attitude, in my experience, tend to take shortcuts on diet as well.
- brandonmenc 9y ago
  He was a health nut before it was popular. Lifted weights, ran nearly every day, ate a Mediterranean diet, low body fat, trim waist, healthy body weight, and a decent amount of muscle. He also did not eat much during the workday, so was effectively unintentionally doing intermittent fasting as well. Ironically, one of his reasons for sleeping less was to have time to fit exercise into his hectic schedule. His diabetes manifested as unexplained weight loss and muscle wasting. So, no, he was not your "typical" diabetes patient.
  - oligopoly 9y ago
    Staying in low fat percentage range for long time can f up your hormonal and other systems. Not saying its the case here but something to take in considerations for those staying lean naturally
    - brandonmenc 9y ago
      Yeah, if you're a bodybuilder or marathon runner carrying a single digit body fat percentage - which is not something the average person is going to "accidentally" do. Everyone else is probably safe trying to get as lean as possible so long as they're not malnourished.
      - oligopoly 9y ago
        10-15% and you have somewhat defined sixpack. Lower range of that continuously naturally and you might have yourself a problem. You only have to be somewhat enthusiastic about fitness and watch what you eat to get there. Not that uncommon these days
        brandonmenc 9y ago
        Citation for 10% being dangerously low?
        ensiferum 9y ago
        15% is pretty damn flabby though. Unless you have a very unique body composition and putting your fat into say your legs and butt (like women typically do) youll def have a soft doughnut around your waistline and no way you have six pack abs. Its more in the below 10% bf when you actually can start to dream about the 6pack if you actually have the muscle.
        oligopoly 9y ago
        You've seen some misrepresented data. You commonly see fit people saying they have 6 or 8% fat % when they are closer to +12%. Most methods to determinate fat percentage are hilariously inaccurate. Look it up. 15% and you see hints of sixpack (clear outline) for most people who train.
flatline 9y ago
Interesting. I had a pre-diabetes marker read high on an annual blood test a few years ago. It has not reappeared since. I wonder if I just hadn’t slept much the week beforehand.
- brandonmenc 9y ago
  A1C is a two- to three-month average, so poor sleep over the past quarter of a year could affect it, afaik.
  - flatline 9y ago
    That was the one, and come to think of it we still had a baby that wasn’t sleeping too regularly right around that time.
georgebarnett 9y ago
I'm have Type 1 Diabetes (the autoimmune kind) and when I don't sleep or exercise properly, my blood sugar is at least 2X harder to manage. Its far more unpredictable and inconsistent. In a weird way, its nice to have my body make these failures blatantly evident, rather than just hiding it behind a working pancreas and then dropping dead at random 15 years earlier than I should.
Barrin92 9y ago
the flipside is you really get a lot of quality time in in your 20s 30s and 40s. Doesn't that count for something? If you sleep five instead of eight hours a night that's actually about two years of additional lifetime even if your lack of sleep kills you at 70 rather than 80, and I'd guess 10 years of life reduction is way too pessimistic of a guess, and it's the bad years at the end you're sacrificing anyway I'm somewhat serious actually, I'm not convinced that sleeping your youth away is actually a good trade-off. Not to mention that sport, a healthy diet and checkups can probably mitigate the downsides to some degree.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- pstuart 9y ago
  “Quality” is subjective
  - Barrin92 9y ago
    I don't doubt that it is, but if we would ask a hundred people if they would want to spend time in their 20s, 30s or 40s again I think we would both agree that the answer would be pretty clear, not to mention that most professional activity, such as entrepreneurship, scientific or career advancement occurs in that period of life.
    - brandonmenc 9y ago
      > most professional activity, such as entrepreneurship, scientific or career advancement occurs in that period of life entrepreneurship and scientific advancement? Meh. Lots of evidence there are sweet spots for that well into your 50s and beyond. Would you rather work an extra decade but live healthily into your 80s or 90s - or try to cram it all in so you can retire unhealthy and miserable in your 50s with your life cut short and dying before you reach 70? I know that's not always the exact trade-off, but I'd rather get my full eight in every night and work productively into my 60s as a healthy person. The idea that work and relaxation are two extreme, distinct periods of life makes sense for a coal miner, but most of us here, fortunately, as "knowledge workers," have the luxury to weave the two together until we get dementia.
pizza 9y ago
Diabetes is known as a/the major driver of heart disease “Those identified with cardiovascular disease, not identified with diabetes, are simply undiagnosed." https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52faa95ee4b0b0a74811f732/t/57ae3a3f197aeaa45925a294/1471035980981/8_8_16_Gerber_Savagian_poster_final.pdf https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52faa95ee4b0b0a74811f...
rconti 9y ago
My dad's one of those lucky guys who did 5 hours a night his entire career (probably going back to his Navy days at least). Now that he's retired, he's a bit more leisurely and sleeps until 6:30 or so (instead of 4:50!) but often I receive emails from him at 1 or 2am, and we'll easily stay up half the night chatting when I'm visiting. He's one of the healthiest 79 year olds you'll ever meet, and not due to a particularly great diet or exercise (though both are fine in his case; he's just not a health nut). The thing that always made me jealous about him is not so much his ability to thrive on less sleep than most of us, but his ability to wake up. One beep from a digital watch alarm and he's out of bed, feet on the floor. I can't wake up to save my life. But then again, I try to get as close to 8h a night as possible, particularly as I've focused more than ever on my health and fitness.
- shams93 9y ago
  Some people may have the ability to drop into deep states of sleep with unusual rapidity where they don't need the extra ramp up and ramp down hours that most of us need so they can make do with 5 hours with the same quality it takes most of us to reach with 8.
  - stevesimmons 9y ago
    I am perfectly refreshed with 5 hours sleep for exactly that reason. I have narcolepsy. Basically I fall asleep immediately and hit REM sleep a minute or two later. That saves the 90 minutes it takes most people need to reach the REM stage. My normal sleeping pattern is in bed at 1am, up before 6am, at work by 7am.
    - murali89 9y ago
      How do you know you go into REM? Do you use any sleep tracking device? Could you please suggest here?
- jaggederest 9y ago
  Waking to an alarm is a training thing. You have to make it policy that when the alarm goes off, you're up and out of bed within 10 seconds. You'll never sleep through an alarm again. It's the snooze button that kills people.
internetman55 9y ago
No offense to your father, but where would anyone get the idea that this is a good thing to do?
- almostApatriot1 9y ago
  Lots of people feel like if you could pul off 4 hrs sleep a night you should. Donald Trump has been touting his ability to do it for decades.
  - dd36 9y ago
    He’s a specimen of good mental and physical health too!
    - almostApatriot1 9y ago
      He's not bad for 71. If he read more and did more than just watch cable news, he'd be pretty sharp imo. My point was it was/is a holy grail of sorts. Not many could 'pull it off,' but if you manage to...
      - chillwaves 9y ago
        Not bad? He is obese and incoherent. His reported go-to order from McDonalds (and he loves to eat fast food) is "two Big Macs, two Filet-O-Fishes, and a large chocolate shake." Do you want to go ahead and calculate the calories on that meal or shall I? Even if he were in good health, it would be in spite of his lifestyle, not because of it. http://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-mcdonalds-order-review-2017-12#trump-is-a-man-of-controversial-tastes-from-well-done-steaks-to-gaudy-gold-louis-xiv-chairs-his-choices-in-food-and-aesthetics-are-polarizing-but-his-favorite-fast-food-is-much-more-approachable-1 http://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-mcdonalds-order-review...
        always_good 9y ago
        Kind of worthless to point out unless he's doing this on a regular basis. That slideshow certainly doesn't mention it. I absolutely binge at McDonalds too, and more impressively than Trump, but I go a handful of times per year. That's the whole treat. You couldn't use my receipt to pinpoint my physical health.
limeblack 9y ago
Sleeping medication isn't always the right solution for people with inconsistent sleep schedules. Antihistamines which are not particularly addictive(compared to most drugs) and used for sleep activate the h1 receptor which promotes weight gain and diabetes.
- facetube 9y ago
  Antihistamines are generally H1 antagonists, not agonists. They block the action of the histamine receptor(s); they don't activate them. They tend to stimulate appetite as a side-effect. "Prescription H1 antihistamine use did not significantly increase the OR for elevated glucose, insulin, or lipid levels." [1] [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3221329/#R6 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3221329/#R6
Aaargh20318 9y ago
> Don't screw around. Get your sleep. Not always an option. My body wants to sleep during the day and be awake during the night. My boss does not agree with this schedule so I have to show up at the office when it's still light out. The end result is that I get maybe 5-6 hours of sleep a night. I don't see a way around this as I unfortunately need to have a job to survive.
- nerdponx 9y ago
  I'm sorry you're being downvoted, but this is the case for the vast majority of people. There are probably a variety of interventions you can try: therapy, meditative practice, adjustments to diet and exercise habits, and dietary supplements.
  - Aaargh20318 9y ago
    Even if those things worked, it's still not my natural day/night rhythm so I'm not sure if that would actually benefit me (has this ever been researched?).

ams6110 9y ago

He wasn't overweight, or living on pizza, candy and soda? I ask because people with that sort of attitude, in my experience, tend to take shortcuts on diet as well.

brandonmenc 9y ago
He was a health nut before it was popular. Lifted weights, ran nearly every day, ate a Mediterranean diet, low body fat, trim waist, healthy body weight, and a decent amount of muscle. He also did not eat much during the workday, so was effectively unintentionally doing intermittent fasting as well. Ironically, one of his reasons for sleeping less was to have time to fit exercise into his hectic schedule. His diabetes manifested as unexplained weight loss and muscle wasting. So, no, he was not your "typical" diabetes patient.
- oligopoly 9y ago
  Staying in low fat percentage range for long time can f up your hormonal and other systems. Not saying its the case here but something to take in considerations for those staying lean naturally
  - brandonmenc 9y ago
    Yeah, if you're a bodybuilder or marathon runner carrying a single digit body fat percentage - which is not something the average person is going to "accidentally" do. Everyone else is probably safe trying to get as lean as possible so long as they're not malnourished.
    - oligopoly 9y ago
      10-15% and you have somewhat defined sixpack. Lower range of that continuously naturally and you might have yourself a problem. You only have to be somewhat enthusiastic about fitness and watch what you eat to get there. Not that uncommon these days
      - brandonmenc 9y ago
        Citation for 10% being dangerously low?
      - ensiferum 9y ago
        15% is pretty damn flabby though. Unless you have a very unique body composition and putting your fat into say your legs and butt (like women typically do) youll def have a soft doughnut around your waistline and no way you have six pack abs. Its more in the below 10% bf when you actually can start to dream about the 6pack if you actually have the muscle.
        oligopoly 9y ago
        You've seen some misrepresented data. You commonly see fit people saying they have 6 or 8% fat % when they are closer to +12%. Most methods to determinate fat percentage are hilariously inaccurate. Look it up. 15% and you see hints of sixpack (clear outline) for most people who train.

flatline 9y ago

Interesting. I had a pre-diabetes marker read high on an annual blood test a few years ago. It has not reappeared since. I wonder if I just hadn’t slept much the week beforehand.

brandonmenc 9y ago
A1C is a two- to three-month average, so poor sleep over the past quarter of a year could affect it, afaik.
- flatline 9y ago
  That was the one, and come to think of it we still had a baby that wasn’t sleeping too regularly right around that time.

georgebarnett 9y ago

I'm have Type 1 Diabetes (the autoimmune kind) and when I don't sleep or exercise properly, my blood sugar is at least 2X harder to manage. Its far more unpredictable and inconsistent. In a weird way, its nice to have my body make these failures blatantly evident, rather than just hiding it behind a working pancreas and then dropping dead at random 15 years earlier than I should.

Barrin92 9y ago

the flipside is you really get a lot of quality time in in your 20s 30s and 40s. Doesn't that count for something? If you sleep five instead of eight hours a night that's actually about two years of additional lifetime even if your lack of sleep kills you at 70 rather than 80, and I'd guess 10 years of life reduction is way too pessimistic of a guess, and it's the bad years at the end you're sacrificing anyway I'm somewhat serious actually, I'm not convinced that sleeping your youth away is actually a good trade-off. Not to mention that sport, a healthy diet and checkups can probably mitigate the downsides to some degree.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
pstuart 9y ago
“Quality” is subjective
- Barrin92 9y ago
  I don't doubt that it is, but if we would ask a hundred people if they would want to spend time in their 20s, 30s or 40s again I think we would both agree that the answer would be pretty clear, not to mention that most professional activity, such as entrepreneurship, scientific or career advancement occurs in that period of life.
  - brandonmenc 9y ago
    > most professional activity, such as entrepreneurship, scientific or career advancement occurs in that period of life entrepreneurship and scientific advancement? Meh. Lots of evidence there are sweet spots for that well into your 50s and beyond. Would you rather work an extra decade but live healthily into your 80s or 90s - or try to cram it all in so you can retire unhealthy and miserable in your 50s with your life cut short and dying before you reach 70? I know that's not always the exact trade-off, but I'd rather get my full eight in every night and work productively into my 60s as a healthy person. The idea that work and relaxation are two extreme, distinct periods of life makes sense for a coal miner, but most of us here, fortunately, as "knowledge workers," have the luxury to weave the two together until we get dementia.

pizza 9y ago

Diabetes is known as a/the major driver of heart disease “Those identified with cardiovascular disease, not identified with diabetes, are simply undiagnosed." https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52faa95ee4b0b0a74811f732/t/57ae3a3f197aeaa45925a294/1471035980981/8_8_16_Gerber_Savagian_poster_final.pdf https://static1.squarespace.com/static/52faa95ee4b0b0a74811f...

rconti 9y ago

My dad's one of those lucky guys who did 5 hours a night his entire career (probably going back to his Navy days at least). Now that he's retired, he's a bit more leisurely and sleeps until 6:30 or so (instead of 4:50!) but often I receive emails from him at 1 or 2am, and we'll easily stay up half the night chatting when I'm visiting. He's one of the healthiest 79 year olds you'll ever meet, and not due to a particularly great diet or exercise (though both are fine in his case; he's just not a health nut). The thing that always made me jealous about him is not so much his ability to thrive on less sleep than most of us, but his ability to wake up. One beep from a digital watch alarm and he's out of bed, feet on the floor. I can't wake up to save my life. But then again, I try to get as close to 8h a night as possible, particularly as I've focused more than ever on my health and fitness.

shams93 9y ago
Some people may have the ability to drop into deep states of sleep with unusual rapidity where they don't need the extra ramp up and ramp down hours that most of us need so they can make do with 5 hours with the same quality it takes most of us to reach with 8.
- stevesimmons 9y ago
  I am perfectly refreshed with 5 hours sleep for exactly that reason. I have narcolepsy. Basically I fall asleep immediately and hit REM sleep a minute or two later. That saves the 90 minutes it takes most people need to reach the REM stage. My normal sleeping pattern is in bed at 1am, up before 6am, at work by 7am.
  - murali89 9y ago
    How do you know you go into REM? Do you use any sleep tracking device? Could you please suggest here?
jaggederest 9y ago
Waking to an alarm is a training thing. You have to make it policy that when the alarm goes off, you're up and out of bed within 10 seconds. You'll never sleep through an alarm again. It's the snooze button that kills people.

internetman55 9y ago

No offense to your father, but where would anyone get the idea that this is a good thing to do?

almostApatriot1 9y ago
Lots of people feel like if you could pul off 4 hrs sleep a night you should. Donald Trump has been touting his ability to do it for decades.
- dd36 9y ago
  He’s a specimen of good mental and physical health too!
  - almostApatriot1 9y ago
    He's not bad for 71. If he read more and did more than just watch cable news, he'd be pretty sharp imo. My point was it was/is a holy grail of sorts. Not many could 'pull it off,' but if you manage to...
    - chillwaves 9y ago
      Not bad? He is obese and incoherent. His reported go-to order from McDonalds (and he loves to eat fast food) is "two Big Macs, two Filet-O-Fishes, and a large chocolate shake." Do you want to go ahead and calculate the calories on that meal or shall I? Even if he were in good health, it would be in spite of his lifestyle, not because of it. http://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-mcdonalds-order-review-2017-12#trump-is-a-man-of-controversial-tastes-from-well-done-steaks-to-gaudy-gold-louis-xiv-chairs-his-choices-in-food-and-aesthetics-are-polarizing-but-his-favorite-fast-food-is-much-more-approachable-1 http://www.businessinsider.com/trumps-mcdonalds-order-review...
      - always_good 9y ago
        Kind of worthless to point out unless he's doing this on a regular basis. That slideshow certainly doesn't mention it. I absolutely binge at McDonalds too, and more impressively than Trump, but I go a handful of times per year. That's the whole treat. You couldn't use my receipt to pinpoint my physical health.

limeblack 9y ago

Sleeping medication isn't always the right solution for people with inconsistent sleep schedules. Antihistamines which are not particularly addictive(compared to most drugs) and used for sleep activate the h1 receptor which promotes weight gain and diabetes.

facetube 9y ago
Antihistamines are generally H1 antagonists, not agonists. They block the action of the histamine receptor(s); they don't activate them. They tend to stimulate appetite as a side-effect. "Prescription H1 antihistamine use did not significantly increase the OR for elevated glucose, insulin, or lipid levels." [1] [1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3221329/#R6 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3221329/#R6

Aaargh20318 9y ago

> Don't screw around. Get your sleep. Not always an option. My body wants to sleep during the day and be awake during the night. My boss does not agree with this schedule so I have to show up at the office when it's still light out. The end result is that I get maybe 5-6 hours of sleep a night. I don't see a way around this as I unfortunately need to have a job to survive.

nerdponx 9y ago
I'm sorry you're being downvoted, but this is the case for the vast majority of people. There are probably a variety of interventions you can try: therapy, meditative practice, adjustments to diet and exercise habits, and dietary supplements.
- Aaargh20318 9y ago
  Even if those things worked, it's still not my natural day/night rhythm so I'm not sure if that would actually benefit me (has this ever been researched?).