5 ms·

I'm sure that it must be true based on how other people act on little sleep, but for me the effects this article claims are blown way out of proportion (or just

by eyegor 7y ago

I'm sure that it must be true based on how other people act on little sleep, but for me the effects this article claims are blown way out of proportion (or just seem wrong). > longer than 48 hours and you’re looking at behavior that mimics psychosis—incoherent rambling, disconnection from reality, prone to outbursts Does anyone else here have experience staying awake this long? In college I frequently stayed awake for 48 hours without much effect besides my reaction times falling off a cliff and a mild high toward the end. Hallucinations never kicked in until 60+ (which is a more substantial increase than it seems). My main gripe is all the effects listed in the article seem to take it as fact that less sleep = more grumpy, while in my experience the complete opposite is true (less sleep = more goofy/euphoria).

apfsx 7y ago
All articles on topics like this blow way everything way out of proportion. I also used to do 48 and 72 hours regularly during my college days and it really wasn't too big of a deal for just getting through a lot of work but creativity/reaction times definitely suffer.
ravenstine 7y ago
I stayed awake two nights in a row during college and, while I felt miserable and perhaps somewhat dilirious, I don't believe I had such disassociative effects. I could believe incoherent rambling after maybe 4 or 5 days, but that seems extreme for 2.
- eyegor 7y ago
  4 or 5 days? I'm not convinced a healthy person could make it that long. I've asked hundreds of classmates and grad students over the years for their records and have yet to meet anyone that claimed over 72 hours. Personally my body was almost completely non functional around 65 ish hours -- stumbling and slurring words, no concept of time, incapable of focusing. The only reason I was awake long enough to reach that point is because it took hours to finally fall asleep. Honestly I'd love to hear what happens if someone could get to 72+ hours.
  - htfu 7y ago
    50-60h is my limit, and luckily haven't been near that in a long time. Shit gets weird. Not having met anyone that claimed 72h+ probably mostly just means you've never known any speed freaks - what happens after that mostly depends on whether or not you're on meth.
  - PuffinBlue 7y ago
    I made it to 82 hours. It was forced upon us (military training, trench digging sleep deprivation exercise). I made it all the way to enforced rest period. Others didn't. Up to 48 hours things were mostly normal in all areas, I was just tired. After that second night things started to get weird. Hand eye coordination worsened dramatically (not good when swinging pick axes and shovels in close quarters with others). Speaking and forming thoughts was definitely affected negatively. One funny thing was we'd frequently have to 'stand to' and prepare for an attack by downing tools and standing in the trench with our rifles ready to fire on any attackers. Standing still for long periods staring at nothing was enough to bring on repeated and severe micro-sleeps. I distinctly remember standing there and hearing clattering noises and soft cries of pain from the field around me. I wondered what it was, until I watched my trench buddy slip into a micro-sleep, his body go limp and fall into the bottom of the trench. His rifle made the characteristic clattering sound against the corrogated iron and his cry came from smashing his knees into the side of the trench as he crumpled. I was 20 at the time, the youngest from my company and dealt best with the deprivation of anyone. Youth plays it's part I think, though I am also predisposed to need less sleep even now, so some genetic factor is probably at play too. From 48 hours onwards I began to realise the less I did the more difficult things would be. I volunteered for soime arduous patrols during the day and we were all forced to do some recce's during the night. That night I fell twice, once down a bank. I cut my hand pretty badly. In a year of training it was the only time I injured myself. My performance was definitely affected. Crouched under a tree in the pouring rain about 70 hours in I remember feeling physically sick from the brain fog. Night time caused the world to close in around me in a very disorientating way. At about 80 hours I remember seeing an old Sergeant from early in my training as I was coming back from a patrol. My directing staff had gone back to their harbour area ahead of us as the assessment phase of the patrol was over and it was our responsibility to get back to our trenches. So, free from interference I went over to shake his hand and found it to be extremely sharp and prickly. I recoiled and couldn't understand what was happening. Trying again I gripped tighter, feeling the sharp needle like pains in my hand again. For some reason I pulled him closer and then I felt the shooting pains right in my face, especially my lips. As I stumbled backwards I forgot to let go of his hand. It came away and I fell back with it. As I hit the ground hard my 'vision' cleared and I could clearly see I had been shaking hands with a Holy tree. The sharp pains were caused by the needle like spines digging into my skin. I chucked the branch from my hand and got back in line. No one noticed my excursion, they were too busy picking two of my patrol buddies up from the track. They were laying face down asleep having simply shut down right as they were walking along, falling face first into the dirt and staying there, snoring. Sleep deprivation is a powerful drug!
pravus 7y ago
This is very much a personal thing and the article is only showing one end of the spectrum. While I have issues staying up past 48 hours and my longest ever stint was 56 or so, I can go for 36 hours easily without any real dramatic adverse effects. I certainly don't feel drunk and am quite capable of performing complicated work even after 24 hours of being awake. As long as the sun is up my body generally wants to be awake and when going for long periods of uptime I only have an issue with tiredness between 2am and 4am. After 4am I can convince myself that the sun will be up soon and once I can actually see the sky brighten I become energized rapidly. The one time I did go past 48 hours I never hallucinated but simply felt like a zombie. My mind basically shut off and I felt very detached and remote to my own consciousness. The odd thing is that when I finally got into bed it still took me something like 2 hours to finally fall asleep because I felt too tired to actually fall asleep. Anyway, that's my experience. When I read through the article I kept thinking it was missing the mark for me completely.
- eyegor 7y ago
  > when I finally got into bed it still took me something like 2 hours to finally fall asleep because I felt too tired to actually fall asleep Oh I can absolutely relate to that. On low sleep I found it incredibly natural to fall asleep sitting on a bench with no back rest (without falling over), but purposefully trying to sleep in a bed was always difficult. Up until about 35-40 hours awake I can easily fall asleep in a bed, but it becomes challenging past that point. I'm guessing my brain is pulling some c4 trickery there since that's roughly when my coordination starts to deteriorate.
  - vraivroo 7y ago
    I developed a trick of sitting on the edge of my bed when I'm in this state. Sooner or later I nod off, and then I can just _literally_ fall back into bed.
grp000 7y ago
I had a bad reaction to an antidepressant that caused me to go for about 6 months with very little sleep 3 years ago. On median, 44 awake, 4 asleep. My record was ~65 hours before sleep. I personally only experienced hallucinations as well at around the high mark. My case was unique in that it was induced by medication causing a chemical change in the brain, not a personal choice, but my mood during that time was quite terrible, and the physical discomfort caused by headaches was extreme.
toast0 7y ago
I've hit 24 hours twice on accident shortly after coming home with a newborn child, and was seeing pulsating walls and other weird visual stuff and generally feeling pretty shitty. The first time, it took me until much later to realize I had been awake so long. So definitely some YMMV.
- cgriswald 7y ago
  “Fireflies” in my vision and then peripheral movement are the two effects that hit me first, usually around 24 hours. I will often hear what sounds like voices from another room. The first time this happened I freaked out a bit, searched the entire house, peeled outside through windows. When it was clear, I put my ear close to my radio thinking it was on at a really low volume. But of course no matter what I did the sound stayed the same. Then the irrational state of my mind lead me to believe the house was haunted.
  - lygaret 7y ago
    Audible hallucinations and peripheral movement are exactly what happens to me - I rarely am awake for more than 20h, but it's been 18-22 hours every day for 6+ months, and eventually they just sort of end up there regularly.
dkersten 7y ago
I find that as I age, the effects of lack of sleep get more and more severe. When I was 20, I could do 48 hours without sleep without any noticeable negative effects, but now, 15 years later, I suffer even if I get sleep in a night but just not enough (where enough seems to be around the 9 hour mark if I really want to be at my best the next day; and I’m a firm believer of waking on a multiple of 90 minutes to wake during a light sleep cycle. 7.5 hours isn’t bad but 9 is better)
mirimir 7y ago
It's not uncommon for me, if I'm highly engaged in something, to work straight for 15-20 hours. So as a result, my wake/sleep cycle is consistently longer than 24 hours. And that has the additional benefit of frustrating geolocation. Even so, I rarely go more than 30 hours awake. But with occasional naps, some as long as a couple hours, runs as long as a few days are not uncommon. I take modafinil for bipolar disorder, and zolpidem for insomnia. So I can avoid many of the downsides of sleep deprivation. One cool thing about modafinil is that it increases alertness and engagement, but doesn't interfere with sleep as much as coffee and amphetamines do.
- s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
  This describes me as well. Bipolar and ADHD. If I'm engaged in something I obsess over it and work 10+ hours until it's done. It takes every other feeling away and not until I stop do other things come back (sleep fatigue, hunger, etc)
  - mirimir 7y ago
    Yes, just that. I struggle a lot with getting engaged. Especially if I'm uncertain how to proceed. Or if whatever seems too difficult. Too big to imagine. But once I do get engaged, especially if I understand (or at least, think I do) how to proceed, I won't stop until it's done.
    - s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
      Yeah that's a symptom of ADHD. I wouldn't trade it for the world though.
wruza 7y ago
I did that often when I was 20-25, and then the habit of not having day/night affinity made it to the core. Then at around 33yo I couldn’t sleep for 3 or 4 nights in a row (not sure how to count). You want to sleep, you have to, you close your eyes and go to bed, but it doesn’t work. You don’t know if it ever will. That was pretty terrifying experience. I was also scared to use alcohol or street drugs to fix that, since the perspective of additionally being stuck in a sleepless hangover was unbearable. Since then I rarely abused my sleep cycles, but my week schedule drifts often. At monday I get up at 10, at friday it’s 16-19 (4-7pm). I un-drift it by not sleeping the sunday day. Can’t do anything with it. Sleep drugs help to fall asleep early, but can’t make me unbroken on wake up. Even a couple of hours now make a big difference, and if I get up early it “doesn’t count anyway” for my body at the nature’s evening.
noneeeed 7y ago
Yep, I was a chronic insomniac. During the worst period (about 15-18yo) I had a few times where I'd start seeing things, getting paranoid or just generally really disordered thought pattern. If you generally sleep well, then the occasional period of 48 hours of wakefulness is probably fine, but chronic lack of sleep (whatever that constitutes for you) can really mess with your brain.
codingdave 7y ago
I believe that your experiences may differ from the norm, and I'm not denying your claim at all. But I also have seen that many truly grumpy, negative people have also lost their self-awareness, and do not realize the state they are in. We see this in the working world quite often, when someone has just gotten into a negative funk, and are bringing down a team, and they don't even realize it. Sometimes those people just need to be told where they are really at, and told to take a break, and yes, to get a good night's sleep.
Jeema101 7y ago
Not only is the article overblown IMO, but it's also irresponsibly written. A lot of people suffer from insomnia and sleep anxiety. They don't need to be told that missing sleep is dangerous. They need to be told that missing sleep is normal sometimes, and that your body will sleep when it's ready to.

by eyegor 7y ago

apfsx 7y ago

All articles on topics like this blow way everything way out of proportion. I also used to do 48 and 72 hours regularly during my college days and it really wasn't too big of a deal for just getting through a lot of work but creativity/reaction times definitely suffer.

ravenstine 7y ago

I stayed awake two nights in a row during college and, while I felt miserable and perhaps somewhat dilirious, I don't believe I had such disassociative effects. I could believe incoherent rambling after maybe 4 or 5 days, but that seems extreme for 2.

eyegor 7y ago
4 or 5 days? I'm not convinced a healthy person could make it that long. I've asked hundreds of classmates and grad students over the years for their records and have yet to meet anyone that claimed over 72 hours. Personally my body was almost completely non functional around 65 ish hours -- stumbling and slurring words, no concept of time, incapable of focusing. The only reason I was awake long enough to reach that point is because it took hours to finally fall asleep. Honestly I'd love to hear what happens if someone could get to 72+ hours.
- htfu 7y ago
  50-60h is my limit, and luckily haven't been near that in a long time. Shit gets weird. Not having met anyone that claimed 72h+ probably mostly just means you've never known any speed freaks - what happens after that mostly depends on whether or not you're on meth.
- PuffinBlue 7y ago
  I made it to 82 hours. It was forced upon us (military training, trench digging sleep deprivation exercise). I made it all the way to enforced rest period. Others didn't. Up to 48 hours things were mostly normal in all areas, I was just tired. After that second night things started to get weird. Hand eye coordination worsened dramatically (not good when swinging pick axes and shovels in close quarters with others). Speaking and forming thoughts was definitely affected negatively. One funny thing was we'd frequently have to 'stand to' and prepare for an attack by downing tools and standing in the trench with our rifles ready to fire on any attackers. Standing still for long periods staring at nothing was enough to bring on repeated and severe micro-sleeps. I distinctly remember standing there and hearing clattering noises and soft cries of pain from the field around me. I wondered what it was, until I watched my trench buddy slip into a micro-sleep, his body go limp and fall into the bottom of the trench. His rifle made the characteristic clattering sound against the corrogated iron and his cry came from smashing his knees into the side of the trench as he crumpled. I was 20 at the time, the youngest from my company and dealt best with the deprivation of anyone. Youth plays it's part I think, though I am also predisposed to need less sleep even now, so some genetic factor is probably at play too. From 48 hours onwards I began to realise the less I did the more difficult things would be. I volunteered for soime arduous patrols during the day and we were all forced to do some recce's during the night. That night I fell twice, once down a bank. I cut my hand pretty badly. In a year of training it was the only time I injured myself. My performance was definitely affected. Crouched under a tree in the pouring rain about 70 hours in I remember feeling physically sick from the brain fog. Night time caused the world to close in around me in a very disorientating way. At about 80 hours I remember seeing an old Sergeant from early in my training as I was coming back from a patrol. My directing staff had gone back to their harbour area ahead of us as the assessment phase of the patrol was over and it was our responsibility to get back to our trenches. So, free from interference I went over to shake his hand and found it to be extremely sharp and prickly. I recoiled and couldn't understand what was happening. Trying again I gripped tighter, feeling the sharp needle like pains in my hand again. For some reason I pulled him closer and then I felt the shooting pains right in my face, especially my lips. As I stumbled backwards I forgot to let go of his hand. It came away and I fell back with it. As I hit the ground hard my 'vision' cleared and I could clearly see I had been shaking hands with a Holy tree. The sharp pains were caused by the needle like spines digging into my skin. I chucked the branch from my hand and got back in line. No one noticed my excursion, they were too busy picking two of my patrol buddies up from the track. They were laying face down asleep having simply shut down right as they were walking along, falling face first into the dirt and staying there, snoring. Sleep deprivation is a powerful drug!

pravus 7y ago

This is very much a personal thing and the article is only showing one end of the spectrum. While I have issues staying up past 48 hours and my longest ever stint was 56 or so, I can go for 36 hours easily without any real dramatic adverse effects. I certainly don't feel drunk and am quite capable of performing complicated work even after 24 hours of being awake. As long as the sun is up my body generally wants to be awake and when going for long periods of uptime I only have an issue with tiredness between 2am and 4am. After 4am I can convince myself that the sun will be up soon and once I can actually see the sky brighten I become energized rapidly. The one time I did go past 48 hours I never hallucinated but simply felt like a zombie. My mind basically shut off and I felt very detached and remote to my own consciousness. The odd thing is that when I finally got into bed it still took me something like 2 hours to finally fall asleep because I felt too tired to actually fall asleep. Anyway, that's my experience. When I read through the article I kept thinking it was missing the mark for me completely.

eyegor 7y ago
> when I finally got into bed it still took me something like 2 hours to finally fall asleep because I felt too tired to actually fall asleep Oh I can absolutely relate to that. On low sleep I found it incredibly natural to fall asleep sitting on a bench with no back rest (without falling over), but purposefully trying to sleep in a bed was always difficult. Up until about 35-40 hours awake I can easily fall asleep in a bed, but it becomes challenging past that point. I'm guessing my brain is pulling some c4 trickery there since that's roughly when my coordination starts to deteriorate.
- vraivroo 7y ago
  I developed a trick of sitting on the edge of my bed when I'm in this state. Sooner or later I nod off, and then I can just _literally_ fall back into bed.

grp000 7y ago

I had a bad reaction to an antidepressant that caused me to go for about 6 months with very little sleep 3 years ago. On median, 44 awake, 4 asleep. My record was ~65 hours before sleep. I personally only experienced hallucinations as well at around the high mark. My case was unique in that it was induced by medication causing a chemical change in the brain, not a personal choice, but my mood during that time was quite terrible, and the physical discomfort caused by headaches was extreme.

toast0 7y ago

I've hit 24 hours twice on accident shortly after coming home with a newborn child, and was seeing pulsating walls and other weird visual stuff and generally feeling pretty shitty. The first time, it took me until much later to realize I had been awake so long. So definitely some YMMV.

cgriswald 7y ago
“Fireflies” in my vision and then peripheral movement are the two effects that hit me first, usually around 24 hours. I will often hear what sounds like voices from another room. The first time this happened I freaked out a bit, searched the entire house, peeled outside through windows. When it was clear, I put my ear close to my radio thinking it was on at a really low volume. But of course no matter what I did the sound stayed the same. Then the irrational state of my mind lead me to believe the house was haunted.
- lygaret 7y ago
  Audible hallucinations and peripheral movement are exactly what happens to me - I rarely am awake for more than 20h, but it's been 18-22 hours every day for 6+ months, and eventually they just sort of end up there regularly.

dkersten 7y ago

I find that as I age, the effects of lack of sleep get more and more severe. When I was 20, I could do 48 hours without sleep without any noticeable negative effects, but now, 15 years later, I suffer even if I get sleep in a night but just not enough (where enough seems to be around the 9 hour mark if I really want to be at my best the next day; and I’m a firm believer of waking on a multiple of 90 minutes to wake during a light sleep cycle. 7.5 hours isn’t bad but 9 is better)

mirimir 7y ago

It's not uncommon for me, if I'm highly engaged in something, to work straight for 15-20 hours. So as a result, my wake/sleep cycle is consistently longer than 24 hours. And that has the additional benefit of frustrating geolocation. Even so, I rarely go more than 30 hours awake. But with occasional naps, some as long as a couple hours, runs as long as a few days are not uncommon. I take modafinil for bipolar disorder, and zolpidem for insomnia. So I can avoid many of the downsides of sleep deprivation. One cool thing about modafinil is that it increases alertness and engagement, but doesn't interfere with sleep as much as coffee and amphetamines do.

s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
This describes me as well. Bipolar and ADHD. If I'm engaged in something I obsess over it and work 10+ hours until it's done. It takes every other feeling away and not until I stop do other things come back (sleep fatigue, hunger, etc)
- mirimir 7y ago
  Yes, just that. I struggle a lot with getting engaged. Especially if I'm uncertain how to proceed. Or if whatever seems too difficult. Too big to imagine. But once I do get engaged, especially if I understand (or at least, think I do) how to proceed, I won't stop until it's done.
  - s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
    Yeah that's a symptom of ADHD. I wouldn't trade it for the world though.

wruza 7y ago

I did that often when I was 20-25, and then the habit of not having day/night affinity made it to the core. Then at around 33yo I couldn’t sleep for 3 or 4 nights in a row (not sure how to count). You want to sleep, you have to, you close your eyes and go to bed, but it doesn’t work. You don’t know if it ever will. That was pretty terrifying experience. I was also scared to use alcohol or street drugs to fix that, since the perspective of additionally being stuck in a sleepless hangover was unbearable. Since then I rarely abused my sleep cycles, but my week schedule drifts often. At monday I get up at 10, at friday it’s 16-19 (4-7pm). I un-drift it by not sleeping the sunday day. Can’t do anything with it. Sleep drugs help to fall asleep early, but can’t make me unbroken on wake up. Even a couple of hours now make a big difference, and if I get up early it “doesn’t count anyway” for my body at the nature’s evening.

noneeeed 7y ago

Yep, I was a chronic insomniac. During the worst period (about 15-18yo) I had a few times where I'd start seeing things, getting paranoid or just generally really disordered thought pattern. If you generally sleep well, then the occasional period of 48 hours of wakefulness is probably fine, but chronic lack of sleep (whatever that constitutes for you) can really mess with your brain.

codingdave 7y ago

I believe that your experiences may differ from the norm, and I'm not denying your claim at all. But I also have seen that many truly grumpy, negative people have also lost their self-awareness, and do not realize the state they are in. We see this in the working world quite often, when someone has just gotten into a negative funk, and are bringing down a team, and they don't even realize it. Sometimes those people just need to be told where they are really at, and told to take a break, and yes, to get a good night's sleep.

Jeema101 7y ago

Not only is the article overblown IMO, but it's also irresponsibly written. A lot of people suffer from insomnia and sleep anxiety. They don't need to be told that missing sleep is dangerous. They need to be told that missing sleep is normal sometimes, and that your body will sleep when it's ready to.