Turns out naps are not so bad for you. (New study, open access.)

Sometimes i think common sense has become the baby who is thrown out with the bath water.

If healthy people find naps work well for them then it should not be dismissed so easily. Of course it should be tested but a little bit of sense would not hurt. I am reminded about something from years ago, scientists found that cycling at a certain rate was the most energy efficient. But athletes found following that rate exhausted them more quickly then their natural rate. Yet they were told the science was right and they were wrong. Turns out the less efficient human rate leads to longer endurance, it may be less energy efficient but people last longer before fatigue when they go at their natural rate then the scientific one.

 

It is good to see research challenging the sleep police.

There is some evidence that aspects at least of our sleep patterns are cultural, for example there is the suggestion that in Europe at least the previous norm was not 'go to bed, fall asleep for eight hours, then get up' but rather 'sleep for several hours, be active for several hours, then have a second sleep'.

See
https://www.sciencealert.com/humans-used-to-sleep-in-two-shifts-maybe-we-should-again
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16964783

However this does not stop people such as Prof Crawley seeking to present a dogma that people with ME must correct their aberrant sleep patterns, must not sleep during the day and must sleep in one eight hour block at night. She even seems to go as far as to suggest establishing 'correct' sleep patterns will change our brain neurophysiology in such a way that is the equivalent of a drug treating the underlying biomedical deficit in ME/CFS.

To quote the Guardian quoting Crawley ( https://www.theguardian.com/society...-syndrome-treatment-trial-success-netherlands ):

There is obviously issues around us not fully understand the implications of artificial light and/or overuse of screen based technology in relation to healthy or restorative sleep, and we can not rule out the possibility there is a group of people who suffer fatigue because of unhelpful sleep habits such as overuse of IT devices before attempting to sleep, who may be helped by good sleep hygiene practices. It may even be probable that Crawley with her over broad definition of CFS misdiagnoses such teenagers as having CFS.

Presumably, if Crawley had data demonstrating ME is invariably linked to low morning levels of cortisol and that changing sleep patterns reverses this which in turn is associated with curing ME, she would have published it. Without such evidence we are dealing with her personal beliefs not evidence based medicine.

There is no evidence that trying to force people with ME into a perceived 'normal' sleeping pattern, is helpful. We do not understand the relationship between ME and sleep, especially as the same individual can shift between sleeping twenty or so hours a day and total insomnia or a complete reversal of the normal diurnal rhythms over the course of their disease.

Anecdotally people report that sleeping when the body demands it is helpful, that day time sleeps can help improve functioning. Until we have evidence that not sleeping when our bodies demands it and trying to force sleep when our bodies reject it is actually helpful, surely the rational response is to listen to our bodies.

 

Well, I didn't want to say anything.

Agree completely. Rest and sleep when your body says it needs to. Being able to do that is one of the very few practical management tools we have.

 

It’s confusing. I’ve had different results at different times. One episode of sleep hygiene and limiting sleep to 7 1/2 hours overnight, then going to bed the next night as early as I was tired worked, that’s when it was pretty early on in the disease. At other times sleeping as much as possible worked better. I need a whole lot more than eight hours total now.

It’s not just Europe where sleep was noted to be in 2 parts, seems to be the case in England as well There were diary entries of “the second sleep” written in a way that expresses that it was usual.

 

Perhaps this is why being away from my apartment seems to lead to a crash. Edit: There was not a place to lie down right there, it was some amount of time, noise, standing & etc. away.
I Did an ‘easy’ errand on Friday, that burned the fuse too far. I’ve slept over 12 hours so far since last night and needed every minute of it.

 

Give how bad some of the testing is, I think I am in favor of common sense.

Alvin wants sense and you want rationality. What are these poor medical professionals to do!

 

Here is what they should do, retire and designate Alvin as the replacement MD. And with hiring authority Alvin will replace them with superior physicians

 

Something so simple that even a person with ME can do it. Well, finding the superior physicians might prove difficult. Maybe Alvin will have to establish a school to train superior physicians.

 

Indeed, Alvin can do that if and when necessary.

 

watched a bit of this on CH5
'How to get a good nights sleep'
episode 2 featured a guy (who helped the Olympic cycling team), who says the whole idea of one block of sleep at night is only something that has only relatively recently come about, and is not the best way.
https://www.my5.tv/how-to-get-a-good-nights-sleep/season-1/how-to-get-a-good-nights-sleep

 

This is well known, at least to myself and various historians on TV. It only seems to be unknown to people teaching sleep hygiene etc.

 

They should also study pre-emptive napping/resting. I don't wait until I feel the need to.

 

As well as the two sleeps idea, there are the Southern European countries that regularly make use of siestas, and presumably lots of other cultural variations in sleeping patterns around the world.

This link looks at the developed world, see https://blog.withings.com/2014/11/05/cultural-differences-impact-on-sleep-patterns/ , but it would also be interesting to know more about sleeping patterns in traditional societies.

 

I wonder if some of this isn't climate related. In southern climates it would be uncomfortable to dangerous to work during the hottest part of the day. In northern climates it might make sense to spend all of the daylight hours outside, then do inside work by candlelight between the two sleeps.

 

The NHS is now spending money teaching sleep hygiene to patients recovering from cancer surgery.

 

Of course there is, the one that allows workers to work as long as possible, without tedious breaks for things like sleeping.......and thus allows the highest profit