The more you stay up late, the more awake you are? ——The harm of staying up late (Part 1)

This is the 3721st article of Da Yi Xiao Hu

"Work at sunrise and rest at sunset" has long been a way of life that people follow in accordance with nature. However, with the advancement of technology and the explosion of information, the pattern of life has also changed in various ways. Eating supper at night, watching TV series and reading comics, playing mobile games until your hands are tired, scrolling through Weibo, liking Moments, etc., it seems that real life has only arrived at this moment, especially the younger generation has begun to "purely enjoy life".

(Pictures from the Internet)

When people ask, "Aren't you tired from staying up late?" most of them answer, "I'm tired after a day's work, but I can't sleep because I'm used to going to bed after midnight." Others answer, "I'm just queuing up for loneliness!" When asked about a new mother, she feels that her whole day is given to her baby, and now she finally has a moment of personal freedom.

As for what to do if staying up late often harms the body, they already have a "magic weapon" to deal with it: apply the most expensive facial mask, brew the most expensive wolfberry tea...

It seems that people stay up late voluntarily due to normal psychological needs, but what is the truth behind it? In addition to the frequent news of sudden death, what other unexpected harms are there behind staying up late?

The Chinese Sleep Research Society once called on the society to pay attention to healthy sleep life by analyzing the sleep status of Chinese people during the COVID-19 pandemic. The "White Paper on Chinese Residents' Sleep during the National Stay-at-Home Period in 2020" mentioned that compared with before staying at home, people slept later during the period of staying at home, and the number of people who went to bed after midnight surged by more than 50%. It was found that people like to play with their mobile phones before going to bed. The later they go to bed, the harder it is to fall asleep. The public is generally caught in a vicious cycle of "playing with mobile phones-sleeping late-not sleeping well". In fact, staying up late actively is different from working overtime all night, working night shifts, insomnia, etc. It is a late-sleeping syndrome, and in a sense it is also a manifestation of procrastination. In 2014, Dutch psychologist Klauer Kruse paid attention to the phenomenon of sleep procrastination and defined it as "not going to bed within the prescribed time, but there is no external environment to prevent people from doing so."

Some people may ask, what time does it mean to stay up late? Strictly speaking, staying up late is considered staying up late if it is past 11pm, and the World Health Organization has even classified staying up late as a Class 2A carcinogen. Carcinogen, you heard it right, it will be explained in detail below. According to expert advice, adults need to get 7-8 hours of sleep a day. It should be noted that if you go to bed at 1am every day and get up at 8am the next day, although the sleep time has reached the standard and it is barely considered staying up late, it is not recommended. In addition, irregular sleep, such as going to bed at 10pm sometimes and going to bed at 2am the next day, going to bed early and late, is also harmful to your health.

We often hear that staying up late will cause baldness and hair loss. Is this true? It is true. We can do a small experiment (hair pulling experiment). 1-3 days after washing your hair, you can try to use your thumb, index finger and middle finger to pinch a strand of hair from the root and gently pull it along the direction of the hair. If 1-2 hairs are lost, there is no need to worry; if 3-5 hairs are lost, there is a risk of hair loss; if more than 5 hairs are lost at a time, it is likely a hair loss problem. It is recommended to go to a regular hospital dermatology department for treatment. Friendly reminder, try to avoid various folk remedies.

(Pictures from the Internet)

In addition to these, what other dangers are there in staying up late?

(Pictures from the Internet)

There are mainly the following types:

(1) Decreased vision and inducing eye diseases

. Looking at the computer or mobile phone screen for a long time can easily fatigue the eye muscles, causing dry, swollen and painful eyes, which can lead to decreased vision. Especially for adolescents and children, it can aggravate the development of myopia. In some serious cases, symptoms such as shadows in the visual field or distortion and deformation of objects may occur. For glaucoma patients, intraocular pressure will increase, aggravating the condition.

(2) Brain memory loss

In August 2021, researchers from the University of Michigan published a research paper titled "Sleep loss drives acetylcholine- and somatostatin interneuron-mediated gating of hippocampal activity to inhibit memory consolidation" in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The study found that when staying up late leads to lack of sleep, the activity of inhibitory neurons in the hippocampus, which navigates, processes, and stores new memories in the brain, increases. These inhibitory neurons limit the activity of neurons around them, preventing normal neuronal activity in the hippocampus from gathering, thereby disrupting memory consolidation.

(3) Increased risk of breast cancer

A Canadian medical study found that women who work night shifts for a long time have a doubled risk of breast cancer. This is because women who often work at night disrupt their physiological rhythms and may experience anxiety, restlessness, depression, etc., which increases the risk of breast cancer. The incidence of breast cancer has a direct causal relationship with negative emotions.

(4) Decreased immunity

Staying up late for a long time will affect the normal metabolism of the human body and cause great harm to the liver and kidneys. From the perspective of traditional Chinese medicine, the period from 11pm to 3am is the best time for the liver to store blood, detoxify and function. If you cannot get enough rest, the liver qi will be damaged in the long run, and the resistance and immunity will naturally decrease.

(5) Prone to depression and heartache

We know that staying up late will disrupt the rhythm of life and the regularity of work and rest. We are very tired during work during the day, and can't sleep at night, with a lot of thoughts. These random thoughts can easily lead to feelings of loneliness, emptiness, irritability, confusion, etc. These emotional garbage will promote the generation of negative tendencies and shut ourselves off. Over time, depression will occur, and severe cases will migrate to mild depression. How can it hurt the "heart"? Because lack of sleep may promote the occurrence of heart disease by damaging blood vessels. Especially under long-term high-intensity work pressure, the probability of heart attack is greater, such as arrhythmia, angina pectoris, cardiac asthma and other attacks.

In summary, staying up late is harmful to physical and mental health, and will also make the skin dark and dry. I personally recommend not staying up late unless necessary. Someone asked if staying up late can be remedied? Of course you can, bright fruits can help. To know what happened next, please listen to the next class.

Author: Changning District Center for Disease Control and Prevention

Magic Sister Lily