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Insomnia Guide
Just How Much Sleep Is Enough?
How much should a newborn sleep? The amount of sleep you need every day depends very much on both your age and your health. However, sleep is not merely about the time that you spend sleeping, but is also a question of the quality of the sleep that you are getting. So, if you are getting the right amount of sleep but are waking each morning feeling tired and going through the day unable to concentrate properly, and perhaps being irritable, then there's a very good chance that the quality of your sleep is poor and you could well be suffering from insomnia.
When it comes to age, newborn babies obviously need the greatest amount of sleep and will usually sleep in cycles of about four hours waking when it's time to be fed and changed.
Typically, a newborn baby will need between fourteen and sixteen hours sleep daily.
By about four to six months children should be able to sleep through the night and will spend longer periods awake during the day when they will start to take more interest in their surroundings and begin to play.
At this point their need for sleep will fall slightly, but they will still need in the region of ten to fourteen hours sleep a day.
Surprisingly enough older children and even teenagers should also be getting a similar amount of sleep and ten hours sleep a day for children is about the right amount of daily sleep.
It has long been thought that children, and especially teenagers, who sleep for more than about eight hours a day are lazy, but this is in fact not the case. Bearing in mind the amount of activity that children are involved in each day, both at school and at home, and the fact that their bodies are changing and growing rapidly, there is a very real need for more than the traditional eight hours of sleep if they are to be given the best conditions for development.
For the majority of adults eight to eight and a half hours sleep each night is just about right and this should be enough to allow the body to recharge and have you up and about, alert and refreshed in the morning.
Another misconception is that as we get older we need more sleep. This is not in fact the case, unless there are also accompanying health problems, in which case more sleep may be needed. The tendency for some older adults to 'take a nap' during the day is often taken as a sign that they need more sleep but in reality the daytime nap is usually offset by sleep less during the night.
One exception in the case of adults is that of pregnant women, who should normally increase their sleep during pregnancy by about two or three hours.
The test of whether you're getting enough sleep is quite simple and involves nothing more than assessing whether you feel refreshed when you get up and can function normally and focus on the tasks at hand throughout the day. If you find that your are not able to concentrate or are falling asleep during the day then you're probably not getting enough sleep.
Missing a little sleep here and there is not going to do you any harm but if you find that you're regularly missing out on sleep then this can have serious consequences. We all suffer from insomnia from time to time, but insomnia which lasts for more than a month or six weeks can have a significant effect on your health and your general quality of life.
The information contained here should NOT be used as a substitute for the advice of an appropriately qualified and licensed physician or other health care provider.
The information provided here is for educational and informational purposes only and in no way should be considered as an offering of medical advice.
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