Sleep
Importance of sleep: Goals of this section
Sleep is a very important state of rest and recharging. Your body needs a certain amount of sleep to function at its best. At night while you’re asleep, your brain files and stores what you learned and experienced during the day and your body grows, heals and recovers.
Sleep can affect all areas of your life, including your concentration and performance at school or work, how well you take part in physical activities, your mood and even your ability to cope well with pain and other difficulties in life.
Humans and animals alike have regular rest and activity patterns. An average person spends about a third of their life sleeping. A baby sleeps about 16 hours a night, but as you get older, you need less sleep. Generally, a teen or young adult usually needs to sleep 8 to 9 hours a night.
People who don't sleep well often feel tired, less energetic, irritable and more sensitive to pain during the day. Research studies show that not getting enough sleep makes people feel pain more strongly and makes them more likely to have headaches and even widespread body pain the next day.
Throughout this section, you will learn:
how sleep works
how chronic pain may interfere with your sleep
how lack of sleep and fatigue can affect your pain
how to cope with impaired sleep and fatigue.