The latest scientific study gives us carte blanche to rouse self-indulgent over-sleepers. Photo / Getty Images
The latest scientific study gives us carte blanche to rouse self-indulgent over-sleepers. Photo / Getty Images
OPINION:
Having a cheeky lie-in on a Saturday can kill you. Who knew? Apart from every couple on the planet, that is?
Sleep, already a marital battleground (aka the Theatre of Snore) has just been weaponised further with research, actual scientific research, revealing that having different sleep patterns from weekdays to weekends can increase gut bacteria linked with obesity, heart attacks and strokes.
That means that my husband’s extra shut-eye isn’t just annoying and selfish. It’s annoying and dangerous!
How dare he potentially rob his children of a father by prioritising a long lie-in over a long life? As for the symphonic rasping and wheezing sound effects, I have just three little words: insult to injury.
According to experts at King’s College London, who run ZOE Predict, the largest ongoing nutritional research programme in the world, an extra 90 minutes in bed is enough to disrupt an individual’s internal body clock. In this instance, two little words will do it: reckless endangerment.
An extra 90 minutes in bed is enough to disrupt an individual’s internal body clock. Photo / Getty Images
If I’m coming across as unnecessarily aggy, then you must be young. Or single. And definitely child-free.
Hand on heart, something happens once you have a baby. I don’t mean the protectiveness or the extraordinary quasi-spiritual awakening. I mean the ordinary sort of awakening and with it the need – the greed – for sleep.
And lo, there arises a competitive exhaustion that supplants all other emotions and fills you with murderous resentment at the sight of your other half nodding off on the sofa.
Hollywood would have us believe your first instinct is to smile indulgently and gently drape an expensive cashmere throw over their supine form.
A murderous resentment often arises at the sight of your other half nodding off on the sofa. Photo / Getty Images
I have never once seen the heroine wrench the smelly dog blanket out from under his head in fury while yelling: “Why must you absolutely insist on watching obscure Flemish-noir on Walter Presents if you’re just going to fall asleep before we’ve even reached the lead detective’s troubled backstory?”
A girlfriend used to say, with frightening earnestness, that she’d much rather her husband was sleeping with another woman than just sleeping; the betrayal would feel less momentous.
Her twins are teenagers now, but the sleep deficit persists. As does her reproach; she will never get those hours back.
One woman confessed that she'd much rather her husband was sleeping with another woman than just sleeping. Photo /123rf
Then again she should consider herself fortunate that she can actually sleep; others in the wider population suffer from such crippling episodes of insomnia that they can barely function.
Tiredness takes its toll. Economically, the cost to the UK economy of sleep deprivation has been put at £40 billion (NZ$84 million) a year.
Little wonder then, the sleep business is booming; wearable tracking gadgets, lavender pillow sprays, noise-blocking headsets, weird-tasting tea.
Figures from Statista show that in 2009 the industry was worth £39 million (NZ$82 million). Last year, it was valued at £64 million (NZ$134 million).
Earlier this year, the Australian Government Office of Road Safety revealed it was trialling roadside “sleep limit” blood tests to ascertain whether drivers are rested enough to drive. If it proves a success it may well be emulated in the United Kingdom.
