Sleep Debt and Mortgage Mind

In the article, ‘Sleep Debt and the Mortgage Minds’ William Dement and Christopher Vaughan have used the metaphor to discuss a very perspicacious issue of today and that is, Sleep Deprivation. Sleep deprivation and accruing sleep debt seems like a new phenomenon that has cropped up in past few decades. Globalization and the changing forms of societies have engendered greater expectations in us, at personal and professional level.  Even though technological advancements have made our lives easier in many ways, the new challenges and demands of the modern times and a stiff competition has resulted in a constant struggle to maintain work-life balance and thus has shifted our focus from this basic meaningless activity we call sleep. The lack of sleep, however, gradually begins to show its effect on our physical as well as mental faculties creating a debt; and every time we have this sleep debt accumulated; we mortgage our mind and suffer. So to get our mind (or sanity back)—the debt needs to be paid off promptly. There is no doubt that we as a nation are “a sleep sick society” as indicated by Paul Martin (464). The phenomenon is so frequently occurring that now even in medicine; ‘Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or CFS’ is a recognized form of disease and is invariably associated with frequent episodes of inadequate sleep. With rising concerns over the issue, sleep disorders are now getting a close scrutiny of researchers and healthcare professionals. Sleep, says Martin, “occupies about a third of each human’s life and up to two thirds of a baby’s time” (507). So there must be a good reason why we spend that much time of our life performing this seemingly meaningless but pivotal activity. Dement and Vaughn have compared sleep with hunger as in both the cases we don’t get satiety unless we have had enough. Thus sleep like other biological activities such as eating and drinking is considered essential for our well-being and maintaining a good health. When we accumulate a sleep debt that is not paid off we reduce our cognitive ability and our mind (and also the body) doesn't function to its full capacity and ability. Consequently we suffer as we do not have full control over it to be able to get the productivity we want. Of course it is due to ‘Sleep Debt’ and the fact that our ‘mind is mortgaged.’ And the only way we can pay off our debt and get this control back is with good amount of regular slumber. So think about it, are you a sleep debtor or sleep defaulter?