Sleep and Dreams

Module 12 Sleeps and Dreams

At one time or another, almost everyone has difficulty sleeping- a condition known as insomnia. There are three stages of insomnia. The three stages are having trouble falling asleep, can't stay asleep or waking up early. Friday morning I woke up at 3 am for no reason which is the first stage of insomnia, not being able to fall back asleep which is stage two and also waking up early which is stage three. "Insomnia is a problem that affects as many as one-third of all people. Woman and older adults are more likely to suffer from insomnia" (PP 139)

At work I daydream every other hour. They are fantasies that people construct while they are awake. They are part of a person's waking consciousness. Doing the same thing for eight hours in a row causes brain fatigue and your eyes to get tired. I'll find myself gazing off with a blank stare and catch myself. My dad and brother suffer from sleep apnea. Apnea means they have trouble breathing and gasp for breath. (PP 140) It can be pretty funny at times, because it looks like my dad wakes himself up with his obnoxiously loud snoring. My twin brother Travis talks in his sleep every now and then while he's in his stage 4 of sleep. When I go to wake my mom up for work I usually ask "are you awake?" she always replies yes but I'll call back 20 minutes later and wake her up. She would have no memory because she didn't have conscious awareness but she was sleep talking.

I had a dream when I was little that I was flying down the stairs in my house. Sigmund Freud's unconsciousness wish fulfillment theory states that dreams represent unconscious wishes that dreamers desire to be fulfilled. The meaning of my dream was disguised and hidden by more objects, known as the latent content of dreams. Hobson's activation-synthesis theory states that the brain produces random electrical energy during REM (Rapid eye movement) sleep that stimulates memories stored in the brain. (PP137-139) The reason I was able to see the vivid dream was because of my conscious awareness in REM sleep.

Saturday to Sunday night I was awake until 4 am. I had gotten a little under 6 hours of sleep. I thought that the average person needed a good 8 hours to function normally. I did more work on a Sunday morning that I did the whole weekend. Since I work 40 hours a week on top of college I tend to crash on weekends. Dead asleep till 6 and 7 and night. I thought that my body was making up all the hours of sleep I had missed; I learned that's not true.

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