Your body needs sleep to heal, grow, rebuild and prepare for the upcoming day. If you have sleep apnea though, your body may not be getting the rest it needs. That’s why you feel tired all the time, because you’re never able to achieve a solid sleep cycle. With sleep apnea treatment from our Michigan dentist office, you can improve your breathing at night so your body can regenerate at night.
In this guide, we will look over the five stages of sleep and how they impact your body as a whole.
Stage 1 – The Shut Down
At the beginning of the sleep cycle, your body slowly starts shutting down. This is when you start to drift off into slumber, but you can still be woken up easily. During the first stage, you may experience muscle spasms, like little jolts running through your body. This is just a result of your muscles trying to relax for the night.
Stage 2 – Preparing For Deep Sleep
Once you get past the drifting stage, your body experiences rapid bursts of brain waves. Your heart rate slows down, and your body temperature drops to conserve energy. That energy will go to other parts of the body to heal wounds, repair muscles, etc. This is when your body starts to prepare for deep sleep.
Stage 3 – Deep Sleep
Deep sleep mostly happens in the brain. Slow waves known as delta waves will move through your brain while your body is at rest. This is the time when most people experience sleepwalking or night terrors. That happens during the transition to REM sleep. If you have sleep apnea, you may reach this stage or stage 4 before your airway is blocked.
Stage 4 – Even Deeper Sleep
In stage 3, there are still occasional moments of rapid brain waves. In stage 4, the brain is running almost entirely on delta waves. If someone wakes you up during stage 4 of the sleep cycle, you may feel disoriented and confused. Your brain will need a moment to restart itself before you can think clearly.
Stage 5 – REM Sleep
REM (rapid eye movement) is the deepest stage of the sleep cycle. This is when your body really works on rebuilding its energy and prepping for the day to come. If you have sleep apnea, you probably miss out on REM sleep every night. During this stage, brain waves move similarly to how they do in the day, but your body is at complete rest. Consider this the moment when your mind takes over and accomplishes all the tasks it couldn’t do throughout the day.
Some people drift in between sleep stages throughout the night, while others experience a consistent cycle from start to finish. If your sleep apnea is keeping you from the sound sleep you deserve, there are affordable treatment programs available to fix that. Contact Clinton Dental Center today to learn more about sleep apnea treatment in Michigan or to schedule a free consultation with our dentist.
