Sleep is very important. We often forget that as due to busy schedules, our first response is to sacrifice sleep. However, this is wrong, even though we can get some extra time by cutting down on sleep, we put ourselves at risk of being sleep deprived.

Being sleep deprived can cause you so many bad things and, in the end, getting that little bit of extra time will bring you nothing good. Sleep is important, both for our physical and psychical well-being and we need to have a well-established sleep pattern to get the most out of each day.

If you don’t believe that being sleep deprived is that bad, read this post to the end and find out all the potential things you can mess up because of it.

Your job

Being sleep deprived every day will make you poor at doing your job. You might be able to pull it off for some time and “get the job done” barely but, sooner or later, when the fatigue and lack of concentration kick in you will be making great mistakes that might affect your current employment.

Not only will you make mistakes but you will also work slower, sloppier, and forget things. Some people even fell asleep on their jobs and this is absolutely the worst possible thing you can do and almost guarantees that you’ll be fired.

At the same time, sleep deprivation might cause you to injure yourself, or even worse, someone else and this is something that nobody can live with. Employers don’t like workers that are always tired and making mistakes, they want people they can rely on to always deliver.

Your family

Our families give us so much in return, but they also require nurturing and growing. When someone is clearly in need of rest and doesn’t take care of themselves, their family members will notice, start asking questions and try to help. Usually, the person who is tired and chronically lacking sleep doesn’t notice how they look and what kind of effect this has on them.

In most cases, it’s the ones close to them that see this up close and sometimes they can’t handle someone they care for being auto-destructive. Additionally, like with your job, sleep deprivation will cause you to miss family events, and forget to pick up kids from school and buy gifts for anniversaries, all of which destroys the family one step at a time.

You might cause accidents

Chances are that you’ve heard about big accidents that did a lot of harm and damage being caused by a sleep-deprived driver. No matter how harmless it might sound, lack of sleep can be the spark for big tragedies and this is something that needs to be avoided. For example, lack of sleep is one of the biggest public safety hazards when it comes to traffic and driving.

When sleep deprived, you will have greatly reduced reactions, similarly to when you are intoxicated and this could easily lead to an accident. Additionally, due to fatigue and exhaustion, you are putting yourself at risk of causing accidents and making big mistakes that might cost you or someone else their life.

Your relationships

As we mentioned earlier, lack of sleep can make you feel less sharp, lost, and prone to mistakes. Not many people like these qualities in their partners and these things might strongly influence your relationships. However, this is not even the worst part, as people with lack of sleep, both men and women, have a reduced interest in sex.

The lack of energy, stress, and overall sleepiness all contribute to these effects. As we all know, sex is also a very important part of relationships and without it, people usually break up. No matter, if you are a man or a woman, not having sex with your partner, will create big issues, as everyone simply wants sex in their relationships.

Your grades and exams

In most cases, people that are most sleep deprived are college students and the reason for this is that they take time away from their sleep to study and learn more. However, this practice only creates a counter effect that brings them nothing good. When it comes to learning and thinking overall, sleep is a very important factor. Sleep deprivation slows down cognitive processes with various mechanisms.

Before anything else, lack of sleep reduces your attention and alertness, it makes it more difficult to concentrate, it reduces problem-solving abilities and impairs logical thinking.  Because of this, not only does sleep deprivation make it more difficult to learn and retain knowledge, but it will also make it harder to showcase the knowledge you have on your exams.

Most importantly, during certain sleep cycles, our brain consolidates the memories we created during the day and the things we learned. Without sleep, you won’t be able to create strong memories of the knowledge you went through during the day so you’ll have a hard time trying to remember facts on your exam.

In the end, sleep deprivation can lead to many health issues and speed up certain diseases. Make sure that you establish healthy sleeping habits and that you get enough sleep every night. When you are fresh and rested, you’ll be able to take care of all the hurdles that await you during the day.