10 Bizarre Things Your Body does while You Sleep

Ever wondered what your body does when you fall asleep? While you are sleeping your body does a lot more than just dreaming and snoring. It is doing some things that might sound really bizarre. What’s that?? You will soon find out, but first just let us put you into deep, deep sleep (We are just asking you to imagine. Alright!).



Lie down and close your eyes and try to sleep. You have entered stage one of your sleep cycle. The scientists say that, there are four stages in a 90 minute sleep cycle. At this stage you are likely to wake up more easily because your muscles are not fully relaxed.







Now let’s begin our journey. Here are the 10 most bizarre things that are going to happen to your body while you are asleep.



1. Hypnagogic Jerk

So here you have it! The first bizarre thing that will happen to your body is the Hypnagogic Jerk. It will occur in the stage 1 of your sleep and can make your entire body shake. Now what happens is that, your body might misinterpret the sleep signals as falling and as a result, you might be awakened with a jolt. However, the scientists are still not very sure what actually causes the hypnagogic jerk. You can relax because it is completely harmless.



2. Temperature Drop

Now we take you to the stage two of your sleep cycle. You will spend half of the night at this stage and it’s not a very deep sleep. However, you will now become unaware of your surroundings. Your blood pressure and heart rate will slow down and there will be a drop in your body temperature also. Again, there is nothing to worry about as at this stage your vascular system is getting the rest it requires.



3. Hormone Production

Now you are falling into deepest sleep phase or shall we say that you have landed into stage 3 of your sleep cycle. At this stage your growth hormones get released. Growth hormones or HGH, regenerate the muscles, bone and almost every tissue of your body. Meanwhile, your blood sugar level will drop, that’s an indication that HGH is being released.



4. Your Breathing Stops. Yes!

You will spend 20% of your sleep cycle in this phase i.e. stage 3. It is where your muscles become completely relaxed and get loosen as a result the throat passage becomes narrow and your breathing slows down.

What’s more alarming is that 30% of the people stop breathing at this stage. You think it’s scary? There’s more scary stuff ahead.

You are more likely to snore at this stage if your nasal passage is blocked (reason could be a stuffy nose or trouble with your tonsils).



5. Sleep Talk

Another exciting thing that can happen during the stage 3 is that we might find you walking or talking while you are deep asleep. Sleep talking is actually a sleep disorder which occurs in 5% of the American population. Depression, illness and stress can also cause this condition. For most of the people, the session only lasts for about 30 seconds.



6. Bruxism

Not sure what Bruxism is? Clenching of teeth during sleep or Bruxism is very common in people who are under stress, or have a misaligned jaw. Many people discover this condition when they end up with sore muscles of the jaw or cracked teeth.



7. Your Height Increases

As we know that there are discs located in our spine which acts as a cushion for it. When we are in a standing position these discs are pressed down because of our body weight. While we sleep these discs get rehydrated and grow big as a result, there is an increase in our height. The doctors suggest sleeping in a fetal position in order to gain maximum height.



8. You Pass more Gas

Deep sleep results in the loosening of sphincter muscles, so you are likely to pass more gas while sleeping. Lucky for you that your sense of smell is reduced.



9. Sleep Paralysis

Now, as you move to the deepest stage of the sleep cycle or REM your arm and leg muscles will get paralyzed temporarily. The moment you wake up everything gets to normal. But there are situations when the paralysis lasts for a few seconds or even for a few minutes after you wake up. If you experience this situation do consult a physician as this could be indicating narcolepsy.



10. Your Eyes Twitch

While you are in the REM stage your eyes will constantly twitch i.e. they will move from side to side. The doctors are not very sure what causes this twitching but this is the phase where you will have most of your dreams. Here your 90 minute sleep cycle will get completed. If you take 8 hours sleep you will complete 5 sleep cycles. So you can wake up now!

This completes our list of 10 bizarre things your body does while you sleep