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Long Sleeping: Symptoms, Causes and Treatments

Sleep is essential for restoring your body and maintaining your health. Memory, learning, emotions and social behaviors are all influenced by your sleeping patterns.

The amount of sleep you need each night depends on your age, general health and quality of sleep. While adults generally need about seven hours of sleep, teens and young children tend to need about ten hours. Regularly sleeping longer (more than an hour) than these normal sleeping patterns is defined as "long sleep."

Symptoms and Causes of Long Sleep

Long sleepers, those who need much more sleep than others in their age groups, can require anywhere from 10 to more than 12 hours of sleep each night to feel fully rested during the day.

Long sleepers have normal, good quality sleep but have a consistent pattern of needing much more sleep. Needing more sleep is a condition that starts during childhood, rather than being an affect of a sudden change in physical or emotional health.

Common symptoms of long sleep include:

feeling tired during the day when you get less than 10 hours of sleep
having long sleeping patterns since childhood
regularly sleeping more than ten hours a day.

Because long sleep patterns can also be a symptom of more serious medical conditions (such as depression), understanding each factor that plays into needing more sleep is important.

While the exact cause of long sleep is depends on a number of factors, some of the common causes of this sleep disorder include:

alcohol or substance abuse
depression
other sleep disorders, such as sleep apnea
personality traits, such as tendencies towards being shy, nervous or worried.

Treatment for Long Sleep

Because long sleepers sleep normally, just for extended periods of time, this condition doesn't really need any treatment. The only time treatment is required for long sleep is if the condition is a symptom of another, more serious condition. In these cases, the underlying condition should be treated, possibly resolving long sleep issues.

The greatest challenge for long sleepers is balancing their schedules with their sleeping needs. This can make long sleepers feel tired, cranky and sleepy throughout the day, potentially causing problems at work or home.

If sleep deprivation starts to affect a long sleeper's daily life, he may want to consult with a sleep specialist. Sleep specialists can help long sleepers determine how much sleep they actually need and then suggest ways to add more sleep into each day without disrupting schedules.

Here are some ways you can create more sleeping time for yourself:

Go to bed earlier. While you may not be able to go to bed that much earlier, just 15 minutes more sleep each night can help you feel more rested the following day.
Reduce your intake of alcohol, caffeine and other medications that tend to disrupt sleep patterns.
Try taking a 30 to 60-minute nap each day, if possible.

If other issues (physical or emotional) are causing you to need more sleep, consult a doctor or sleep specialist to identify the causes and suggest treatments.

Resources

eMedicine (2006). Normal Sleep, Sleep Physiology, and Sleep Deprivation: General Principles. Retrieved January 17, 2007, from the eMedicine Web site: http://www.emedicine.com/neuro/topic444.htm

Helpguide (2007). Getting the Sleep You Need. Retrieved January 17, 2007, from the Helpguide Web site: http://www.helpguide.org/life/sleeping.htm#Sleep_

deprivation_signs_debt.

Holistic Online (2007). Proposed Sleep Disorders. Retrieved January 17, 2007, from the Holistic Online Web site: http://www.holisticonline.com/Remedies/Sleep/sleep_description-proposed.htm.

Sleep Education (2007). Long Sleeper. Retrieved January 17, 2007, from the Sleep Education Web site: http://www.sleepeducation.com/Disorder.aspx?id=24.

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