“I’ll sleep when I’m dead” | A Harmful Maxim (Part 1)
Thank you for joining me on what is an important (and personal) topic for me, and in my opinion, one that needs more attention in wellness discussions.
If this is your first time joining the Boukabou Solutions blog, you can learn more about the mission here and what the blog is all about by reading the first introductory blog post: Boukabou Solutions | Solutions to What?
When we join the law enforcement profession, we anticipate that we will stress our bodies because of the nature of the work that is required to serve our communities. The intentions are primarily to be committed to the mission and make well-intentioned sacrifices.
Unfortunately, to make the according sacrifices to fulfill the obligations these professions often require, we develop and learn various maxims, which set the rules of conduct and expectations within our culture.
One such maxim is “I’ll sleep when I’m dead.”
Chances are that we have all worked shifts that have extended beyond our regular assigned shift. But, I do not mean the few hours of overtime at the end of our shifts. I am highlighting the culture that when we start to doubt whether we should go into court in the morning after our night shift, someone will remind us of the maxim—“you’ll sleep when you’re dead.” So we go into court after little to no sleep only to return home for a quick nap before the next regular shift.
Maybe we have driven a SWAT armored vehicle—weighing dozens of thousands of pounds—after a lengthy call-out, which occurred after we completed our full regular shift. After all, are we not on a specialty assignment, which requires the additional commitment and sacrifice to serve our community and carry out the mission? And if doubt enters the mind, remember: “suck it up buttercup, you’ll sleep when you’re dead.”
We may feel that our community needs us. We chose to be part of this profession, and additionally committed ourselves to a specialty assignment (whatever it may be: SWAT, bomb squad, detective, and so on). Consequently, the idea of valuing sleep becomes correlated with lack of commitment and resolve. Prioritizing sleep is a luxury—not afforded to our profession—and reserved for those that are weak and uncommitted. And we are not weak and uncommitted—are we?
Is this paradigm about sleep familiar?
This culture of sleep deprivation appears to affect so many in our community that it is worth exploring and learning more about. I am not a sleep science expert, nor am I making any recommendations as to what policies agencies should adopt, nor what decision you should make as an individual regarding your sleep.
It is my hope that exploring this topic will inspire us as a community to increase our knowledge and awareness of the trade-offs involved in any important decision—including the decision to sacrifice our opportunity for restorative sleep.
Most importantly, I hope you—the reader—find value by exploring this topic and that you decide to investigate further. This hopefully leads to more conversations in our community about being safer, healthier, and more effective on and off-duty.
A Sleepy Culture
First of all: Is sleep important? Is it really a sacrifice to go without sufficient sleep here and there?
In our community, is it not just part of the job to be sleep deprived?
Between working long shifts, overtime, court, specialties, and off-duty life responsibilities, is it not a part of the reality facing law enforcement and other first responders? Do we not just drink copious amounts of coffee and getting (fill in the number of “minimum” hours of sleep we claim we need—I usually hear 4-hours of sleep) to function; therefore, are we not just doing what needs to be done to do the job?
We will explore all of this!
You may find—like I did—that to make good and informed decisions there is a lot to learn about why we sleep. If we do not investigate why sleep is important, then we cannot make good and informed decisions about what trade-offs and sacrifices are appropriate in our lives.
https://www.statista.com/chart/26201/americans-reporting-sleeping-six-hours-or-less-per-night/
Even beyond the first responder community, our culture in the Western world appears to have made the decision to prioritize other things over the need to get restorative sleep. In fact, “two-thirds of adults throughout all developed nations fail to obtain the recommended eight hours of nightly sleep” (Walker, 2018, p. 3).
According to statista.com, a Gallup poll revealed that in 1942 only 11 percent of adults 18 years and older in the United States reported sleeping six hours or less per night. By 2013, the percentage of adults 18 years and older sleeping six hours or less per night increased to 40 percent!
How many hours of sleep do you get on average each day?
Sleep Is Personal
At a young age, I lost my father to a devastating (and particularly cruel) disease—Alzheimer's.
My father was relatively young to suffer from Alzheimer's and it was incredibly difficult to see what the disease did to him. After having my own children, I have had thoughts about the potential genetic risks I might have inherited for developing this awful disease. For the sake of my wife and children, I became committed to learning about what I could do to mitigate risks for developing Alzheimer's.
My previous interest in neurology and neuroscience led me to investigate the topic of sleep further. In 2018, I found the most impactful book I had ever read on the matter—Why We Sleep by Dr. Matthew Walker. Ever since, I have been passionate about sharing what I have learned, and I have been recommending the book to anyone that is interested in learning more about the importance of restorative sleep.
Recently, I was at my wellness check-up with my family doctor. I wanted to discuss sleep and what I had learned in the book. I discovered that my family doctor had taken a class from Dr. Walker at University of California, Berkeley.
Small world moment, right?!
My family doctor was kind enough to let me ask a few questions about Dr. Walker and his class. He praised Dr. Walker and made it clear that his class was excellent, but admitted there was not much he could offer me to improve my sleep—specifically the deep sleep that I wanted to improve. I have had concerns that I might possess the genetic markers for the apolipoprotein E ɛ4, which significantly increases an individual’s risk for developing Alzheimer's disease. Furthermore, I have struggled with the quality of my sleep and I wanted to discuss the topic with my doctor.
Unfortunately, I learned that primary care physicians typically get less than two hours of instruction on sleep in four years of medical school (Winter, 2018). Consequently, I learned that if I wanted to improve my sleep and mitigate my health risks, I would need to do the research and learn what I could on my own. Dr. Walker’s book is an incredibly informative source to start with.
I will not even scratch the surface of what there is to learn from this book (and other sources) in this series of blog posts about sleep. I already planned for this blog post to be broken up into parts—sometimes I struggle with brevity.
(Whatever you just said in your head, that is not very nice! Also, thank you for being a devoted reader.)
Anyways…
What Is Your Rhythm?
Are you a morning person? Or are you a night owl? Neither?
In essence, I am asking what is your chronotype—your genetically driven preference for your body’s rhythm of when it wants to sleep.
Indeed, your rhythm depends on your genetics (your chronotype). You may have believed—like I did—that sleep is something you decide.
And indeed you do!
However, your ability to decide when you sleep does not change the fact that you have a genetic preference, which likely falls into one of these three categories:
Morning | ~40%
Evening | ~30%
Somewhere in between | ~30%
Walker (2018) explains it this way:
Although every human displays an unyielding twenty-four-hour pattern, the respective peak and trough points are strikingly different from one individual to the next. For some people, their peak of wakefulness arrives early in the day, and their sleepiness trough arrives early at night. These are “morning types,” and make up about 40 percent of the populace. They prefer to wake at or around dawn, are happy to do so, and function optimally at this time of day. Others are “evening types,” and account for approximately 30 percent of the population. They naturally prefer going to bed late and subsequently wake up late the following morning, or even in the afternoon. The remaining 30 percent of people lie somewhere in between morning and evening types, with a slight leaning toward eveningness, like myself. (p. 20).
I—like Dr. Walker—also find myself to be part of the 30 percent that are somewhere in between morning and evening types with the slight preference toward eveningness.
“Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
I grew up in a culture that valued those that went to bed early and woke up early to start the day. And I always wanted to adopt Benjamin Franklin’s advice of going to bed and rising early, which he stated would make one “healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
Nearly my entire life I felt there was something wrong with my ability to sleep. I would do my best to go to bed early and I would try to fall asleep, sometimes waiting hours to fall asleep. As you might know—or at least might imagine—this can be very frustrating.
In the morning, I would wake up early and feel unrefreshed and tired.
What a surprise, right?!
However, I noticed that usually I felt better by late morning or the early afternoon. Late morning and early afternoon are also my most productive hours.
I figured I just needed to do what others do. I needed to suck it up and drink copious amounts of nasty bean water… (just settle down, I love coffee now and drink it black, but that was not always the case).
I judged myself harshly for a long time and wished I could be better about going to bed early and waking up feeling good. And although I do believe we are adaptable and can adjust, I learned to understand and accept that I do have a personal rhythm that my body prefers.
I feel best—healthy in mind, body, and spirit—when I resonate with my body’s natural circadian rhythm for when I sleep.
This is the point of knowing our own chronotypes.
Sleep and Our Health
In future posts, we will investigate the strong links between:
sleep and mood,
sleep and depression,
sleep and cancer.
…and so many more. Winter (2018), in The Sleep Solution, also argues that sleep is virtually connected to every organ, disease, and disorder.
Consequently, we will explore how poor sleep quality:
increases the risk of developing dementia (such as Alzheimer's),
contributes to all major psychiatric conditions (such as depression, anxiety, and suicidality),
affects the ability to learn, memorize, and make logical decisions and choices,
affects weight management,
impacts cardiovascular health,
and impacts the immune system.
Together, Dr. Walker’s and Dr. Winter’s books compliment each other. Dr. Walker will undoubtedly convince you, based on the leading research in the field, how important and integral sleep is to your health. Dr. Winter will help manage the potential anxiety you may feel about your quality of sleep and offer a helpful perspective on how to improve it.
Your Rhythm ≠ Society’s Rhythm
Unfortunately for many of us, society appears to favor one rhythm—the rhythm of the morning larks. Do you remember the morning people? Are you one of the approximately 40 percent of the population that thrives on this rhythm?
If not, you likely know it—especially if you are a night owl. Walker (2018) states:
Consequently, job performance of owls as a whole is far less optimal in the mornings, and they are further prevented from expressing their true performance potential in the late afternoon and early evening as standard work hours end prior to its arrival. Most unfortunately, owls are more chronically sleep-deprived, having to wake up with the larks, but not being able to fall asleep until far later in the evening. Owls are thus often forced to burn the proverbial candle at both ends. Greater ill health caused by a lack of sleep therefore befalls owls, including higher rates of depression, anxiety, diabetes, cancer, heart attack, and stroke. (p. 21).
As first responders, we are generally part of the shift worker club—meaning we usually work nontraditional hours (basically anytime outside of the 0900-1600 work window). Additionally, our shifts might rotate, change due to shift bidding, and be affected by other obligations such as specialty call-outs.
It is difficult to ignore that society generally has a morning rhythm, which is at odds with many first responders’ rhythms, especially when they are on swings or nights. Those that work nights often will try to still participate in family and social activities that occur during regular/traditional hours.
The challenges facing those working nontraditional hours become obvious. Knowing our chronotypes and the importance of sleep on our health might help us make informed decisions about when it is or when it is not appropriate to make sacrifices to our sleep. The decisions are our own, but to truly make your own decision, you have to be empowered with the knowledge to make it.
Sleep [Knowledge] Deficiency
The culture in law enforcement about sleep made it easy for me to make the mistake that sleep is often a luxury and that I needed to be tough and get things done with little sleep—no matter how tired or awful I felt at times.
I am responsible for those poor sleep habits and decisions because of my lack of knowledge. I wish I had better understood the importance of sleep to my safety, health, and effectiveness on and off the job earlier in my life.
I am not an expert—like Dr. Walker and Dr. Winter—but I want to share with you what I have learned and how it might impact our wellness.
Based on all that I have learned, I am convinced that sleep is the foundation of good health. Proper exercise and nutrition are important pillars of good health, but they are the pillars that rely on the strong foundation of good health—restorative sleep.
I have trained thousands of police officers and continue to have meaningful interactions with many of them, which fortunately provides me insights into the struggles that many officers are facing. Consequently, I am hopeful that you will find the information in these blog posts about sleep helpful.
I have been surprised how serious the topic of sleep is for many in our profession and how many have struggled with sleep to various degrees of severity. Many male officers in law enforcement have revealed to me their struggle with low testosterone levels as discovered by their doctors. It is surprisingly common how many young men in law enforcement are taking treatments for low testosterone. I have encouraged many of them to discuss sleep with their doctors because this is what I learned from Dr. Walker (2018):
Take a group of lean, healthy young males in their mid-thirties and limit them to five hours of sleep for one week, as a research group did at the University of Chicago. Sample the hormone levels circulating in the blood of these tired participants and you will find a marked drop in testosterone relative to their own baseline levels of testosterone when fully rested. The size of the hormonal blunting effect is so large that it effectively “ages” a man by ten to fifteen years in terms of testosterone virility. (pp. 178-179).
Do you remember what the Gallup poll revealed about adults in the U.S. sleeping less than six hours per night?! How many hours of sleep are you getting each day?
Furthermore, Dr. Walker (2018) explains that it is not only mens’ hormonal health that is impacted by compromised quality and duration of sleep by stating that:
Routinely sleeping less than six hours a night results in a 20 percent drop in follicular-releasing hormone in women—a critical female reproductive element that peaks just prior to ovulation and is necessary for conception. In a report that brought together findings from studies over the past forty years of more than 100,000 employed women, those working irregular nighttime hours resulting in poor-quality sleep, such as nurses who performed shift work (a profession occupied almost exclusively by women at the time of these earlier studies), had a 33 percent higher rate of abnormal menstrual cycles than those working regular daytime hours. (pp. 179-180).
Hormonal and reproductive health impacts of poor sleep, such as low testosterone appears to be among many common issues in law enforcement; however, these are not the most serious of the sleep-related issues I hear from officers.
Sleep Is Serious
One officer had confided in me the struggles he had with feeling unrefreshed by sleep for years. He had been sleeping so poorly and had been so fatigued that he finally decided to advocate for himself to see a specialist and make sure he was not suffering from sleep apnea (something we discussed).
Unsurprisingly, after a sleep study, they found that he was suffering from severe sleep apnea and his body was struggling to breathe, which resulted in his body being deprived of optimal levels of oxygen at night. This serious sleep disorder was causing all sorts of other health issues for this officer, but the most surprising statement he made after beginning treatment for his sleep apnea was that he felt that discovering this problem saved his life.
He admitted that the fatigue caused by the lack of good sleep had started to make him consider suicide as an option to alleviate the pain and suffering he felt.
Sleep is a serious issue for many first responders and some have shared with me how much they have suffered because of poor sleep.
The attitude around this suffering is concerning. So many accept it as part of the sacrifice and culture of being a first responder. However, I learned that this attitude is accompanied by the lack of knowledge about what studies have revealed about the impact that sleep quality has on our health.
I recently had a conversation with an officer that stated that his life had markedly improved after he and his wife decided to start to go to bed regularly at the same time and wake up every day at the same time. I had given this advice after everything I had learned through all the books, podcasts, and research I had done. This advice is—not coincidentally—Dr. Walker’s top advice to improve sleep quality and overall health.
Unsurprisingly, about a year later the same officer told me that not only has the couple’s sleep improved, but also their weight management, nutritional choices, and exercise consistency all improved. All these changes had also impacted the couple’s mental health and mood and overall satisfaction in life.
Therefore, I invite you to consider with me:
Is sleep an issue of toughness?
Is sleep an issue of making the required sacrifice to serve others?
Is sleep an issue that is integral to taking care of yourself?
Is sleep an issue that is important to consider when we commit to serve others for the long term?
Is sleep an issue worth investigating in order to make informed decisions about our health, which impacts us on and off-duty?
Get Some Rest | We Will Need It to Learn More
Start getting better sleep tonight! We need good sleep to learn new information and move that information into the long-term memory part of our brains.
For now—if you will trust me—I will work hard to write and publish part two soon. Be sure to subscribe to the free newsletter on the main blog page to be notified when part two is published. Below are the references for Dr. Walker’s and Dr. Winter’s books on sleep if you are interested in them.
I encourage you to also take a moment to read some important information below and find out how you can support this blog and mission so that I can continue to provide you with valuable content. I look forward to your comments, questions, or any reflections that you might share with our community.
To be continued…
References:
Walker, M. P. (2018). Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams. Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Winter, W. C. (2018). The Sleep Solution: Why Your Sleep is Broken and How to Fix It. Berkley.
Be sure to check out the main blog page where you can subscribe to the free email newsletter, which will notify you when new blog posts are published.
To stay connected, you can follow Boukabou Solutions on social media channels (see below at the bottom of the page for social media links).
If you find the content on this blog valuable, I need your support to continue providing this content. Please consider becoming a Patreon Patron through the link below.
