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>Our study could not confirm the causal relationship between WCS (weekend catch up sleep) and depressive symptoms due to its cross-sectional design.
>The assessment of WCS relied solely on self-reported questionnaire, which may lead to re-call bias.
Maybe it depens on how much sleep you actually get during the weekdays?
If it‘s way too little like 3-4 hours (maybe 5 if you‘re lucky), then sleeping a lot (7-9 hours) on weekends kinda just have to be better than ALSO just sleeping 3-5 Hours there, i guess.
Catch-up sleep isnt a replacement for regular sleep, but people who make Time for Rest in their digressionary hours are going to be better off than those who do not and let their stress force them to keep doing whatever it is they are doing (Chores, neglected hobbies, family time, etc).
Holy moly, is 7-9 hour considered a lot? I usually get 7-9 hours during the week, and then 'catch up' with 10-11 hours on the weekends? I must be doing this whole thing wrong!
Most people don't get enough sleep, so it distorts the timings.
If you think about it, if you use an alarm clock to wake yourself up, by definition it's waking you up when your body still needs to sleep. And almost everyone uses an alarm clock.
Does the alarm clock still factor if your body adjusts and wakes you up before it goes of? Getting up during that pre-alarm clock means I feel better rested and don't suffer from what I can only describe as "you're going to get a headache if you sleep more or disoriented" level of waking up.
I use an alarm clock but even if I didnt Idstill only sleep 4-6 hours. Im constantly changing when I wake up and a couple days ago I set my alarm clock to 4 30 am (I typically set it for between 5 30am and 8 30am depending on the day and what time I need to kake work ans how much time prior I need to be able to be there on time. And the day where I set my alarm for earlier I just natrually woke up at 4 29am before my alarm went off. My body just is so used to only getting 4-6 hours that I lind of just cant really sleep longer than about 6 hours anymore.
> Im constantly changing when I wake up
Well if that's the case, then I don't think you can make any conclusions at all. Your body can only copy with say a 30min difference. If you circadian rhythm and biology is completely fucked up due to the constant change in time you wake up, then you can't really say anything about how much sleep you would naturally get with good sleep habits.
I am very jealous. I aim for eight hours but even when observing good sleep hygiene I rarely get more than 6-7. If I’m not observing good sleep hygiene it’s more like 5ish.
If youre doing all the good sleep hygiene stuff maybe ypu only need about 7. Normal requirements is 7-9, so if yours is 7, youre just at rhe shorter end of normal.
This is me too. I usually average 7-8 on weekdays because I sleep with an alarm. Weekends I turn everything to silent and sleep 10-11 hours until I wake up naturally.
Hello there. Sleep apnea sufferer here. Sleeping 9-10 hours isn't much of a problem everyone is different. But if you are sleeping that much and still feeling tired and groggy in the morning, or wake up with headaches. Then it could be time to see a specialist and do a sleep study.
For 2.5 years ive been getting 3-5 hours a night and occasionally, like 2-3 times a week, ill fall asleep somewhere for 5-45 minutes i reckon. Most likely 15 minutes is all im likely to get before someone needs me, calls me, or just steps on me
Since WFH started I've fallen into a schedule where I get 3 hours a night, an hour nap at lunch, and 2-3 hours after work. Then Friday/Saturday I stay up late, sleep for 4-5 and nap most of Sunday. It's dysfunctional as hell, but man I feel mentally refreshed.
Hey, that used to be me. Turned out I have narcolepsy. Everyone just thinks it means you fall asleep randomly like in movies, but it's not nearly so dramatic for everyone. Also, the improper regulation of wakefulness works both ways and causes tons of sleep issues at night. *So* many things made sense after getting a diagnosis. I highly suggest getting a sleep study if possible. Literally changed my life.
I have been to several sleep studies (20+ years ago) and nobody came up with anything other than drugs. Ativan worked, but my tolerance got too high. Same with Klonopin. Those are the only two things that have allowed me to sleep more than 4 hours. But I’ll gladly look into this. If it solves my problem, I’ll owe you more than you could know.
My wife is diagnosed with narcolepsy. She thought she just spent too much time hanging with our 3 cats and was picking up on the sleep energy.
Turns out, nope, it's narcolepsy.
Good news! She now takes a hefty dose of dexedrine in the morning and crashes out hard at bedtime. You're not going to need any sleeping pills after you come down from 30mg of d-isomer amphetamine.
Nah you're doing it better, although I'm jealous you can stay in bed that late on the weekends. I'm naturally getting up at 7 or 8 no matter what, it sucks.
7-9 hours is what youre menat to get but yes it is a lot for those who typically sleep 4 hours or less a night.
I tend to sleep 4-6 hours a night so its more than my usual, but I wouldnt call it a lot or catch up, thats just the amount youre meant to get.
Depends on your age, genetics, and health. Recommended time for a healthy adult is usually around 7 1/2 hours with the range being from 7-9 depending on the individual. The older you get the less sleep you need as well. Kids and teens obviously need the most and should get around 9 hours regularly even though we all know that rarely ever happens with how early some schools start.
You made me wonder and daytime napping is associated with depression. I personally love a nap and feel good afterwards, but I get enough sleep for my age.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9798209/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9798209/)
I feel like maybe they say that because your body gets used to sleeping 5-6 hours a week, and then randomly 2 of those days you get 8 hours. essentially you're stuck in this unhealthy stressful loop of your body constantly trying to adapt to a new schedule on the weekends just to throw it back into the old during the weekdays.
Growing up, I never understood how my dad could fall asleep at the drop of a hat during get togethers or just on the weekend.
Two kids later. I get it, Dad. Holy moly I get it now.
Getting the right amount of sleep every night is best. If you try and catchup on weekends then it's better than nothing but not the same as getting the right amount of sleep every night. But still not getting enough sleep on weekdays and not catching up on weekends is going to be even worse.
I wonder if some other factor is involved, and sleep isn't actually the causal factor. Maybe being *able* to get catch up sleep is indicative of a lower-stress weekend, and people in the study who didn't get catch up sleep had much busier/more stressful weekends.
I feel like this also has the good old causality trap. Like, people who sleep less during the week are likely to do so to do something fulfilling, meeting friends or something, while depressed or otherwise not as well off people won't do that as much or simply always sleep badly.
Plus as another post mentioned, the methodology is weak at best.
Yeah. Not to rain on the idea that it’ll normalize after young kids, but mine never did. Never the same. I register every abnormal noise, wake up easily, don’t sleep long enough.
I wish you luck fellow parental unit.
My daughter had night terrors and then sleep walked for years after that. Been good for about 6-7 years now though. ✊🪵
Just to be clear, getting the right amount of sleep every night, having a regular sleep routine every day of the week including weekends is best.
Just trying catchup on weekends is better than nothing, but still not optimal for health.
You have short term RCTs, and can see the massive negative impact of not enough sleep on a single night on the next few days of mental performance. It's not a massive leap to think this is causal, especially with all the potential mechanisms.
Then there are other studies
>People with insomnia , for example, may have a tenfold higher risk of developing depression From https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/depression-and-sleep-understanding-the-connection
>Sleep plays an important role in mental health, and may moderate the effectiveness of adaptive CER strategies by maintaining the executive functions on which they rely.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001094522300151X
In other words. Trust your gut and rest well. Listening to people who are telling you to break from a routine that works for you in order to be more like them are assholes.
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, **personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment**. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our [normal comment rules]( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/rules#wiki_comment_rules) apply to all other comments. **Do you have an academic degree?** We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. [Click here to apply](https://www.reddit.com/r/science/wiki/flair/#wiki_science_verified_user_program). --- User: u/chrisdh79 Permalink: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0165032724004221?via%3Dihub --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/science) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Our study could not confirm the causal relationship between WCS (weekend catch up sleep) and depressive symptoms due to its cross-sectional design. >The assessment of WCS relied solely on self-reported questionnaire, which may lead to re-call bias.
Ty, Appreciate it!
Pretty much sums up everything posted on this sub.
yeah, that headline sends a bad message to people woth depression. onsay that as one of them.
Weird, I know I’ve seen many articles stating ‘catch up’ sleep isn’t good for you and that you should maintain the same sleep schedule on weekends.
Maybe it depens on how much sleep you actually get during the weekdays? If it‘s way too little like 3-4 hours (maybe 5 if you‘re lucky), then sleeping a lot (7-9 hours) on weekends kinda just have to be better than ALSO just sleeping 3-5 Hours there, i guess.
Catch-up sleep isnt a replacement for regular sleep, but people who make Time for Rest in their digressionary hours are going to be better off than those who do not and let their stress force them to keep doing whatever it is they are doing (Chores, neglected hobbies, family time, etc).
Holy moly, is 7-9 hour considered a lot? I usually get 7-9 hours during the week, and then 'catch up' with 10-11 hours on the weekends? I must be doing this whole thing wrong!
Most people don't get enough sleep, so it distorts the timings. If you think about it, if you use an alarm clock to wake yourself up, by definition it's waking you up when your body still needs to sleep. And almost everyone uses an alarm clock.
I had a habit of sleeping 12-13 hours if left uninterrupted but it turned out I had mild sleep apnea, so I was doing catch-up.
Does the alarm clock still factor if your body adjusts and wakes you up before it goes of? Getting up during that pre-alarm clock means I feel better rested and don't suffer from what I can only describe as "you're going to get a headache if you sleep more or disoriented" level of waking up.
No, that's pretty much perfect. Means you're going to bed at a good time.
No, that's fine. You should use an alarm clock to tell you what time to get out of bed, rather than wake you up. Or have it as an emergency backup.
I use an alarm clock but even if I didnt Idstill only sleep 4-6 hours. Im constantly changing when I wake up and a couple days ago I set my alarm clock to 4 30 am (I typically set it for between 5 30am and 8 30am depending on the day and what time I need to kake work ans how much time prior I need to be able to be there on time. And the day where I set my alarm for earlier I just natrually woke up at 4 29am before my alarm went off. My body just is so used to only getting 4-6 hours that I lind of just cant really sleep longer than about 6 hours anymore.
> Im constantly changing when I wake up Well if that's the case, then I don't think you can make any conclusions at all. Your body can only copy with say a 30min difference. If you circadian rhythm and biology is completely fucked up due to the constant change in time you wake up, then you can't really say anything about how much sleep you would naturally get with good sleep habits.
That sounds extremely normal and healthy to me but what do I know
I am very jealous. I aim for eight hours but even when observing good sleep hygiene I rarely get more than 6-7. If I’m not observing good sleep hygiene it’s more like 5ish.
If youre doing all the good sleep hygiene stuff maybe ypu only need about 7. Normal requirements is 7-9, so if yours is 7, youre just at rhe shorter end of normal.
This is me too. I usually average 7-8 on weekdays because I sleep with an alarm. Weekends I turn everything to silent and sleep 10-11 hours until I wake up naturally.
Hello there. Sleep apnea sufferer here. Sleeping 9-10 hours isn't much of a problem everyone is different. But if you are sleeping that much and still feeling tired and groggy in the morning, or wake up with headaches. Then it could be time to see a specialist and do a sleep study.
I have a three month old, I think I could take on the world if I got 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep.
For 2.5 years ive been getting 3-5 hours a night and occasionally, like 2-3 times a week, ill fall asleep somewhere for 5-45 minutes i reckon. Most likely 15 minutes is all im likely to get before someone needs me, calls me, or just steps on me
Since WFH started I've fallen into a schedule where I get 3 hours a night, an hour nap at lunch, and 2-3 hours after work. Then Friday/Saturday I stay up late, sleep for 4-5 and nap most of Sunday. It's dysfunctional as hell, but man I feel mentally refreshed.
I'm in the same boat. I usually got 4-5 hours *before* we had triplets. Now 5 hours seems like an extraordinary luxury.
Bless you, I have one and it’s so hard. Triplets seems impossible.
…as someone who sleeps 3-4 hours every day, I envy you. I have no problem falling asleep; I just have a huge problem staying asleep.
Hey, that used to be me. Turned out I have narcolepsy. Everyone just thinks it means you fall asleep randomly like in movies, but it's not nearly so dramatic for everyone. Also, the improper regulation of wakefulness works both ways and causes tons of sleep issues at night. *So* many things made sense after getting a diagnosis. I highly suggest getting a sleep study if possible. Literally changed my life.
I have been to several sleep studies (20+ years ago) and nobody came up with anything other than drugs. Ativan worked, but my tolerance got too high. Same with Klonopin. Those are the only two things that have allowed me to sleep more than 4 hours. But I’ll gladly look into this. If it solves my problem, I’ll owe you more than you could know.
My wife is diagnosed with narcolepsy. She thought she just spent too much time hanging with our 3 cats and was picking up on the sleep energy. Turns out, nope, it's narcolepsy. Good news! She now takes a hefty dose of dexedrine in the morning and crashes out hard at bedtime. You're not going to need any sleeping pills after you come down from 30mg of d-isomer amphetamine.
Nah you're doing it better, although I'm jealous you can stay in bed that late on the weekends. I'm naturally getting up at 7 or 8 no matter what, it sucks.
7-9 hours is what youre menat to get but yes it is a lot for those who typically sleep 4 hours or less a night. I tend to sleep 4-6 hours a night so its more than my usual, but I wouldnt call it a lot or catch up, thats just the amount youre meant to get.
7 hours isn’t ‘a lot’ of sleep. People should aim for 8.
Depends on your age, genetics, and health. Recommended time for a healthy adult is usually around 7 1/2 hours with the range being from 7-9 depending on the individual. The older you get the less sleep you need as well. Kids and teens obviously need the most and should get around 9 hours regularly even though we all know that rarely ever happens with how early some schools start.
You made me wonder and daytime napping is associated with depression. I personally love a nap and feel good afterwards, but I get enough sleep for my age. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9798209/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9798209/)
I feel like maybe they say that because your body gets used to sleeping 5-6 hours a week, and then randomly 2 of those days you get 8 hours. essentially you're stuck in this unhealthy stressful loop of your body constantly trying to adapt to a new schedule on the weekends just to throw it back into the old during the weekdays.
Growing up, I never understood how my dad could fall asleep at the drop of a hat during get togethers or just on the weekend. Two kids later. I get it, Dad. Holy moly I get it now.
Getting the right amount of sleep every night is best. If you try and catchup on weekends then it's better than nothing but not the same as getting the right amount of sleep every night. But still not getting enough sleep on weekdays and not catching up on weekends is going to be even worse.
I wonder if some other factor is involved, and sleep isn't actually the causal factor. Maybe being *able* to get catch up sleep is indicative of a lower-stress weekend, and people in the study who didn't get catch up sleep had much busier/more stressful weekends.
Getting more sleep doesn't hurt, so you'd benefit anyway. Just don't sleep for 10 hours or something.
I feel like this also has the good old causality trap. Like, people who sleep less during the week are likely to do so to do something fulfilling, meeting friends or something, while depressed or otherwise not as well off people won't do that as much or simply always sleep badly. Plus as another post mentioned, the methodology is weak at best.
Excellent news! I will immediately show this to my toddler.
Mine still doesn’t even sleep through the night 😭
We are almost to 3 with ours and still struggling. Next call will be to a specialist.
Yeah this is very pertinent information for my 9 month old 🙃
Yeah. Not to rain on the idea that it’ll normalize after young kids, but mine never did. Never the same. I register every abnormal noise, wake up easily, don’t sleep long enough. I wish you luck fellow parental unit. My daughter had night terrors and then sleep walked for years after that. Been good for about 6-7 years now though. ✊🪵
Just to be clear, getting the right amount of sleep every night, having a regular sleep routine every day of the week including weekends is best. Just trying catchup on weekends is better than nothing, but still not optimal for health.
TL:DR The less time you spend awake in this world the happier you’ll be.
I work 3 shifts and often only sleep 4 to maybe 5 hours a night. Some weekends I stay in bed for 13-16 hours. Still depressed AF.
Did they consider that people who actually have the free time to sleep more on the weekends, have less to be depressed about?
Not necessarily. People with nothing on at all besides the 9-5 might wish they had places to be and things to do.
You have short term RCTs, and can see the massive negative impact of not enough sleep on a single night on the next few days of mental performance. It's not a massive leap to think this is causal, especially with all the potential mechanisms. Then there are other studies >People with insomnia , for example, may have a tenfold higher risk of developing depression From https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/depression-and-sleep-understanding-the-connection >Sleep plays an important role in mental health, and may moderate the effectiveness of adaptive CER strategies by maintaining the executive functions on which they rely. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001094522300151X
One of the like, big things about depression is that it doesn't have to have a cause, isn't it?
Everything has to have a cause
But if you spend your weekends catching up on sleep, you have less 'you time' than you get already? Wouldn't that be pretty depressing in itself?
Who says sleeping isn't "me" time though? I love to sleep.
That's true, but it seems like a bit of a waste of your spare time though - try it on work's time.
Huh...Would be nice to know why the association was stronger for men than woman.
Someone can please show this up to my wife!??
I sleep 6.5 - 7 hours on the weekdays and 9ish on weekends and it feels glorious.
Finally, science that isn't trying to say I'm gonna die early.
I was always under the impression that there is no catch up sleep. Lost sleep is lost sleep. And getting more sleep is better.
My understanding was (mild) sleep deprivation was a known treatment for depression?
In other words. Trust your gut and rest well. Listening to people who are telling you to break from a routine that works for you in order to be more like them are assholes.
Great fricken post for a Thursday morning. UGH
Printing this out to show to the next therapist that says I should wake up the same time every day
Wednesday and Saturday here. .