Time in bed is not sleep. If you lie in bed for eight hours, the average person will only get about seven hours of sleep. So if you want to know your real number, the only way to do that is with a sleep tracker.
How I used to count my sleep
Now the way that I used to track my sleep is to think like, oh, I went to bed at about midnight. I woke up at 8 a.m. I got eight hours of sleep. But that is totally, totally wrong.
Laying down in bed, your time in bed, is not equivalent to sleep. It’s not as simple as just laying down in bed for eight hours, because maybe you weren’t even asleep for that entire eight hours. So when I was telling myself I got eight hours, what I really had was eight hours in bed. That’s a different number.
Eight hours can still be a terrible night
Furthermore, there are different types of sleep. You can get eight hours of sleep and still get a terrible night of sleep.
So what do I mean by that? It’s not just about the total. You also need to get sufficient deep sleep. You need to get sufficient REM sleep. So even if you really were asleep for that full eight hours, if you didn’t get sufficient deep sleep and sufficient REM sleep, that can still be a terrible night.
Use a sleep tracker
So use a sleep tracker to track and improve your sleep. That’s the reason why I’m telling you all this.
Without a sleep tracker, you have no understanding of your efficiency, your REM sleep, your deep sleep, or these more sophisticated metrics. All you have is the time you went to bed and the time you woke up, and like I said, that is not your sleep. You can’t improve your sleep if you don’t even know what you’re getting.
If you ain’t tracking, you’re slacking. It is the same reason I tell people to weigh yourself every single day.
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This is general fitness information, not medical advice.
