CDriving while deprived of sleep would be as dangerous as driving after downing two glasses of wine. This is approximate information that will keep some people up at night. Happy were the insomniacs of previous centuries who could not sleep without knowing what they were exposing themselves to when they took the wheel or the carriage the next day. Insomniacs of the 21ste century, they are flooded with studies which inform them of the consequences of their short nights on health. Obesity. Cardiovascular accident. Diabetes. Hypertension. Depression. They can spend all their sleepless nights reading scientific publications about what they risk by keeping their eyes open.
The insomniac of the XXe century drank chamomile, today’s century lives in the hour of quantified self, the “measure of oneself”, in French in the text, namely the quantification of all aspects of one’s life. The person prone to insomnia thus has all kinds of tools – connected watches, rings, apps – which allow them to wake up with a poor rating in deep sleep and a mediocre one in paradoxical sleep. As if it wasn’t enough to sleep poorly, you also have to feel guilty.
In January 2024, when we learned that Gabriel Attal, appointed Prime Minister, only slept four hours a night, the information gave rise to a flood of articles on the harmful effects of lack of sleep. This is the ability to sleep well that has become an attribute of productive people. Congratulating yourself on only needing a few hours of sleep a night is as anachronistic as boasting about eating lots of red meat. Orthosomnia, that is to say the obsession with sleeping well, is now carried not by people who want to have breakfast in bed, but by those who want to be efficient and live longer. Seven hours of sleep is the new ten thousand steps a day.
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Out of superstition, they prefer to say that they have “sleep problems” than use the word “insomnia”. They heard about an application that allows you to measure the quality of your sleep, but also heard of studies indicating that you sleep less well with a phone in the room. As they got older, they moved from books about children’s sleep to articles about adult sleep. They use the “delayed sending” option for emails they write at 3 a.m. They wonder if it might not be the fault of Covid, teleworking or a sedentary lifestyle. And, in the meantime, they can’t fall asleep because they ruminate about the effects that lack of sleep will have on their day the next day and on their life expectancy the day after that.
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