Four Ways Men and Women Sleep Differently

Breaking News:

This just in, folks: men and women are different. Yes, we’re having a hard time believing it ourselves. But seriously: there are actual, honest-to-goodness differences between them. What kind of differences?

Well…we don’t want to get too technical, but there’s a wide variety of departments that men and women differ in.

The category that we’re most concerned with right now is in the department of sleep. Did you know that men and women do it differently? Er, rest differently, we mean? According to some authorities on the matter, they most certainly do.

We were intrigued by the concept that these gender variations of humanoids which you call “men” and “women” could do something fundamental to their species so differently, although they appear to do the same when you look at them doing it. (Again, we’re talking about sleep here.)

That’s why we decided to come up with a list of four ways that men and women supposedly sleep differently – and also, because we thought maybe you might like to know.

Women go to sleep earlier, men don’t.

It appears as though these creatures you call “men” aren’t liable to pass out until two hours after a woman does. But…uh, why again?

According to a study conducted in 2011, It appears as though women’s circadian clocks are wound up to slow down sooner in the day than men’s. This makes them tend to fall asleep at a decent hour in the evening and wake up bright and early the next morning.

In fact, researchers found out that females were more likely to be up and at ‘em ahead of schedule than their male counterparts. Believe it or not, women’s circadian cycles were technically shorter by about six minutes. Isn’t that nuts? (No pun intended.)

Men and women dream about different things.

This may come as a shock to you, but when it comes to the themes and content in dreams themselves, men and women differ considerably.

For instance, women are reported to have more nightmares than their counterparts.

Psychologists have theorized that nightmares are sometimes used as a subconscious strategy to help them deal with the fears and anxieties that they carry around in our waking lives (but we think that’s true for men, too). On average, women are said to have twice the amount of bad dreams that men do.

Men, on the other hand, dream about sex with unknown partners, physical aggression, violence, cars, roads, and physical aggression in dreams that tend to be shorter in the length. Ahh, sounds relaxing, does it not? (And, uh, who is said to have more nightmares again?)

Women, meanwhile, dream about family members, emotional expression, flirting with someone, talking it out, having sex with someone they know, and – trigger warning – the loss of loved ones. However, ladies do have longer, more colorful dreams overall. So that’s something.

Women have colder feet in bed – somehow?

And sometimes out of bed, too.

Why is it that women’s feet are so chilly? What’s the rub? It makes cuddling and/or snuggling more complicated than it has to be.

Some experts have stated that it’s because of women’s evenly distributed fat layers. Before you get mad, let us clarify.

Women’s even distributed fat layers provide a much needed internal insulation that keeps them warm – for the most part. But this means that females have more warmth that protects their core and trunk, which means less blood flows to their feet and hands.

In comparison, men have more muscle mass that generates heat and is sufficiently supplied by blood vessels that keeps their feetsies nice and toasty.

But that’s just one theory, of course.

Women are more prone to insomnia than men.

Sigh. Okay, fine. This is true as well. Again: why?

Women have different levels of hormones that interfere with their body chemistry than men do. Unexplained shifts in estrogen and progesterone at night can interrupt sleep on occasion.

Also, women have these things called menstrual cycles that their men didn’t seem to pick up when their archetypes were being manufactured in the platonic realm of ideals. You may have heard of them before. They tend to disrupt female sleep cycles too, as they create further hormonal dramas within their physical constitution.

Oh, and there’s this other thing that happens to women called “pregnancy”. It can interfere with their circadian groove just as much, if not more.

This concludes our studies on the sleeping patterns of the humanoid lifeforms known as “men” and “women”. We hope that one day, in the distant future, your species’ evolution will eventually heal the schism that exists between your physical presences – if your planet allows it.

We also hope you get a good night’s rest, too. Live long and sleep in!

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Main image credit.