Things Your Body Does While Sleeping (3 of 5)

Dry Mouth

The reason saliva is in our mouth is for eating purposes. Since we’re not eating during our sleep, our body shuts down the flow of saliva. As a result, our mouth is pretty dry when we wake up in the morning. Not to mention we get a craving to drink some kind of beverage first thing in the morning too.

We Grind Teeth

About 5% of the world has a condition called sleep bruxism. This is the act of grinding your teeth while you are sleeping. This can lead to us damaging our teeth over time. Scientists have yet to pinpoint what causes this condition, though some think it’s a form of stress relief.

We Grow Taller

Yes there are growth spurts, but even us folk who have long past those growth spurts experience height growth. It’s been discovered that we grow several centimetres taller in the morning only to lose those centimetres by the evening.

Why this is the case is because we often sleep in a horizontal position. This allows our spine to extend and the weight of our body doesn’t press down on it.

Lower Blood Pressure

When we are sleeping, we experience “nocturnal dipping” This is where our blood pressure will drop by 5 or 7 points when we get a good night’s sleep.

We Dream

Even if we don’t remember whether we are dreaming or not, we still experience dreams on a daily basis when we sleep. Dreams often occur in the first stage of sleep where our brain is most active, however most of the dreams we go through are quickly forgotten.