How long can you go without sleep until it's dangerous?

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I have had a period of 3 consecutive nights of near complete sleep deprivation (severe insomnia.) On the thrid night, I was hallucinating I was down the pub with friends and had to stay awake, it was weird!

Reply 41

Dieselblue

To the point where you collapse, if you manage to not collapse you will probably die from a lack of energy

Reply 42

nineteenone

I remember I did 3 or 4 days?? Not sure...but then I went to wash my face to keep myself alert before carrying on and I'm pretty sure I started hallucinating and seeing really freaky things so I went to sleep STRAIGHT away. That **** was scary lmao

Reply 43

nineteenone

But I'd say try to do as much as you can (maybe 3 or 4 days)until you get physical pain or start feeling really strange cos then it could have some sort of weird affect on your health, even if it's small

Reply 44

Callicious

Sleep 4 hours, i'm fine. Sleep 16 hours, i'm fine. Sleep 8 hours, and i'm a mess in the morning.

Everyone has their own variation; they say 8 hours is fine and dandy, but when I wake up like i'm more groggy than Blackbeard after a few barrels of rum.

Reply 45

username1692103

I've gone almost 3 days without sleep, I think it was about 60 hours, I was fine. I don't sleep much anyway, about 5-7 hours average?

Reply 46

Bulletzone

I quote an experience by Mattias A:
"
Day 1 without sleep: Extreme fatigue, poor coordination, and low focus.

Day 2: Fatigue Worsens, focus is almost nonexistant. Frequent hunger. Hot and cold flashes add to the misery.

Day 3: Fatigue is replaced by a nervous, almost manic energy. You feel that you can focus, but in reality cannot. Hunger worsens.

Day 4: Fatigue returns. Your body will feel like it is breaking down. I am no stranger to severe injury, but can honestly say, this is the closest I have ever felt to death. You can actually feel your body dying. That may not be the case, but I have no other word to describe the feeling. Most of your time spent in a disassociative fugue. Even without sleeping, you will begin to lose track of large segments of time.

Day 5: This is when the hallucinations start. large blocks of time gone missing, you'll go through entire classes at school, then look up, and realize you are in your room, and the classes never happened. Talk to people, freinds and family for hours, make plans, then look up, and its 10 minutes later in your room. I hear scratching on the walls, but no matter how fast I turn my head, the scratching will always be 90 degrees off center, just out of my sight. I hear gentle, and sometimes not so gentle knocking at my door, to open it and find no one there. Tapping at the window when you are not looking at it.

Day 5.5) about 12 hours into Day 5, the visual hallucinations begin. You will look at something, and small shadows will suddenly dart out of your peripheral vision. If you try to visually follow them, you can't, they're gone, but more will dart the other way out of the corner of the opposite eye. Sometimes, the room will suddenly darken, or slide out of focus. (Interestingly, the shadows running in the corners of your eyes do not).

Day 6: Things start to get really weird, but I'd rather not discuss it.

Sleep deprivation can be fatal, but it usually takes more than one week. I have heard estimates from 10 days to 3 months. Studies have proven that it can kill though. I do not recommend trying it, as any sleep loss is very bad for your health. This is what I experienced, hope it helped.

"

Reply 47

RickmanAlways

It depends on the person. But you might pass out if your body gets to tired to function properly. :smile:

hope this helps!

Reply 48

username2548927

The longest I've went without sleep was 2 full days and I was messed up I could barely keep my head up so anything above that I think I would have passed out. Before it comes dangerous I don't really know it's probably different for every person but I would say anything like 4 days would be quite dangerous, just estimating.

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Reply 49

bj27

I regularly go 4 hours sleep. Not so much now.

Reply 50

Reeeeyah

I went 3 days without sleep once and I felt extremely dangerous and like I may have lost touch with reality.

Reply 51

username2548927

Original post by Reeeeyah

I went 3 days without sleep once and I felt extremely dangerous and like I may have lost touch with reality.

That's one of the symptoms of sleep deprivation. You don't know if what you're seeing is real or not and you will start to have illusions. I think people who have insomnia suffer with this.

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Reply 52

Lil08

I've gone two days without sleeping,it's possible as long as you're not doing anything mentally challenging.

Reply 53

username2548927

Original post by Lil08

I've gone two days without sleeping,it's possible as long as you're not doing anything mentally challenging.

Yeah haha, I was in school when I was coming up on 2 days without sleep it was hard to not pass out. I ended up falling asleep in English lol and I woke up to everyone staring at me.
For real though I don't plan on doing that again, it was so hard to stay conscious.

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Reply 54

HucktheForde

Original post by Lil08

I've gone two days without sleeping,it's possible as long as you're not doing anything mentally challenging.

are u lilypear? how are u doing lol

Reply 55

WorldisAstageBro

When I was highly addicted to my adderall prescription ( I'm talking minimum of 120 mgs a day) I use to smoke heavily and drink plenty of stimulants as well. I would literally work. Come home ignore my at the time gf. Sit down and play competitive call of duty and get roughly five hours a night during the week ( only bc she would would wait for my stupid until she went to sleep) when the weekends came I would seriously binge the entire time. I sometimes would sneak into bed as the sun had already risen, grab an hour of sleep and get up like that didn't just happen. **** had me ****ed up. Since then, and our break up lol (I clearly was trying to escape that relationship and didn't even realize it until after ), I had detoxt off of adderall (still miss that lil buddy). I was from that point "drug" free (I quote bc I continued to drink not realizing I had an addiction problem). Later on met this girl I thought I could save (don't ever let yourself play that role.). Felt like a Demi god bc I had quit most drugs before I fell in love with legal meth. Oxi, cocaine, ectasy, weed most painkillers. I really enjoyed my college days I would say while maintaining B+ grades at a pretty well known east coast business university (granted it offered other majors it was just known for this and nursing) somehow 🤔... anyways I keep getting side tracked. So yEah I made her into my project and thought I could easily get and or show her how you quit a drug i.e. The one she was addicted to long before she met me. I had found out and felt bad and wanted to be that rock. Man biggest mistake 👋🏽👋🏽 (Don't get me wrong I fell in love and honestly we connected more than I have with anyone before sadly) we still talk and have sex (something in trying to abstain from as well✊🏽. I got hooked to dope then. Aaaaaand stop. The reason for this back story is bc I recently relapsed on this ****ing brown devil by associating with old people places and things and getting carried away with the euphoric sex that came with the high. I'm back into working my program of NA and I am lucky to have even made it back. Kept my nice job somehow just used all my money to grab. So yeah I'm quite blessed by god I would say. I have been tempted by Satan many times in life. But I am detoxing currently from my relapse at home. I have not slept for four days and three nights and that's straight drug free. I run on coffee during the day otherwise I would be miserable. I came on here to look up how long I could stay awake straight without death.bc after my whole dangerous party riden night life and normal day life (that was basically dr jekel mr Hyde type ****) I thought to myself....🙄 you midden me holy smoke bro if this somehow would be the stupid way I would die lol (makes me laugh honestly after all the dumb **** I have done since I was 14) that at the ripe old age of 27 (still got my looks and witty personality along with charm) I would die trying to live a better way of life and I would simply crash my car from falling asleep or what have you. F***in dumb. Anyways anything is possible in this world and Satan is real lol(I laughed out loud here bc I just picture some of you going 👈🏽This bible banger 🙄 Which I assure you I am not here to restore faith or debate religion) use to not believe in any of that **** but there is a daily battle for you guys I know bc many things/"billboards"/signs/ not normal things that you would deem a coincidence. Hopefully this gets out to some one and it can be a beacon of hope. Be steadfast you posters. I'm going to close my eyes and roll around a bunch and be pissed off that I'm going on night 3 no sleep but atleast it's Friday baby. So I can be miserable by myself for the weekend sleep deprived/ horny/ yet freaking happy af I'm still alive and I know God still has a plan for keeping me around. Be safe. Don't do anything I wouldn't do lol
Oh research NA in your area for meetings. Go hit a meeting like me get your hand up. Gods will guide

(edited 7 years ago)

Reply 56

Jad 1234

I think it is 4 days I haven't done it myself though

Reply 57

WorldisAstageBro

Well if I don't respond then your answer if four days will be correct lol haven't slept in over reading while watching streams hoping this day will not take as long as this continuous "longest day" I got going right now. I was like at one point 👌🏽That close to actually disconnecting and slipping into my body shutting down for sleep then I caught restless leg syndrome along with achy joints and here I am still.... fml hitting a shower now then driving my ass in the tag race to work. O on a side note during this sleepless week I am having I have visited the gym. I thought it would help pit my ass to sleep. Wrong. Only thing it did was boost my endorphins. I felt more winded than normal so fatigue is pretty bad rn. But f it man if my body can take the abuse I gave it my whole life it shouldn't give up now right? As long as I don't fall asleep at the wheel or run a light lol. Anyways best a day to ya

Reply 58

Nunchuck-master-2334

Original post by Anonymous

I'm just curious. I last slept wednesday morning, went to bed at 4am and woke up at 13:30pm. But I had a lot of coursework to do after stupidly leaving it over Christmas and such. Got everything done okay but stayed up last night to make sure I'd covered everything and planned on sleeping through tonight.

Just remembered I have some more work due in tomorrow and I might have to stay up again. I'm not sure I could. I'm running on energy drinks at the moment.

Would I be at risk of passing out or anything? I only need to last until tomorrow lunchtime then i'm free for sleeping all weekend.