The Machinist : Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Is it techically possible for a person to live, if he/she doesn't sleep for a year?

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Yes. I relate to this movie allot because i did not sleep for an entire year. I was around 15 and going through an incredibly terrible time. Post traumatic stress and night terrors made sleep difficult, and i even developed a delusion that i would die if i fell asleep. I was not eating either. I basically went completely insane because of the deterioration. I could hardly think, or even form sentences. I started having nightmares while awake. I started having heart palpitations, i honestly thought my heart would stop. Eventually i was committed. I have been on sleeping meds since then, because it almost seems as though my ability to sleep on my own has vanished. It is possible, but it is absolute hell.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

I am very sorry to hear... Hope everything gets better.


Destiny calls.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Sorry for the late reply. Yes, things have improved immensely for me and I've never been happier.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Wow really? An entire year? Nightmares while awake sounds terrifying.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Thats what hallucinations are, dreams while awake. I totally believe her story too, all the adrenalin would be really hard on your heart. I went 3 days without sleep and i could no longer read. If anything its totally unrealistic how functional he was. You could not hold a job.

Oh here's something for you about sleep. Dolphins apparently sleep with one side of their brain constantly while the other is awake. Makes me wonder if Dolphins are more like 2 different personalities in the same body.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

(sorry for the late reply) Yeah. They were realer than any dream I ever had, and I wouldn't even notice they were happening at first, so it seems like I was always dreading them.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Is that why you have Freddyfan as your username? Seems like you actually were going through the plot of the Nightmare on Elm Street series. I cannot imagine what that must have been like, sleeping is my favorite part of the day tbh.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Haha. I just love horror movies. I WISH i'd seen Frdddy, that would made the whole thing worth it, lol.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

15??? Oo jeez, not cool man!

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

No. The world record, I believe, is 11 days.

Even after 3 days of no sleep, it takes a heavy toll on one's sanity.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

nope, not medically possible... longest reliably recorded instance that I've ever seen in medical literature is 6 months... numerous people have died in less than 2 weeks... people with insomnia often think they haven't slept, but in fact the sleep deprivation screws with their sense of time and they've slept an hour or two overnight

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

Yes - anyone who says they haven't slept at all for longer than 11 days is mistaken. Sheer exhaustion would have caused them to have at least short snatches of sleep.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAIJ3Rh5Qxs

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

I thought it was a miracle that he was able to keep his job for so long. I wouldn't last a week without sleep.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

No, as others have stated, it is not possible to go without sleep for a year. It is possible however, for an individual to believe that one has been without sleep for a year. The individual's brain would shutdown periodically and go into rem sleep which the individual may not be conscious of.

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

I don't believe you

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

It's pretty neat because insomniacs can swear up and down that they haven't slept for months... but it simply isn't true. For the movie, it makes a lot of sense that Trevor could have delusions like that, because he's always at risk of falling asleep for literally seconds at a time, and dreaming. Or having those "waking dreams." It's more plausible than say, a movie with vivid visual hallucinations for a sufferer of schizophrenia (not impossible, mind).

Wveth!

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

A person cannot survive for a whole year with zero sleep. A body would shut down way before that. Now, that's not to say that a person can't have insomnia for a year and survive. The definition of insomnia is a difficulty falling and/or staying asleep, not necessarily getting absolutely no sleep. Most people start having micro naps and little snatches of sleep here and there without even realizing it. So they are getting sleep, just nowhere near what they need to function properly.
There is an extremely rare condition, call FFI (Fatal Familial Insomnia), that literally kills a person from lack of sleep. A person gets insomnia that become progressively worse until they get zero sleep, dementia sets in, and they die. It's pretty hellish. The average lifespan from onset to death is about 18 months, but the longest a person will live from no sleep to death, is about 9 months (there is 4 stages and zero sleep is stage 3). So the line in the movie, "nobody ever died from insomnia", is not entirely accurate...
But, like I said, FFI, is extremely rare. For most people their insomnia is transient, it comes and goes and is sometimes worse than other times.


"He made a brouchette. Mushrooms and cheeks."

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

See the patients with FFI. Link here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatal_familial_insomnia

You don't have to be good all the time.....only when it matters

Re: Can you really survive without sleeping a year?

This thread is laughable.

At most, you'll stay awake for a week.

Other than that you HAVE to log some hours into sleep.

A bright light can hollow the deepest of nothingness.
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