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Why does a small amount of caffeine sometimes make you want to nap and actually make your sleep more refreshing? (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by [email protected] to c/nostupidquestions

13 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Pure conjectural or anecdotal but it is my intuition that there is something to it

EDIT: My running theory is related to hormesis or tolerance where the body produces an opposite effect to the ligand to maintain homeostasis and there is not a sufficient dose of the exogenous drug taken to override the body's compensatory reaction

So even tho caffeine is a stimulant (adenosine antagonist) it actually causes the body to produce the opposite reaction, causing the reverse effect of making you sleepy

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[–] lambdabeta 24 points 2 months ago (2 children)

IIRC it takes about 30ish minutes for caffeine to "kick in". So if you have a bit, then take a nap, it can give you a nice 20ish minute power nap, then naturally wake you up so you don't feel groggy. The key is to be able to fall asleep quickly enough to have a decent power nap before it kicks in.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

Also, wild and vivid dreams.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

This restonates ;)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I feel like there's different sorts of 'tired', and caffeine only interacts with one of them. I've had some crazy dreams from caffeine naps

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

different kinds of tired

Can you described some of these, intrigued

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

There's exhaustion, which builds up and is relieved gradually with sleep, and is effectively masked by caffeine. Then there's the feeling of incomplete/interrupted sleep; maybe the quality of sleep was poor somehow, maybe you were woken up by an alarm in the middle of a sleep cycle, but it's painful, cognitively debilitating, and sticks around like a splinter in your brain. Caffeine doesn't help it at all, but it can be completely relieved by a nap in which you succeed in falling completely asleep even just for a few minutes, which caffeine does not prevent from happening.

I don't know how much of that is objectively how it works for everyone, but that's how I understand it.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This is purely personal experience, but I've found that the usually warm beverage that caffeine comes in + the increased heart rate helps to warm up my muscles, which makes the muscles relax more easily.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Checks out. Like a warm bath before bed

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Oh. Easy.

Biphasic dose response.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0269749113004235

Also known as hormesis.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hormesis

Small/normal doses of cannabis can perk you up. Large ones sedate. Reasonable doses of alcohol give party energy. Larger ones make you go to bed.

Same with caffeine.

And everything, really.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 2 months ago

Very cool, I'll be spending more time meditating on this answer later :)