The Promise of Sleep - Breathing Space Blog

In The Promise of Sleep, pioneering researcher William C. Dement, MD, Ph.D. noted that "Many people work long hard hours throughout the week hoping to catch up on sleep over the weekend. They collapse in the bed on Friday night and sleep deeply until late in the morning."

"Even though they have paid back several hours of sleep debt, they walk around like zombies all day Saturday, barely able to stay awake. The reason is obvious: You cannot pay back a week's worth of sleep debt in one night. Less obvious: The stressful arousal of the weekday work place is no longer masking sleep debt on Saturday. As people tend to drink and eat more on weekends, their sleep fighting arousal is further suppressed."