Insomnia
- Thread starter Jon
- Start date
I would say that 95% of the time, I do not have this problem. MAYBE once at night I have to get up for a bathroom call, but I get right back to sleep quickly. When I was having serious gall bladder issues, I would wake up several times a night for digestive issues. (That's the kind way to put it.) But once my gall bladder and I parted ways and my Gastro guy gave me a prescription with a bile sequestrant in it, I sleep pretty well. Now the only thing that will keep me up is if my wife and I go to a party that stays late and we indulge in some late-night snacking. Eating late keeps both of us up late.
No. Late night snacking keeps me awake because I'm wired. Perhaps elevated blood sugar gives me extra energy and I have no easy way to burn it off? The problem has nothing to do with bladder voiding.
Ever since my prostate surgery that allows me to empty my bladder in a single event, I don't have nightly bladder issues, or at most only one. Before the surgery? Several times a night because the BPH (benign prostatic hyperplasia) didn't allow me to dump more than a medium fraction of content.
After the surgery? I could put out a small campfire and not have to get close enough to get burned in the process. It's an unfair coin flip as to whether I sleep the whole night or have to get up exactly once. Maybe twice a week I need the mid-sleep visit. Otherwise, I get a whole night of sleep - and THEN run to the bathroom.
For any guys in the forum, prostate problems are no joke. Take care of your prostate. If it is unhealthy, you dribble a lot, have no pressure to what you do, and therefore have a half-done job that needs repeated attention. Urination can be uncomfortable and, in later stages, actually painful. You also risk kidney damage by causing back-pressure because there is no room in the bladder for what the kidneys want to put out. Besides stretching of the bladder (which isn't good any way you look at it), the reverse pressure affects the osmosis potentials that are the basis of kidney function. This in turn causes the wastes to hang around in the kidneys longer than necessary and that eventually poisons them.
Women? You don't have a prostate but you have a corresponding structure that ALSO can cause similar symptoms. Problems in urination can lead to serious illness. Don't play around with that particular system. When my mother's kidneys were damaged through other reasons, it led to extreme toxic shock which was Mom's technical cause of death even though the real problem was that her Alzheimer's didn't allow her to tell us what was wrong.
Ever since my prostate surgery that allows me to empty my bladder in a single event, I don't have nightly bladder issues, or at most only one. Before the surgery? Several times a night because the BPH (benign prostatic hyperplasia) didn't allow me to dump more than a medium fraction of content.
After the surgery? I could put out a small campfire and not have to get close enough to get burned in the process. It's an unfair coin flip as to whether I sleep the whole night or have to get up exactly once. Maybe twice a week I need the mid-sleep visit. Otherwise, I get a whole night of sleep - and THEN run to the bathroom.
For any guys in the forum, prostate problems are no joke. Take care of your prostate. If it is unhealthy, you dribble a lot, have no pressure to what you do, and therefore have a half-done job that needs repeated attention. Urination can be uncomfortable and, in later stages, actually painful. You also risk kidney damage by causing back-pressure because there is no room in the bladder for what the kidneys want to put out. Besides stretching of the bladder (which isn't good any way you look at it), the reverse pressure affects the osmosis potentials that are the basis of kidney function. This in turn causes the wastes to hang around in the kidneys longer than necessary and that eventually poisons them.
Women? You don't have a prostate but you have a corresponding structure that ALSO can cause similar symptoms. Problems in urination can lead to serious illness. Don't play around with that particular system. When my mother's kidneys were damaged through other reasons, it led to extreme toxic shock which was Mom's technical cause of death even though the real problem was that her Alzheimer's didn't allow her to tell us what was wrong.
The requirements for frequent "wake-up" calls occurred while I was still working. Now I sleep very well but back then I was always cat-napping. In order to be ready for work, I had to get up at 5:25 AM (local) and had to be on the job by 7:00 AM. So no, I could NOT sleep longer to make it up. Now, though, I wake up anytime between 7:30 and 8:15 depending on exactly when I sacked out. BIG difference in a feeling of being rested now.
I have a theory. If someone needs to pee multiple times during the night, is part of that determined by your bodyfat? If someone slimmed down say 20lbs and they previously weighed 200lb, they have shaved 10% off their bodyweight. But some of that would be bones! So, maybe it is the equivalent of losing 20% of actual tissue. Would that mean 20% less peeing? Your thoughts?
I would say that body fat doesn't strongly contribute to frequency of urination unless you are gaining or losing weight. Passively stored fat isn't doing anything at all, metabolically. On the other hand, difficulties in voiding bladder content WILL affect frequency of urination. Basically a physiological manifestation of "If you can't do it right the first time, you'll have to do it again until you get it right."
Your "metabolic rate" is a catch-all term that relates to your body's ability to process what you eat and drink. If you have eaten, your body will break down the protein and carb content, which involves "denaturing" (removing water from) the food. It is said that we are over 70% water. But because we ALL came from the same "tree of life," everything we eat is the same way - mostly water. Metabolism includes the act of chemical breakdown in our digestive system, where the water comes out as the proteins unfold, releasing what is called "water of hydration." I know it sounds like a tautology, but isn't because it is distinguishing between water that is strongly bound (water of constitution) from that which is less strongly bound (water of hydration). The primary sources of the water going through your kidneys are (a) whatever water is in what you drink and (b) water of hydration from what you eat.
To the extent that you have excess body fat, it is possible that the fat interferes with your other organs since fat cannot be so quickly stored in the body. It is, after all, less soluble in water. That management of fat is handled by the liver and gall bladder. As those organs lose some of their function with age, we find it easier to put on a few pounds because we can no longer process fatty foods so quickly. So to this fine point, Jon, it is true that extra weight might affect that frequency of voiding. But the simple direct link isn't there. It might be possible to lose the weight and still have issues with frequency of urination. The more direct link is the efficiency of how we process our food.
Your "metabolic rate" is a catch-all term that relates to your body's ability to process what you eat and drink. If you have eaten, your body will break down the protein and carb content, which involves "denaturing" (removing water from) the food. It is said that we are over 70% water. But because we ALL came from the same "tree of life," everything we eat is the same way - mostly water. Metabolism includes the act of chemical breakdown in our digestive system, where the water comes out as the proteins unfold, releasing what is called "water of hydration." I know it sounds like a tautology, but isn't because it is distinguishing between water that is strongly bound (water of constitution) from that which is less strongly bound (water of hydration). The primary sources of the water going through your kidneys are (a) whatever water is in what you drink and (b) water of hydration from what you eat.
To the extent that you have excess body fat, it is possible that the fat interferes with your other organs since fat cannot be so quickly stored in the body. It is, after all, less soluble in water. That management of fat is handled by the liver and gall bladder. As those organs lose some of their function with age, we find it easier to put on a few pounds because we can no longer process fatty foods so quickly. So to this fine point, Jon, it is true that extra weight might affect that frequency of voiding. But the simple direct link isn't there. It might be possible to lose the weight and still have issues with frequency of urination. The more direct link is the efficiency of how we process our food.
To be clear, I am not suggesting that if someone loses weight they will not still have issues with frequent urination. Instead, I am hypothesising that if you lose weight you have less mass. Less mass means we need less food to sustain your weight. Less food being processed means less water extracted. Also, less water is required to hydrate. A mouse - for example - pees a smaller amount than an elephant, although one might scare the other. 
Imagine someone who is 300lbs verses someone who is 150lbs. I would imagine that the latter needs less water than the former.
Imagine someone who is 300lbs verses someone who is 150lbs. I would imagine that the latter needs less water than the former.
You would imagine - and in so doing you would be neglecting that metabolic rate is the primary factor in how fluids are processed. Water is the materials carrier of the metabolism of the body. A small person with a high metabolic rate will need more water than a large person with a low metabolic rate. Your surmise would be correct if and only if they both had the same effective metabolic rate, which is kind of ruled out by the size difference.