9 facts about REM sleep you probably didn't know

1. Being in REM sleep is a lot like being awake! Your brain activity, heart rate and breathing rate during REM are similar to what they are like during waking hours. WEIRD!
   
   
2. It was a graduate student from the University of Chicago who first discovered REM sleep.
   
   
3. It is common to wake for a short time at the end of a REM phase
   
   
4. We enter REM sleep about 5 times in an 8 hour time period, and if we count each period as a different dream, we will have 1,825 dreams in on year!
   
   
5. A 75 year old person will have about 136,875 dreams in a year!
   
   
6. A lack of muscle immobility during REM leads to REM Behavior Disorder; sufferers act out the movements occurring in their dreams.
   
   
7. Because our muscles are rendered immobile during REM, people who sleepwalk are not in REM sleep and thus are not acting actually out their dreams.
   
   
8. Because erections are a regular part of REM, doctor's use REM sleep testing to determine if a if a male's erectile is a physiological or mental in origin.
   
   
9. The amount of REM sleep a person gets, relative to their total sleep varies greatly with age! A newborn baby spends more than 50-80% of total sleep time in REM, while people over 70 years old spend less than 10%. The average is 20%.