Unsplash/Becca Tapert

Cognitive neuroscientist Sara Mednick, PhD, argues that we should all have more sex in order to rev up every cell in the body and brain and release feel-good hormones that set us up for a good night’s sleep.

“To all you insomniacs out there, to the anxiety-prone people who spend hours ruminating, to anyone who feels exhausted all the time, whether or not they get good sleep: sex is the answer,” Mednick, a sleep researcher at the University of California, Irvine, writes in her new book, The Power of the Downstate. “I know that shaking the sheets can sometimes be the furthest thinking from your mind after a busy day that has sucked up your very last ounce of energy. But think about it as medicinal sex, like taking your vitamins, and have fun!”

Though “medicinal sex” might not be the first item I’d put on a list of fun activities, it’s hard to argue with Mednick’s advice: have more sex and sleep better.

However, there’s not a lot of hard data on the relationship between these two enjoyable activities. For one thing, sleep scientists and sex researchers haven’t hooked up a lot for serious study. And the obvious observational challenges, the intense monitoring needed for good research, don’t make studying these things easy.

One review of 12 studies analyzed the effects of nighttime sex on women with insomnia. “Engaging in sexual intercourse prior to sleep can decrease stress, and can assist female insomniacs by helping to initiate and maintain sleep,” the researchers concluded. And guys, well, as any woman in a heterosexual relationship will tell you, sex zonks us out faster than a 19th-Century romance novel.

Perhaps the most basic case for nighttime sex is the simple fact that anything that reduces stress can be good for sleep. Stress increases the production of cortisol and other hormones that trigger your fight-or-flight alert system. At the same time, stress dampens the output of the sex hormones testosterone and estrogen.

Meanwhile, sex tamps down the release of cortisol and ramps up production of the feel-good hormone oxytocin, also called the love hormone, along with other hormones that foster relaxation and a sense of well-being.

“This post-orgasmic cocktail can leave us feeling quite relaxed (both physiologically and psychologically) making it easier for us to initiate sleep,” says Michele Lastella, PhD, a sleep researcher at Central Queensland University in Australia. “Women have an extra advantage as sex increases estrogen which has been shown to increase REM sleep and shorten the time it takes to fall asleep.”

Outside the framework of clinical studies, lots of people think sex benefits their sleep, but views vary based on how questions are asked.

In a survey led by Lastella, for example, 63% of people — both women and men — said having an orgasm during sex with a partner helps them fall asleep. But when they were asked more generally about the effects of sex on their sleep, without including “orgasm” in the question, 66% of men said it helped them fall asleep, while only 53% of women said so. Meanwhile, quality of sleep was perceived to be aided by orgasmic partner sex in 71% of both women and men, but again when asked just about the effects of sex on sleep quality without including “orgasm” in the question, the figure fell to 68% in men and 59% in women.

Orgasm through masturbation, on the other hand, was also deemed effective, but for somewhat fewer folks, helping 47% of both men and women fall asleep — and improving sleep quality for 54% of them.

On the flip side, sleeping well can improve your sex life, creating a virtuous circle of potential.

• How much sleep you need and how to get it

Mednick posits that various body and brain functions form a set of complex, rhythmic systems she calls upstates and downstates.

• Upstates turn on every ounce of energy and focus, whether to handle a difficult problem or passionate pursuit, or to deal with anxiety created by some nebulous worry.
• Downstates, arguably harder to achieve nowadays than in our primal past, are for recharging.

In a proper downstate — primed during the day by physical activity, eating right, getting plenty of daylight and a host of other healthy behaviors — sleep is truly restorative, giving us the energy and vitality needed for the next day.

Good sex is one of those healthy behaviors, the thinking goes, leaving the brain “soaked in a warm bath of attachment-facilitating oxytocin and feel-good serotonin.” A successful romp ramps up the brain and body to a state of calm bliss, with just the right amount of arousal in all the body systems to set us up for a serious, and quite sudden, downstate cycle.

“I like to think of orgasms as blow darts, whisking you off on a nightly voyage to the downstate,” Mednick writes, “whether your with a partner or Lone Ranger style.”

Who are we to argue with that?

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