You don’t simply “fall” asleep. You descend slowly through different levels. As you close your eyes and drift off, you enter the first stage of what is called quiet sleep. Your brain produces irregular, rapid waves, and muscle tension decreases. You breathe smoothly, and mundane thoughts float through your mind. If roused, you might jerk awake quickly and deny that you’d slept at all.

In stage 2 of quiet sleep, your brain waves become larger, punctuated by occasional sudden bursts of electrical activity. You’ve definitely crossed the border between wakefulness and sleep. If someone lifted your eyelids gently, you wouldn’t waken; your eyes no longer respond to stimuli.

As you descend into stage 3, your brain waves become slower and bigger. In this state of deep slumber, your bodily functions slow down even more. Finally stepping into stage 4, you reach deepest sleep, the most profound state of unconsciousness. On an EEG (electroencephalogram), your brain waves would appear extremely large and slow. You are so “dead to the world” that a thunderstorm might not wake you.

This step-by-step journey into oblivion usually takes more than an hour. Then you begin to climb upward, moving rapidly through the same sleep stages as before, not all the way to full wakefulness but in active sleep. Because the pupils dart back and forth, this stage is called Rapid Eye Movement or REM sleep. (The four stages of quiet sleep are often referred to as non-REM or NREM sleep.)

During REM, your brain waves resemble those of waking rather than of quiet sleep. The large muscles of your torso, arms and legs are paralysed, although your fingers and toes may twitch. You breathe quickly and slowly, the flow of blood through your brain accelerates. REM sleep is the time of vivid dreaming, and if wakened, you’d probably recall a fragment of a fantasy.

After about ten minutes in REM sleep, you descend the sleep staircase again. The entire cycle of REM and NREM stages takes roughly 90 minutes. Early in the night, the periods spent in the deepest stages of quiet sleep are longer. In the second half of the night, REM sleep predominates. By morning, you go around the sleep circuit four or five times.

This pattern changes gradually throughout life. From infancy to adulthood, REM periods dwindle to less than a quarter of a night’s sleep.

By their thirties, men spend less time in the very deep stages of REM sleep. Women begin to sleep less deeply in their fifties. By age 65, both sexes spend half as much time in deep sleep as they did when 25.

The lighter sleep stages increase later in life, and REM shrinks to about a fifth of total sleep time.

If you snore and sleep with a partner you will probably disturb them who will probably waken you to tell you. It is important therefore that you find a cure for snoring. Should you not both of you could suffer from sleep deprivation.

The feature was written by a female journalist, Hannah Borno, and told of her lifelong problem, snoring, and what she did about it.

There are some 10.4 million snorers of which 4.5 million are women. Seventy percent of snoring is inherited, as we inherit the shape of our jaws.

Hanna thought she might have sleep apnoea and made an appointment to visit her GP. However her snoring worsened, as did her level of tiredness, so she went straight to a Sleep Centre. Here she was put on a sleep study machine to take home for the night to reveal possible reasons for her snoring.

The results proved she had mild obstructive sleep apnoea and was experiencing eight OSA events per hour (this is where the airway collapses and you stop breathing for longer than ten seconds – the worst recorded was a French lady who suffered over 600 a night). OSA affects two to four per cent of the population, where the throat relaxes too much during sleep so that it ‘flops’, causing a narrowing with each progressive breath until breathing is stopped. After a few seconds the brain detects the problem and triggers consciousness so that the throat opens and breathing restarts.

This sleep disruption leads not only to daytime sleepiness, but memory lapses, weight gain,, headaches and poor work performance. It can also contribute to psychological disorders such as depression. In severe cases there is an increased risk of high blood pressure, premature heart disease and stroke.

A CPAP (Continues Positive Airways Pressure) was recommended, which Hanna or a mandibular Advancement Device. (MAD) a splint (like the SnorBan mouthpiece) which holds the lower jaw forward during sleep to make more breathing space. She rejected these two on the grounds of vanity.

Hannah was then told of LAUP (Laser Assisted Uvulopalatoplasty). She writes, “This trims the uvula and scars the soft palette, creating a seared arch at the back of the throat. The theory is that the scarred tissue becomes so taut it vibrates less during the night.

During my consultation I learned that not only was my uvula and soft palette extra flaccid, but my nose was partially blocked. I booked in for both a turbinectomy to thin out my nasal tissue, and a laser session to deal with my problem palette – at a cost of £3,000.”

The initial procedures including acupuncture needles being placed all around her face, and anaesthetic being spraying into her mouth.

The Doctor said, “Say Ah,“ and then “a laser flicked on and a slender and intense red beam shot out and I felt a thin hot pressure, not painful at the back of my throat.”

Hannah continued, “Then my nostrils were opened with forceps and the laser thinned out the tissue there too. Immediately afterward my nose felt clear.

“The first fortnight was agony, but six weeks later when the laser burns had fully healed, I stopped snoring completely.

“Sadly, after another month or so I stated snoring again.

She bought a MAD, stopped snoring completely and “starting to feel livelier in the mornings. Now I can’t remember the last time I napped in the day.”