Women more often suffer from sleep deprivation and because of this, they put their health at serious risk, experts say.

A new research has shown that women sleep an average of 3 hours less than needed each night. Among the reasons that disrupt women’s normal sleep, experts point out the most common ones: menstrual cycle pain, as well as waking up because of children and due to snoring men. These conclusions by researchers are based on the results of a survey conducted among 2,000 married couples. It was found that one-third of women always feel sleepy and exhausted, whereas solely two out of ten men face this problem.

Therapist Sarah Jarvis claims that lack of sleep has a profound effect on women’s health. In particular, their eating habits are disrupted, and women start eating more sweet and fatty foods—the tendency toward which is usually exacerbated by lack of sleep.

Such food leads to increased blood sugar levels, accumulation of fats, and activation of inflammatory processes.

In addition, lack of sleep reduces women’s confidence in themselves and their appearance. Some other studies have shown that if a person sleeps less than 7 hours a day, it can lead to DNA damage and even cause cancer.

Lack of sleep also makes a person malevolent and irritable.