Laying in bed listening to the seconds tick away, knowing that in just a few hours you need to be getting back up to start your day is frustrating at best but it can also have a serious impact on your health and wellbeing. Lack of sleep has been proven to have an immediate negative effect on a person’s hormones, exercise, and performance and can impact a person’s weight, temperament, and vulnerability to disease. If you’re struggling with sleep then here are 7 things to try.
1. Reduce your blue light exposure
Technology and artificial lighting are not natural and can upset our bodies’ delicate circadian rhythm which tells us when it’s time to wake up and when we should go to sleep. Looking at your phone, laptop or TV all reduce the body’s ability to produce melatonin, a hormone that helps the body to relax and prepare for sleep but not all forms of light are created equal and the most unnatural and disruptive of them all is blue light. Blue light is emitted by all electronic devices and tricks your body into thinking it’s day time, which means than an extra episode of Netflix or that quick scroll through Instagram could be the cause of your nighttime woes. Thankfully, electronic device manufacturers are realizing the impact their devices can have on people’s ability to sleep and many are now including a blue light filter in their settings to enable users to reduce the amount of blue light their devices produce after day-time hours. Some other things you can do to help limit your exposure to blue light include wearing blue light filter glasses, downloading an app such as f.lux which will block the blue light for you or forgoing your evening television or phone scrolling in favor of something offline such as checking out some best selling books or listening to a podcast.
2. Set yourself a bedtime
Our bodies are creatures of habit and love nothing more than a regular routine to follow. Naturally, our circadian rhythm is set to align with sunrise and sunset which is why it can be so much harder to get up in the darker days of winter, but you can give it a helping hand by trying to go to bed and rise at the same time each day. Having a set bedtime and wake time not only trains your bodies to sleep in rhythm but can improve the quality of the sleep you get too with studies noting that those with the most irregular sleep patterns often have the poorest quality sleep. Try setting yourself a bedtime and wake time that you can stick to and for best results try to also stick to it at the weekends, though a little extra time in bed won’t do you any harm.
3. Make sure your room is dark
As we’ve already established, our bodies are sensitive to light and it can trick them into thinking it’s time to be awake, this means that a light bedroom whether from a street lamp, the TV or a night light, can all stop your body from sleeping properly. Try to make your room as dark as possible, if your partner is watching television then ask him to turn the brightness right down, or better, to watch television in another room. If the street light pollution is casting a glow through your curtains then consider investing in some blackout blinds to block external light and keep your room dark and cozy.
4. Set the temperature
Aside from light, the temperature is perhaps the largest environmental factor in your bedroom and can have a profound impact on your sleep quality. Once again the influence of temperature on our sleep is down to what is natural for our bodies. If you think about it, the temperature usually drops at night and we do all we can to stay warm with blankets, fire, and shelter. Now, in our modern houses with heating, thick artificial duvets and insulation it is too easy to set the temperature too high and our bodies don’t like it. It is much easier for our bodies to warm themselves up than it is to cool themselves down so try to keep the temperature of your room a cool 70 degrees Fahrenheit or 20 degrees Celsius.
5. Stop consuming caffeine and alcohol
You may have thought that having a nice relaxing glass of wine or a nightcap before bed would help you sleep but in fact, alcohol has been proven to do the opposite, altering our melatonin production and increasing the chances of snoring, sleep apnea and disrupted sleep patterns. Another drink to avoid in the evenings or during the day at all is caffeine, which can stimulate the nervous system and has been proven to impact sleep for as long as six hours after consumption. Try swapping caffeinated beverages such as coffee for decaffeinated alternatives or go for something more soothing altogether such as chamomile tea.
6. Move your body
When it comes to our health there’s not a lot that exercise doesn’t help with and sleep is one of them. Exercise has been proven to reduce insomnia and to half the time it takes for people to fall asleep, just remember not to exercise too late in the day as this will have the opposite effect, waking you up and making you feel more alert. For best results try to exercise regularly during daylight hours and to make it a part of your daily routine.
7. Make sure you’re comfortable
Finally, it may seem obvious, but make sure that you are comfortable, a poor quality mattress can cause back, neck and shoulder pain keeping you awake and preventing you from falling asleep. If your mattress is over 7 years old then it may be time to get a new one and although an expensive fix, a new mattress can have a huge impact on the duration and quality of your sleep. While you’re at it, check the age of your pillows too and make sure that you purchase a new one that provides the neck support you need.
