How do you feel when you wake up in the morning? Are you chipper? Do you hop out of bed and get after your day? Or do you tap away at the snooze button on your alarm and then after a few (or more) rounds of this you begrudgingly drag your corpse like body out of bed? I imagine most of us are somewhere in the middle of those extremes, but from my observations we mostly lean to the less sleep, overly tired side of the spectrum. According to a 2013 Gallup poll, 40% of Americans get less sleep than needed. Moreover, the problem may be more than just the amount of sleep, but the quality of the sleep can be an issue too. Is your sleep interrupted by frequent waking, do you toss and turn, etc. If we are sleeping poorly or if we are sleeping too little, we are bound to have some issues.
Sleep is simply, very important. There lots of theories on what happens to us when we sleep. It is believed that it effects the health of our brain, our hormonal releases like growth hormone, it is when our body heals, and when our brain consolidates memory. These are all good things and well worth our time. On the flip side of the coin, lack of sleep can affect mood, concentration, weight gain, and there are even possible links to immune system suppression and heart disease (WebMD).
Clearly, we need to avoid being a sleep deprived individual. There are many ways to improve sleep and get more of it, thus improving our overall wellness.
1) Make sleep a priority: This sounds basic, but sometimes we don’t sleep enough, simply because we don’t value sleep. We’d rather play on the computer, binge watch Netflix, or go out. These things can be okay, but regularly pushing off sleep will eventually catch up to us.
2) Sleep on a schedule: many believe that going to bed and waking at the same time daily, teaches your body when to sleep and wake. It essentially puts you on a timer. This will improve your quality of sleep, but the catch is you have to do it daily meaning, even on weekends and holidays.
3) Watch what you eat and drink: eating too much or too little can affect sleep. The other obvious factors are caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol. All three have been shown to mess with your sleep cycles. Most are surprised to hear alcohol, because of the idea of a nightcap, but it does affect our sleep.
4) Limit electronics an hour before bed: our eyes are sensitive to the blue lights of screens from tablets, phones, and television and they may interfere with sleep. Limiting your exposure the last hour (or two) before bed may help you sleep better.
5) Limit distractions: visual and sound distractions can negatively affect your sleep. Lights from your alarm clock, streetlights, or the little light on the DVD player can all disturb sleep. Likewise, the noise of a dripping faucet, the house creaking, or a playful pet running all over can be just enough sound to disturb you. For the lights, simply remove them or cover them. The noises, may be alleviated by a neutral sound like running a fan.
Overall, I can’t stress the value of sleep enough. It does so much for you, yet requires little of you. It is free, it is done in your home, and it doesn’t require a consult (generally, unless you are truly suffering with insomnia, then you should visit your healthcare provider). We spend a ton of time and money trying to find things that can make us feel better or just give us some general health improvement. Sleep can do all of that and its so simple. A small change for a big reward, is always a good choice.