Are you one of those people that merely need a full stomach for them to sleep like a baby? Me neither. Perhaps, you fall in the opposite category whose system can’t shut down without tossing and turning in bed. If so, you’re not alone. While sleep is an important occurrence for our bodies, many adults struggle to charm the sleep gods. This begs the questions: what causes sleepless nights and what are the short-term and long-term effects?
This is how Disrupted Sleep is Costing you
Whether from a major lifestyle change, a physical illness, or even advanced age-a wrecked sleeping pattern will cost you productivity, emotional stability, and your physical well-being. If you’re always tired, anxious, and irritable, there’s a high chance you’re not getting enough sleep.
Over the long-term, sleep deprivation can interfere with your physical health. Consistent inadequate sleep precedes life-threatening diseases like obesity, depression, heart failure, stroke, and High Blood Pressure. But on the brighter side, it’s something that has a remedy.
Here are 8 Tips to Help you Sleep like a Baby again!
1. Walk in the Sun
Although sunburns may have slapped sunny days with a bad reputation, nothing is as underrated as the sleep-inducing power of a little bit of sunshine. There’s even a term for this- “sleepy-sunshine” -and it better describes the drowsiness that accompanies a sunny day.
According to science, sitting under the sun makes your body double its efforts in maintaining the room temperature necessary for internal processes. It is this attempt to cool down that causes you to sweat on a hot day. Naturally, excessive sweating precedes dehydration and fatigue, which eventually induces sleep as soon as you settle down.
Coupled with fighting-off the effects of Ultra-violet rays, your system wears off under high temperatures. So if you’re finding it hard shutting your eyes at night, taking a walk around the block during summer will help you sleep like a baby.
2. Cheat your Mind
We’ve all been there before: you’ve tried casting every sleep-inducing spell on the internet but none seems to be working. Reverse psychology suggests that if forcing yourself to sleep becomes problematic, then try forcing your eyes to stay open instead. How does this work? Well, everyone hates commands, including your brain. So if you instruct your brain to stay awake and deliberately pull your eyelids away from each other, they’ll rekindle their romance just so they can prove you wrong.
3. Eat sleep-inducing Foods Before bed.
Having trouble sleeping? Certain foods can help you sleep through the night. In fact, high-protein foods such as cottage cheese contain high amounts of tryptophan, an amino acid that prompts sleep. This contradicts the initial spooky perception that cheese causes nightmares. As long as you don’t over-eat it, you’re guaranteed a restful night by munching on some cheese. Other foods that can play a similar role include almonds, chamomile tea, tart cherries, and warm milk.
4. Stop sleeping with someone you hate
Sorry, but sleeping next to an awful person inevitably messes around with your sleep. Doesn’t matter whether you’re bound by friendship or something more solid like a wedding ring, the only way to improve your sleep is to iron out your relationship with them. Tons of researches confirm that happy couples generally enjoy nice sleep. Whether this is because of their frequent steamy sessions or their blissful connection, the common factor here is that they genuinely like each other.
5. Keep your feet warm.
Adding some warm sleeping socks or a bottle of warm water to your sleeping arsenal will drastically increase the speed with which you doze off. This is according to one study conducted by Swiss Researchers. Turns out, warming your feet provokes a process known as vasodilation. When your blood vessels dilate, there’s an increased blood flow and heat redistribution from your feet throughout your body. As your body cools off and loses some of the heat, it creates a suitable environment to help you sleep better.
6. Make your room sleep-friendly
If you’re like most parents, you probably went all-out when embellishing your baby’s nursery. White noise to drown external noise, long drapes to shut out excess light and a thermostat to regulate the room’s temperature; these conditions are equally paramount for an adult’s sleeping environment. Other aspects that could help make your bedroom insomnia proof include:
- De-cluttering – It’s difficult to drift to sleep when there’s a human-shaped heap of clothes on a chair somewhere plotting to take you out. If you want to sleep better, start by cleaning out your room. Get rid of toys, electronic gadgets, extra clothes or any other item that sways your mind from sleeping. Most of these distractions trigger anxiety, and stress-both of which are harmful to your sleep efficiency. Additionally, TVs and phones emit blue light that suppresses the body’s melatonin, prompting you to stay awake for much longer.
- Décor– You should decorate a sleep-friendly bedroom with a calm, relaxing theme. Go for a subtle paint color like blue or light green. For your mattress and pillows, don’t compromise on size and support level. Investing in a good mattress is paramount to sleeping more peacefully, and waking up without body aches. Finally, stick to low-watt light bulbs that reflect a relaxed mood.
- Noise– Apart from bringing in white noise, you can also learn simple DIY ideas to soundproof your bedroom. Sealing the spaces in your door is a good place to start. Not only will this reduce the noise coming in from other parts of the house, but it will also conceal any private sounds from seeping outside.
- Scent– Research shows that certain scents can help you sleep like a baby. Lavender oil and chamomile oil scents are particularly popular for their naturally calming and sleep-provoking effects. If you have no money to spend on aromatherapy, your partner’s scent will do the job. When one study made 155 participants sleep next to their partner’s scent and another control scent, they discovered that sleeping next to the scent of someone you love helps you sleep better.
7. Restrict Alcohol intake before bedtime
This isn’t college where you easily drift off after a crazy night of booze consumption. As soon as you get off the twenty-something train, you’ll realize that hangovers feel empirically worse on this side. But it isn’t an age thing really. Although night revelry may make you fall asleep faster, it will greatly impede your sleep quality. Granted, the many trips to the bathroom will interrupt your sleep. Also, consuming alcohol in excess is a common cause of insomnia and day time sleepiness. Consequently, experts advise that you stay away from alcohol within four hours to bedtime.
8. Nap Strategically
While we all love an afternoon siesta, taking long naps past four. P.m. will interfere with your night’s sleep. Long in this case refers to a nap that exceeds 45 minutes. Think of sleep as a debt you owe your body. When you take a nap, you pay this debt in partiality. And the more naps you take during the day, the less debt you owe your body for that particular day.
So if you usually sleep for 8 hours every night and manage to take a three-hour long nap, your body will only need five hours of sleep at night. This means that either you’ll take longer to find sleep, or you’ll lose some hours to disruptions in the middle of the night. This is why it’s always better to let your desire for sleep build-up and satiate it fully at night. And if you have to nap to make up for a sleep-less night, do it before 2.00 p.m. and make it 30 minutes or shorter.
Are you having trouble sleeping at night? We recommend any of our three sleep-centered E-books. These books will introduce you to new concepts (such as sleeping productively) that will help you make the most out of your night’s rest. Check them out here!
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