Tips To Improve Sleep

One of the best ways to retrain your body to fall asleep and stay asleep longer is sleep hygiene. Sleep hygiene is making sure that you’re going to sleep under optimal conditions. This of course includes stress management, because no matter what kind of sleep hygiene you do, if you’re stressed it will still interfere with your sleep.

Here are some Sleep Hygiene Tips:

Bedroom

Save your bed for sleep.  It is recommended to keep your bedroom cool, dark, and quiet, and to avoid working, eating or watching TV in the bedroom.^[1]

Caffeine

It’s important to avoid caffeine later in the day as this can make it harder to fall asleep even when taken 6 hours before bedtime.^[2] Caffeine has a half-life of about 5 hours, and the duration of caffeine’s effects depend on how much you had as well as personal factors such as your body type and how sensitive you are to it.^[3]

Alcohol

Drinking alcohol within four hours of bedtime might make you fall asleep quickly, however it can negatively effect your quality of sleep, causing you to wake up throughout the night.^[4]

Sleep Schedule

Try to keep a consistent sleep schedule by having a regular bedtime and wake up time.^[5] Have you noticed how stressful it is when you try to go to sleep, and you can’t? The more you look at the clock and get frustrated, counting the dwindling hours until you have to get up just makes it worse.

Naps

Sometimes you have to accept that your body just can’t sleep for long, regular periods and instead you just need to sleep where and when you can. This might mean that you need a nap during the day. While many people think that a nap will ruin their night-time sleep, research has shown that even a nap as short as 10 minutes can reduce the effects of sleep loss and increase energy and alertness.^[6] While long naps can compensate for significant sleep loss, they can cause you to feel groggy for about a half hour after waking. Thus, generally speaking the ideal length of a nap is 10-20 minutes, ideally taken between 1pm and 3pm, when one of the body’s natural resting periods occurs.^[7] In societies like Spain where taking a siesta is the norm, people have one- to two-hour afternoon nap during the workday with the ability to stay awake later with a shorter sleep at night.

Phones

Use your phone’s do-not-disturb settings to allow calls or messages from certain people only if you’re worried you’ll miss an emergency call while sleeping.  Cell phones are best to be placed out of easy reach from your bedside to encourage a better nights sleep.

Alarm Clock

Go back to the olden days of using a dedicated alarm clock instead of your phone’s alarm so your phone doesn’t have to be beside your bed. Sunrise stimulation alarm clocks are great to work with your natural circadian rhythms, and many have settings to have no illuminated time so the light doesn’t disturb you.

Light Exposure

Another imperative strategy is to manage light exposure. When we are exposed to sunlight during the right time, especially in the morning, it helps regulate our internal circadian rhythms. However, light at the wrong time like right before bed can switch our sleep and wakeful times.^[8] Even small amounts of light pollution from plugged in devices can negatively impact your circadian rhythms.^[9]

Blue light is a short wavelength portion of visible light, and it’s important in the daytime to suppress melatonin secretion^[10] and to keep us alert, thinking and attentive. However, chronic exposure to blue light before bedtime has a serious impact on our sleep quality and circadian rhythms ^[11] by making us stay alert longer than we should.  Most of our artificial light sources such as LED and fluorescent lights, and electronic devices such as computers, TV’s, e-readers and smartphones emit blue light. The negative effects of blue light before bedtime can be mitigated simply by turning off the lights and devices a few hours before bed, but if that isn’t feasible, there are some solutions. Some lightbulbs are color-changing, and the red or orange tones diminish blue light. Dimming the brightness of electronic devices or turning on night mode can help, as can apps that help reduce blue light emission.  One product that can help reduce blue light exposure are blue light blocking glasses. Many people choose to use these when using their electronics in the evening.

Circadian rhythm disturbances and sleep problems that affect a large majority of blind people demonstrates the importance of the light/dark cycle.^[12] This is also true for people that live in places like Alaska, where, apart from a few months, they deal with darkness that lasts most (or all) of the day, or light that lasts most (or all) of the night.

Light Therapy

Light therapy is a great way to treat insomnia, circadian rhythm sleep disorders, seasonal affective disorder (SAD) and depression.^[13] During a session a person sits in front of a specialized light therapy device that emits bright lights that is similar to the lux of natural sunlight. ^[14] One doesn’t look directly into the light but positions the lightbox indirectly within two feet from their face, and a session lasting typically 20 to 40 minutes.^[15]  While the use of light therapy in the morning tends to be the most effective for people experiencing insomnia or depression, it can be helpful as well for individuals who are tired in the early evening or who need to work a night shift by using it later in the day. For those with seasonal affective disorder, a depression which occurs mostly in the fall and winter due to the changes in sunlight, light therapy can be beneficial.^[16] Researchers found that depression can be reduced with just one hour session of light therapy.^[17]  Light therapy devices are typically in a tablet like shape but even come as alarm clocks that mimic the rising sun.

White Noise

Some people find that listening to white noise such as a fan, or nature sounds such as the ocean, to help one sleep, especially if they are light sleepers. There are a variety of sleep machines you can purchase or even apps to use on your phone.

Relaxation Techniques

Another important tip is to not lie awake in bed worrying and ruminating about things.^[18][19] If your mind is overactive when you’re trying to fall asleep it could be helpful to write out your thoughts in a journal. You can find lots of information on journals in the Self-Care section. Some people choose to practice relaxation techniques like progressive muscle relaxation or creative visualization at bedtime to reduce tension and facilitate sleep.^[20] Even counting backwards from 100 or from 20 to 1 repetitively can block any worrying thoughts and make it easier for your body to relax.

Exercise

Regular exercise is not only good for your physical being, but it can help improve sleep quality and duration – as long as there is not a vigorous workout done an hour or less before bedtime. When our body knows it’s bedtime, our temperature drops, our pulse slows, and our brain waves get slower. Exercise, however, leads to a rise in core body temperature, an increased heart rate, and increased arousal.^[21]

Snooze Foods

Some research suggests that different types foods can improve our sleep. A few examples:

Turkey (tryptophan)
Greek yoghurt (tryptophan and probiotics)
Walnuts (melatonin)
Fatty fish (omega-3)
Pumpkin seeds (magnesium)

Sleep Chronotypes

Did you know that there is a theory that each of us has a chronotype?^[22]  Generally this means whether we are a “morning person/early bird” or a “night person/night owl”, or somewhere in between. Certified Sleep Specialist Michael J. Breus PhD has written extensively on his theory of 4 chronotypes: Lion Chronotype: morning types, Bear Chronotype: middle of the road types, Wolf Chronotype: nighttime types, and Dolphin Chronotype: difficult sleepers.^[23] He states that in order to get the best sleep every night, it’s important to understand how your chronotype impacts your sleep.

Want to know what your chronotype animal is? Here is an online quiz to find out.