- No heavy meals at least 3 hours before bedtime
- Exercise Before Bedtime
- Keep your naps short
- Keep your bedroom at a cool temperature
- Stay of screens and/or use blue light blocking glasses
- Don’t go to bed at a heightened level of stress
- Sleep in a completely dark room
- Expose yourself to natural sunlight
- Get your hormones checked
- Keep a consistent sleep schedule
NO HEAVY MEALS AT LEAST 3 HOURS BEFORE GOING TO BED
There are many reasons you shouldn’t eat close to bedtime.
1. You may experience indigestion, reflux or heartburn. Even if you don’t deal with these symptoms during the day normally, if you eat a lot and then immediately get in bed, laying horizontally could cause acid reflux, symptoms of which include heartburn, trouble swallowing and nighttime asthma. Experts recommend waiting at least three hours after you’ve eaten to go to bed.
This allows your body time to digest your food so you’re not up at night with an upset stomach, indigestion or heartburn, which can be pretty miserable. Btw, these symptoms can keep you from having good sleep throughout the night.
2. It disrupts the body’s natural circadian rhythm – having to digest food when it’s meant to be sleeping and fasting, and may even cause weight gain.
3. It increases your chances for mental exhaustion possibly resulting in weakened willpower and impaired judgment, which can lead to weight gain.
4. Eating late may result in less hunger in the morning which might cause you to skip breakfast – which could result in less than stellar food choices the rest of the day.
That being said, don’t forego a meal to follow this rule. Life happens. If you don’t get home until 8:30 p.m. and want to be in bed by 10 p.m., you shouldn’t skip dinner just because you won’t have three hours between eating and bedtime. But you should consider a lighter meal than normal – just half what you would have normally eaten at a more ideal time. The three-hour rule isn’t a “must,” but you’ll definitely feel better and sleep better if you follow it.
EXERCISE BEFORE BEDTIME
Regular exercise has many benefits, including better sleep. It can promote relaxation, reduce anxiety, normalize your internal clock, and increase your core body temperature. And when your body temperature begins to drop, you feel sleepy.
A word of caution: not just any exercise will help you sleep better. If you’re going to exercise at night, it’s best to do light to moderate-intensity activity. This level of activity may help you fall asleep faster and get better quality sleep. Whereas a high intensity workout might actually do the opposite and keep you awake long after you’d like.
It’s also important to complete your workout at least 1 hour before bedtime. If possible, aim to finish at least 90 minutes before you head to bed. This will give your body enough time to wind down. Examples of appropriate pre-bedtime exercise include: yoga, stretching, walking, swimming leisurely, biking leisurely, and light weightlifting.
As I mentioned, vigorous and intense workouts should be avoided in the evening (HIIT for example). Strenuous physical activity can stimulate your nervous system and raise your heart rate too much, making it difficult to fall asleep – and we don’t want that.
Keeping in mind that we’re all different – the best time to get active is the time that works for you. What’s most important is that you move regularly, whenever that may be. I don’t have trouble winding down and falling asleep, so my best time to move (exercise) is in the morning.
KEEP NAPS SHORT
Finding the time for a quick snooze offers a lot of benefits. A quick nap can enhance your performance, increase alertness, and improve your mood.
The key to successful and beneficial napping is to keep it short – around 10 to 20 minutes – so you don’t go too far into the sleep cycle, which can actually leave you feeling groggy and more tired than before. The opposite of what you’re wanting, right? So if you’ve ever had a nap longer than 20 minutes you might have experienced these undesirable affects.
A word of caution: if your sleep schedule is out of whack, avoid naps during the day because napping can make it difficult to go back to sleep at night and disrupt your natural sleep cycle.
However, if you must nap, aim for less than 30 minutes and nap early in the afternoon (or before 3 p.m.) so your nighttime sleep isn’t disrupted. The exception to this is if you’re sleep-deprived and have the luxury of being able to nap long enough to complete a full sleep cycle, which is at least 90 minutes.
There are many tips for napping just the right amount of time – one of them is to put keys into your hand and by the time they fall to the ground and wake you up, it will have been the perfect amount of time and you should be refreshed and ready to tackle the rest of your day.
KEEP YOUR BEDROOM AT A COOL TEMPERATURE
Being in a comfortable environment is essential for healthy sleep. Keeping your bedroom at a temperature near 65°F (18.3°C), give or take a few degrees, is ideal. That might sound crazy, but your body’s temperature decreases during sleep, and a cool (but not cold – you shouldn’t be shivering 🥶 ) room will help you settle into and maintain sleep throughout the night. If the temperature in your sleeping environment is too hot or cold, it may affect the drop in your body’s internal temperature and cause you to have disrupted sleep. Ideally, your room should be between 60 and 67°F (15.6 and 19.4°C) (depending on the weather or season) for healthy sleep.
STAY OFF SCREENS AND/OR USE BLUE LIGHT BLOCKING GLASSES
The use of artificial lighting and electronics at night definitely plays a part in sleep disruption 😴 . These devices emit blue light, which tricks your brain into thinking it’s daytime. Many studies suggest that blue light in the evening disrupts your brain’s natural sleep-wake cycles.
Your body has an internal clock that regulates your sleep circadian rhythm (btw, all body systems have their own circadian rhythms, but more on that later) – it determines when your body is primed for being awake or asleep. However, your sleep circadian rhythm needs signals from the external environment — most importantly daylight ☀️ and darkness 🌚 — to adjust itself.
Blue light stimulates sensors in your eyes 👀 to send signals to your brain’s internal ⏰ – keeping your 🧠 active – so it tricks your brain into thinking it’s daytime, which disrupts the production of melatonin and reduces both the quantity and quality of your sleep.
Not exactly helpful, right? Studies suggest that wearing blue-light-blocking glasses 🤓 increases melatonin production during the evening, leading to major improvements in sleep and mood. That’s a pretty simple modification IMO – and blue light blocking glasses don’t have to break the bank. While there are many upscale blue light blockers, there are also affordable options (like, $12) on Amazon. I even sometimes use blue blocking readers during the day – which helps my eyes to be less fatigued since I spend a good chunk of time on my computer 💻 .
Other ways to block blue light in the evening include dimming or turning off the lights in your home and installing an app that adjusts the light your laptop and smartphone 📱 emit. So if you’ve been struggling to get a good night’s sleep, try reducing your blue light exposure – especially after the sun goes down.
DON'T GO TO BED AT A HEIGHTENED LEVEL OF STRESS
You probably already know firsthand that sleep affects mood. Who hasn’t woken up after a sleepless night more irritable, short-tempered, and vulnerable to stress? Then after a good night’s rest, your mood often returns to normal.
We’ve already talked about many factors that lead to a disrupted night’s sleep. The biggest: too much stress! High stress on a regular basis (chronic stress) is just all around bad for us and leads to numerous mental and physical health issues. Heightened, consistent stress results in a poor night’s sleep (or many poor nights of sleep). On the other hand, normal (acute) stress can actually be good for the body. It can motivate us to work harder, focus better and even improve performance. But, this type of stress is only good when it’s happening short term.
When you are under stress continuously, this aggravation to the nervous system doesn’t subside and it can have a devastating effect on your overall health. Chronic stress causes our blood pressure to be continuously raised, our breathing and heartbeat is affected negatively, our muscles are continuously tense, which can cause headaches, neck strain and so on. It’s no wonder we can’t sleep when our stress levels are raised, right?
Here are some stress relief techniques you can try:
- Increase your exposure to daylight (especially in the morning before 10am – get some sunshine in your eyes to reset your body’s circadian rhythms)
- Movement – find something active you enjoy and just do it.
- Try some natural relaxation and wellness techniques – like infrared sauna, massage, grounding or meditation.
- Adjust your diet – eat foods that nourish and add to your vitality (rather than take away from it)
- Turn off the news and get off social media at least an hour before bedtime – it’s all stressful right now!
- Ask for help – I’d love to work with you!
SLEEP IN A COMPLETELY DARK ROOM
Studies show 7-8 hours of uninterrupted sleep every night – in a dark room – helps us sleep better and lets our bodies go through all the vital sleep stages smoothly.
Total darkness helps our body to naturally produce the melatonin it needs to fall asleep – and stay asleep. When it gets dark, our pineal gland secretes the hormone melatonin, which tells our body it’s time to sleep. Might be hard to believe, but even just a bit of light exposure can disrupt the production of this hormone – thus reducing both the quantity and quality of our sleep.
In fact, just one instance of exposure to blue lights (screens) or artificial lighting after dark can delay melatonin production by 90 minutes! Just one, y’all! Take a moment to consider how many times you typically expose your eyes to blue light screens and artificial lighting in the evening after the sun goes down. Then do the math. Maybe it’s not so surprising to find you’re having trouble getting some good, solid sleep after all.
If you want to improve your sleep length and quality, invest in the blue blocking glasses I mentioned earlier and start using them each evening when the sun goes down and notice the difference in your sleep. Add to that sleeping in a completely dark room (I even put blackout tape on any small lights in my bedroom), and you’ll be sleeping better in no time – I know I do! If you can’t do blackout curtains, try wearing an eye mask. In order to get the best night’s sleep ever, make sure your sleeping environment is completely dark – get rid of those night lights, close your curtains, turn off the lamps, and put down that phone.
EXPOSE YOURSELF TO NATURAL SUNLIGHT
Seeing the sun ☀️ at a set time each day helps to keep your internal clock ⏰ in sync. Our bodies work on 24-hour circadian rhythms, and this affects not only our sleep-wake cycle but countless other functions including hormones, appetite, digestion and so much more.
Getting sunshine at the same time each day helps to set our clocks for the day – it tells each cell in our body that it’s time for a new day, let’s get going! In turn, when it’s time for bed, we’re more prepared and ready to fall asleep and stay at rest.
Exposure to sunlight is most beneficial if you do it in the morning as soon after waking as possible – but definitely by 10am. It’s best to spend between 30 to 45 minutes getting sun exposure into your eyes 👀 – but even 5 minutes will be beneficial. It’s important to get sunlight into your eyes without looking directly at the sun by just allowing the sunshine to enter your eyes indirectly – and don’t wear a sun visor or sunglasses 😎 because that won’t produce the benefits I’m talking about.
Please keep in mind that sunlight filtered through a windowpane may not have the same effect, but it’s better than nothing. Also, don’t be fooled because cloudy days can actually have a bigger affect than full sunshine – so just look in the direction of the sun on those cloudy days and soak it up.
One word of caution: avoid looking directly into the sun with your eyes open. Make sure you keep them closed if you’re looking directly into the sun! Aside from helping you reset your Circadian Rythyms, you will also get your daily dose of vitamin D, which is super important especially during seasons of flu and colds.
GET YOUR HORMONES CHECKED
Sleep and the stress response share the same pathway: the HPA axis. When something disrupts the HPA axis functions, it can disrupt your sleep cycles as well. Cortisol is a stimulating, alerting hormone. It’s the body’s primary stress hormone—that’s the role that gets cortisol most of its attention. Too often, the cortisol rhythm is thrown out of sync, leading to problems with sleep and health. Cortisol levels can be too low, but much more often, it’s elevated cortisol that’s the problem.
Chronic stress is a major contributor to elevated cortisol, an excessively active HPA axis, and an ongoing state of arousal that’s exhausting, anxiety-producing and sleep-depriving. Poor sleep itself also can increase cortisol production and dysfunction of activity along the HPA axis. If you’re experiencing sleep issues and think cortisol could be playing a role, rest assured there are many things you can do to help. Improvements in your diet, exercise habits, or sleep hygiene will go a long way.
These are all things I work on regularly with my clients. If you suspect cortisol may be a problem for you and you’d like some insights, schedule a free exploratory call with me by clicking this link today. You may also get your cortisol checked through a hormone test.
KEEP A CONSISTENT SLEEP SCHEDULE
If you want to fix your sleep schedule, the first helpful step is to create a sleep schedule and stick to it. Choose a daily bedtime and wake-up time. Stick to these times every day, even on weekends or days off. Any variation from this schedule over :30 minutes one way or the other will disrupt the routine your body prefers. Try to avoid staying up late or sleeping in just because you can. By following a regular schedule, your internal clock can develop a new routine and your sleep will improve by leaps and bounds.
Over time, you’ll be able to fall asleep and wake up with ease. Shift work, all-nighters, and jet lag can mess with your sleep schedule. (But if you’re a shift worker, don’t fret – there are strategies you can employ to maximize your body’s circadian rhythms.) Fortunately, practicing good sleep hygiene can get you back on track. If you still can’t sleep well, I would suggest you seek professional help and perhaps participate in a sleep study to better understand what’s keeping you from getting the rest you need.
