Making sure your sleep space promotes rest.
I am willing to bet at some point in our lives we have
all dealt with a chronic sleep problem. A quick search in Pinterest can show
you a tiny portion of all the blogs, books, or articles written on the subject.
As usual I have combed through these sources for you (and myself) to come up
with my own list of ways to get better sleep.
I would like to pause a moment and remind everyone why
sleeping—and getting enough sleep—is so incredibly important. Sleep is when your
body does most of its major repairs. Our immune system kicks into hyper drive,
producing higher levels of disease fighters. These levels drop when we wake up
the next morning. No matter how many
times your position shifts in your sleep, your muscles continue to be relaxed
which helps them repair themselves faster. Sleep hastens our metabolic rate
which helps heal our skin, a process that our bodies ignore during the day
because they are too busy doing everything else—hence the term beauty sleep.
Our bodies also produce higher levels of the human growth hormone which
promotes growth and healing throughout our bodies.
Jennifer Aniston told Vogue, “Because this is the only
body we’re given, we need to be really good and mindful of what we eat and how
we take care of our skin—getting a good night’s sleep is extremely important,
as is hydrating with water, water, water. It’s so important to getting that
extra glow.” To add to that, even William Shakespeare knew how healthy sleep
was when he wrote Macbeth.
Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast.
Now that we have a deeper understanding of why sleep is so important, let’s focus
of how to achieve it.
First, and I think this is the most important, your
quality of sleep has far greater benefits than your quantity. I, for one, have
enjoyed fourteen hour sleep marathons and woken up no more rested than before. By
the same token I have gotten just a small amount of sleep and functioned well
the next day. We spend so much time worrying about the amount of sleep that the
recommendations seem to have a life expectancy of a Spinal Tap drummer. Is it
eight hours? Seven? Ten? Oh, but wait; everyone is different so it could be all
of the above. You just have to figure it
out for yourself? Good luck with that.
Your focus on having good sleep starts when you wake up.
As you wake, your brain fills with chemicals and sends them into the body to
tell you it is time to rise. Once these kick in and get everything up and
running, they have done their job so they get to go home early. Once they are
gone you slowly start to get a buildup of your sleep driver chemicals. They
mount slowly throughout the day until they reach critical mass and you hit the
hay. The more you pack into your day, the more these sleep drivers build up
while the less you do, the more they dissipate.
Everyone’s rhythm is slightly different. To have an
optimal sleep schedule for you, you need to figure out what your natural rhythm
is. When do you first start to feel tired in the evening? Note I said evening!
Taking naps during the day reduces your buildup of sleep chemicals and makes it
harder for you to fall asleep at night. For me, finding my sleep window was
slightly challenging. I found that I would first be tired around five or six
but this was way too early to go to bed. Somedays it is harder than others, but
I forced myself to stay awake until the feelings passed. After that my best
time to fall asleep is somewhere between ten and eleven. If I stay up too late
I become more tired but have a harder time falling asleep because my mind won’t
shut off. Sound familiar to anyone?
If you continue to have an erratic sleep cycle, your
mind has a harder time knowing when it is time to shut off. As I said, your
sleep driver chemicals begin to build when you wake up. If you wake up at noon
one day, nine, the next, and then eleven, your sleep driver chemicals are
constantly starting at different times, confusing your circadian rhythm. So
once you find your natural sleep window, start looking for what time is best to
get up. What time do you need to wake up to go to work and look presentable? Or
if you don’t work or work from home, what time do you wake up without an alarm
clock?
If the answer to the last question is later than ten
o’clock then you may be over sleeping, or have a circadian rhythm mix up. Try
to spend time to correct not only when you fall asleep but when you wake up.
Once you have this schedule, stick to it, even on days off.
There are several small things you can do to help you
get into the mindset of falling asleep. First and foremost, your bed is for
sleeping. Not watching TV. Not reading a book. Not writing your grocery list.
Sleep. Your body needs to know that when you lay in the space there is nothing
else that you might be doing. You are to sleep. [There are of course exceptions
such as marital (or otherwise, I don’t judge) relations.]
When we talked about setting up a healthy kitchen in my
other posts, we mentioned the importance of having “zones.” No matter how many
functions your room may have. it all needs to exist in its own zone. My room
plays host to library, storage, desk, and sleep. Everything related to work,
blogging, or personal business stays in the desk area. All of my books, unless
they are being read, are on the shelves. My clean clothes are put away and my
dirty clothes are in the hamper. Everything I am storing is in its appropriate
box. (At least this is the ultimate goal, sometimes my room is not perfectly
clean but I am striving!) This is also something you should strive for. At the
very least, keep the bed for only sleeping.
That being said, having a small routine before going to
sleep can be quite helpful. I’m sure most of us change into our pajamas, brush
our teeth, and wash our face before going to bed. Maybe you check on your
children one last time or prepare your clothes for the next morning. Any or all
of these things are also helpful in training your mind to sleep. If you do them
consistently every night before sleep, your body will take the routine as a
promise of bedtime.
Once in bed, there are several calming yoga poses that
can help your body relax into restfulness.
Reclined Spinal Twist
Lie flat on your back. Keeping your shoulders against
the bed, twist your hips and cross your legs, bending the top knee.
Reclined Cobbler
Lie flat on your back and bring the soles of your feet
together as close to or as far away from your body as is comfortable.
Happy Baby
Lie on your back and bring your knees up to your
armpits. Hold the bottoms of your feet to keep them straight up from your
knees.
Knee to Chest
Bring your knees to rest on your chest. Either place
your hands behind your knees to hold your legs in place or wrap your arms
around your legs.
But it can be so hard to wake up too! I know, but I have
some tips. One I found surprisingly helpful is to forget the snooze button on
your alarm—crazy, I know. If you spend your last half hour of sleep waking up
every ten minutes, it is not very restful and you would actually feel more
rested if you got up even earlier. Calculate how much time you need to sleep,
or the very latest you can sleep in, and set your alarm accordingly. Once you
wake up, bring as much light into your room as possible. Natural bright light
is best but in winter months it can be hard to come by early in the morning. A
lamp close to your bed will work as well.
A few minutes of extra stretching in your bed can help
wake you as well. There are many small yoga routines you can use or simply
borrow a couple of the ideas. Even small movement helps your “wake up
chemicals” get moving through your body.
Fish
For fish pose bring your arms to your side and prop
yourself onto your elbows. Be sure your elbows are directly under your
shoulders. Press into your elbows to hold your chest as high as you comfortably
can and lean your head back to rest. Do not hold tension in your neck here.
Cobbler Forward Fold pose
Come to a seated position and bring the soles of your
feet together. They can be as close or as far from your body as is comfortable
so long as your feet stay together. Keep your back as straight as possible as
you bend forward over your legs. Stretch your arms out in front of you and
release your head to hang between your arms.
Cat Cow
Come to your hands and knees; keep your hips over your
knees and your shoulders over your wrists. For cat arch your back, lowering the
bottom of your spine and your head. As you breathe in, lower your back raising
the bottom of your spine and head. Breathe out again switching back into cat. Continue
back and forth as long as you wish.
Wide Leg Child's Pose
Come onto your knees, opening them wider than your hips.
Set your sit bones back then bend forward flattening your chest into the bed
and stretch your arms forward. I held my head to the side so as not to smother
myself.
Seated spinal twist
Sit on your bed with one foot held against your opposite
thigh, that leg straight. Twist toward the straight leg and look over your
shoulder. Twist as far as you can comfortably.
Do you have trouble staying asleep once you finally get
there? Are you described as a “light sleeper?” I can tell you the most likely
reason why. We all have an activation system built into our sleeping pattern.
It is there to jolt us awake if we are suddenly in danger. However, in this
modern world a lot of little things can trigger the system. A louder car may
drive past our house, the cat may jump into the bed, a whole host of things.
There many other factors that exist during the waking hours that can also have
a negative effect, stress being a huge one. Having the room too hot or too
cold, anxiety, cold medications, writing a to-do list in bed, alcohol or other
drugs, and even reading in bed can have an impact on your activation system.
Now that I have written 1,492 words about everything
you can over-think about trying to sleep better, I am going to throw you a
curve. Don’t. TRY. So. Hard. Wait? What? That’s right. The more you focus on
trying to get enough sleep, or better sleep you are adding stress to your day.
If you stress yourself out every time you go to bed, you will never be able to
relax because going to bed will mean stress and anxiety to your brain.
When you are in your sleep window, simply go and lie in
bed and let yourself fall into sleep. Trying to be sure the white noise machine
is on and at the right volume, taking your melatonin, preparing your wine or
warm milk, all distracts from the act of going to sleep. The point is to relax
your body and rest.
So what if I still can’t shut my brain off? Don’t stress
over it. Let your thoughts float through your mind because it is too hard and
stressful to totally shut it up at this point. Your bed is a sanctuary for rest
and sleep. If you think of something you need to do in the morning, take a deep
breath and tell yourself that is for tomorrow. Still stressing out and can’t
fall asleep? If you are lying in bed stressing and can’t even remotely come
close to feeling tired, get up and find another calm activity to do until you
feel more tired. There are some nights no matter how tired I feel my body seems
to want me to stay up until four or five. When that happens I get up, fix some
decaffeinated tea and read a book until I can sleep more soundly. It is totally
normal, again, don’t stress over it. When you lose sleep one night your body
makes up for it the next by sleeping more soundly.
When this kind of thing happens, make sure to avoid
having a race with your clock. Don’t lie there telling yourself, “If I go to
sleep right now, I can get this many hours of sleep.” You are adding to your
stress by feeling you need to sleep right now to get those hours and trying to
force your sleep. It doesn’t work that way. Furthermore, try to avoid
self-fulfilling prophecies. If you are so worried that you won’t get the sleep
you need then you won’t. Simple as that. Just lie down and relax.
Once you find your schedule keep it. Always rise at the
same time each day whether you work or not. Go to bed at the same time each
night. This is incredibly important when you are starting out with your new
schedule as well as continuing the schedule. I can tell you I have stayed out a
little late to party with friends (totally worth it) and felt the effects for a
week. I can also tell you I wake up more easily, feel more awake during the
day, and sleep much more easily. I hope you can achieve this too!
*Goodnight Mind: Turn off your noisy thoughts and get a good night’s
sleep by Colleen E. Carney, PhD and Rachel Manber, PhD
