Prioritizing and Protecting Your Sleep

Welcome back, friends! I’m excited about today’s episode because we are diving into one of the pillars of good health - sleep! Sleep often gets overlooked because a lot of us think “well yeah, I sleep” but we haven’t really paid much attention to the quality of the sleep we are getting and often don’t prioritize getting enough sleep. 

In an article by Dr. Chris Kesser, it stated that “more than 1/3 of Americans have trouble sleeping every night, and 51% of adults say they have problems sleeping at least a few nights each week. 43% of respondents report that daytime sleepiness interferes with their normal daytime activities.” Can you relate to that? I know I can. There are many days that I feel like there isn’t enough coffee in the world to get me through! 

Why is sleep so important to our health?

Sleep is absolutely essential for the basic function and repair of our bodies! Our neurological, endocrine, immune, musculoskeletal and digestive systems all depend on us getting enough sleep for them to properly function. In its natural design, the hormone melatonin naturally increases after sundown and during the night, which actually increases our immune function and helps protect us against infection (this is why you’re so likely to get sick after not sleeping well for a few nights). Sleep has been shown to be so important to our overall health that total sleep deprivation has been proven to be fatal! (The article stated that lab rats who were denied the ability to sleep died within a couple of weeks.)

Among many others, here are a few of the health benefits of a full night’s sleep (7-9 hours is the National Sleep Foundation’s recommendation):

• regulates blood sugar and metabolic function

• decreases the risk of heart disease and diabetes as well as autoimmune diseases

• enhances memory and mental clarity

• improves athletic performance

• boosts mood and overall energy

• improves immune function

• increases stress tolerance

What happens when we don’t get enough sleep?

In the same article that I mentioned before, it stated that most adults admit only get an average of 6 hours of sleep in a 24 hr period (again, the recommendation is 7-9 hrs). This can greatly increase your risk for an impaired immune system, obesity, blood sugar imbalance and insulin resistance, diabetes, hypertension, mood disorders, impaired cognitive abilities, and systemic inflammation (which as we know leads to all kinds of other problems). Lack of proper sleep has also been shown to make you hungrier and lead to more severe cravings.  Honestly, there is no health condition or symptom that lack of sleep doesn’t make worse. We talk a lot about the importance of a nutritious diet but if you eat all the healthy foods and ignore dealing with your stress or prioritizing sleep, you will still be unhealthy. 

How can we make sleep a priority and protect it? 

Set good boundaries and protect your sleep environment:

• Reduce your exposure to artificial light at least 2 hours before bed (turn down the lights in your house, wear blue-light blocking glasses, turn screens off at least 1 hour before bed-time, use a salt lamp in your bedroom instead of artificial light)

• Find a ritual to clear your mind and de-stress before bed. Maybe a bath, maybe stretching or praying, reading a book - something that will help your body calm down and clear the thoughts and stress from the day in your mind. Remember when we’re stressed = cortisol and adrenaline and those two things are enemies of sleep! 

• Go to bed at a decent time (deepest sleep in the first half of the night (less REM) this is where most of the body’s restoration and regeneration happens) 

• Try to go to bed and wake at the same times each day (within a short window)

• Make your room a preferred environment for sleeping - cool and dark with no artificial light at all (blackout curtains, alarm lights off or covered, or use a sleep mask), use a sound machine if needed, keep phones and electronics out of your room. 

• Diffuse essential oils while you sleep (lavender, roman chamomile, and ylang-ylang are great ones)

Set yourself up for success during the day:

• Get outside during the day (the natural sunlight during the day helps the brain with regulating rhythms and will give you a good dose of vitamin D which can help with melatonin production)

• Move your body during the day (walking outside in the evening around sunset would be a double win! Movement plus red-light to trigger melatonin)

• Decrease caffeine consumption, especially at night (try switching to a caffeine-free herbal tea like chamomile)

• Stop eating at least 1-2 hours before bed (2-3 is really preferred unless you are hypoglycemic)

• Add extra magnesium into your day if you feel that you need extra support (Epsom salt soaks in the bath or take a multi-mineral like this one from Mary Ruth Organics). Most health professionals prefer magnesium over melatonin being that most people are deficient in magnesium anyway. Also, melatonin is a hormone, which means you should use EXTRA caution and if you take it, only do so short-term and under supervision from a health care professional.

I know that we do not live in a perfect world and something there are things that interfere with both the quality and quantity of our sleep (hello, parenthood), but there are still things we can do help prioritize and protect our sleep because it does matter and if we don’t do it, it will catch up to us! 

If one of these tips stood out to you, let me know in the comments or if you’re listening on apple podcasts, leave me a review (hopefully with 5 stars :)) and let me know which tip you plan to try! 

I hope you guys have a good week full of good sleep!