Five Tips to Get a Better Sleep
Happy New Year, everyone!
I hope that you all had a lovely December. I spent a blissful holiday rejuvenating by reading, cooking, going to yoga classes, and taking long walks with my dog. This was also the first year that I stuck to a regular sleep schedule, even though I was off work for two weeks. This has me feeling alert and ready to take on my first day back to work, and it feels awesome to be back!
I’m looking forward to getting back into a gentle routine in January, and I’m here to encourage you to join me in practicing healthy habits that pro-actively nourish positive mental health.
I use the word “practice”, because I believe that mental health is a just that - a process in which you prioritize the things that contribute to wellbeing and come back to healthy habits non-judgmentally when you stray from them. You wouldn’t expect to go to the gym once and come out with strong muscles, and working on inner strength (like physical strength) takes repetition and the resolve to try again when goals go awry.
Although this time of year we talk a lot about New Year’s resolutions, I’m going to encourage you to start with the building blocks of positive mental health, and that includes prioritizing getting a good night’s sleep.
When I think of January, the word that comes to my mind is routine. When we prioritize a structured sleep schedule, this gives us the base from which to achieve higher order “resolutions”, which can include creative pursuits, prioritizing exercise, focusing on career goals, and improving relationships.
The importance of a good night’s sleep:
When people come to therapy feeling bad, sleep, diet, and exercise are often the first things we focus on improving, since physiological needs make up the basis of wellbeing.
Good quality sleep is essential for rejuvenating the brain and promoting the neurological centers involved in feeling happy, attentive, and connected. Poor quality sleep can contribute to both the onset and worsening of mental health challenges including depression, anxiety, and the exacerbation of PTSD symptoms.
When people feel bad, they often try to “think their way” to feeling better. However, when you get a good night’s sleep, you solve problems from a more grounded stance, and you may find that problems don’t feel so overwhelming once you’re in a better place.
Without further ado, here are 5 essential tips for a better night’s sleep:
Tip 1: Go to bed and wake up at the same time each day, and stick to a schedule:
You may be tempted to use time off/the weekend to catch up on some much needed sleep, but did you know that there’s actually a benefit to maintaining a consistent sleep cycle, 7 days a week?
Going to bed at the same time each night and waking up at the same time each morning regulates the body’s circadian rhythm. From the latin “circa diem” (meaning about a day) Circadian rhytms are the cycle of physical, mental, and behavioral changes that the body goes through in a 24-hour cycle.
The circadian rhythm is your body’s “internal clock” that regulates the daily cycles of sleep and wakefulness, hunger and digestion, and hormonal activity.
When you have a consistent sleep schedule, your body naturally adjusts and begins to feel tired at just the right time each day. This cuts down the amount of time you'll spend waiting to fall asleep and can eliminate late-night wakefulness.
According to the CDC, adults aged 16-64 need “7 or more” hours of sleep a night, while the sleepfoundation.org puts this number at 7-9 hours a night. I find the sweet spot for our household is going to bed at 11-12pm and waking up at 7am, but you know what works best for you. I recommend choosing a time that works both on the weekdays and weekends. I also realize that for parents of young children, this can be an unrealistic goal for a period of time, and that the mental health of parents requires its own conversation.
Tip 2: Create a nightly ritual that is calming and soothing:
There are two therapeutic principles that I refer to often that can be used to highlight the importance of a nightly ritual.
First, memory is associative. That means that when we pair two things together, our brain begins to associate those things and expect one to follow from the other. For example, if I go to the gym and see friendly familiar faces, my brain associates the hard work of abdominal crunches with happy smiling faces. The result - My brain pairs the act of working out with pleasant social interactions. Now I find myself excited to go to the gym, even though it’s simultaneously torturous.
Once we understand how the brain works, we can apply this principle to associating bedtime rituals with sleepiness.
Create a list of rituals that you associate with getting a good nights sleep. This could include brushing/flossing your teeth, engaging in a skincare routine, changing into comfy pajamas, meditating, reading, and setting dim, bed-time lighting.
You’ll notice that when you start to engage in a ritual, you may begin to feel sleepy, as your brain pairs the activity with the feeling of relaxation.
The second therapeutic principle I’ll use to support a nightly ritual is that containment is an important part of mental health.
When you engage in a night time routine, you’re letting your brain know that you are containing all that you have done during the day, and that you’ll come back to anything that is unresolved tomorrow (not tonight!)
By setting a bedtime routine, you give your brain and body permission to let go of planning, solving, and worrying (read my article here about how giving permission to the brain to let go of anxiety can be an effective tool to calm the body).
In essence, engaging in a ritual is letting your body know that it is time to put all the day’s worries away, and makes it more likely that your brain will be convinced that it’s safe to do so.
Tip 3: Avoid food and beverages that negatively impact sleep
We need to talk about caffeine:
There’s no way around the fact that we are a caffeinated culture. While a cup of coffee can provide a comforting morning ritual, drinking coffee too close to bedtime can have you feeling alert and vigilant, which is the opposite of the energy you’re looking to harness before bed time.
According to sleepfoundation.org, while the level of caffeine in your blood peaks about one hour after coffee consumption, it can take up to 10 hours for your body to completely clear caffeine from your bloodstream. The recommendation, then, is to limit caffeine intake to the early morning.
Better yet, I invite you to try out my favorite solution to avoid the over-caffeinated jitters - half-caff coffee. Your body (and sleep!) will thank you.
While coffee is the most potent caffeinated beverage, be mindful of other beverages that contain caffeine: energy drinks, soda, green and black tea, and coffee liqueur.
Curb alcohol consumption:
While it may seem like drinking alcohol could be supportive to sleep due to its sedative effect, consuming alcohol before bed leads to disruptions in the sleep cycle, a decrease in restorative REM sleep, and breathing problems.
Try to stop drinking alcohol four to five hours before going to sleep, as this is how much time it takes most people to metabolize alcohol (although this depends on size and wieght).
Avoid sugar - cereal, desserts, chocolate, and candy have the effect on causing blood sugar to spike and crash.
Spicy foods - when going to bed, your body temperature should lower to facilitate sleep, while spicy food has the opposite effect of boosting the body’s temperature.
Instead of the food and beverages listed above, try the following:
almonds/walnuts- contain melatonin and reduce inflammation. I find that grabbing a small handfull of these nutritional gems can help curb cravings for late night snacks. A little bit of nuts goes a long way.
chamomile tea - not only is chamomile tea rich in antioxidants that reduce inflammation, making a tea before bed is a sensorial delight, and can support creating a positive bedtime routine that associates the soothing smell of chamomile with sleep.
tart cherry juice - this is one that I had no idea about! According to healthline.com, tart cherry juice is known to promote sleepiness and has even been studied for its role in relieving insomnia. I tried tart cherry juice recently and found it to be delicious!
Tip 4: Get electronics out of your bedroom and invest in an alarm clock.
The results are in, folks! Using a computer or phone before bed is detrimental to the production of melatonin, the natural hormone we’ve been discussing in this article that helps you feel tired and ready for sleep.
Any electronic back-lit devices like phones, tablets, readers, and computers emit blue light, which reduces the amount of time spent in restful sleep. According to sleepfoundation.org, certain types of bright household lighting can even affect sleepiness/wakefulness, and the recommendation is to create a dim and calm atmosphere.
My recommendation to everyone is to make the bedroom a screen-free zone altogether. Remember, memory is associative, and you want to set your bedroom up as a refuge where you can relax after a long day.
I highly recommend the use of an alarm clock, or better yet, a sunrise simulator alarm clock to avoid the “jolt’ of waking up with a startling traditional alarm clock.
Although I had heard about the merits of a daylight simulator historically, this is the first year that I’ve tried one out myself and I feel compelled to share with you that it’s been an absolute game changer.
An alarm clock that simulates the sun rise is particularly useful in the darker months where you still have to wake up at the same time as you did in the summer, but the sun is nowhere to be found.
A sunrise alarm clock is particularly pleasant to wake up with as it can brighten for up to 20 minutes, allowing the wake up process to be gradual, instead of jolting.
This is not an affiliate link, just a $44 alarm clock that has made my mornings significantly more pleasant, and I hope you’ll find it useful, too!
Tip 5: Move your body daily
We have solid evidence that exercise significantly improves the ability to fall asleep and improves sleep quality. According to an article in the National Library of Medicine, aerobic exercises, including jogging, swimming, cycling, walking, and dancing, reduces anxiety and depression by releasing endorphins, the brain’s feel-good neurotransmitters.
Furthermore, exercise has the effect of contributing to positive mental health by creating distraction from the stressors of life, increasing self-efficacy and confidence, and boosting positive social interactions.
Because the quality of a person’s mental health impacts the ability to fall and stay asleep, engaging in exercise can improve mood and thus, the quality of sleep. This will be the topic of my next article, as I’m committed to inspiring you to find movement that feels good and can help you stay mentally healthy.
So there you have it. I hope that you’ve found this article useful, and that you’ll engage in some of the tips I discussed.
Have a wonderful start to the year!
Jenn