One of the most effective changes you can make to improve your slumber is to sleep at the same time every day. You should also avoid using your mobile phone, computer or tablet at least 30 mins before bedtime as the blue light emitted can make it harder for you to have a good night’s sleep. If you’re not already exercising regularly, it may be a good idea to start. Regular exercise, particularly in the morning or afternoon, can impact sleep quality by raising your body temperature a few degrees.
Conducive Sleeping Environment
Do not underestimate the benefits that a comfortable environment can do for your sleep. If your surroundings are noisy, play white noise, nature sounds or calming music to mask the noise. Shades, eye masks, and earplugs are other things you can use to help achieve a cool, dark and quiet environment. It might also be a good idea to start a bedtime ritual to get yourself ready for bed. Try winding down by dimming the bright lights, listening to soft music, reading a book or taking a warm bath.
Diet Changes
Making some changes to your diet may help to improve your sleep. Avoid heavy meals just before bedtime. Also cut down on your caffeine as it is a stimulant that can keep you awake. Do avoid alcohol as well as it can dehydrate you and disrupts your sleep by making you wake up in the middle of the night to get a drink. Instead of eating a hearty dinner in the evenings, make lunchtime your main meal. You’ll have more time to digest it. Cutting down on spicy foods can also help prevent heartburn.
Sleep Better. Feel Better.
Sleeping well directly affects your mental and physical health. Fall short and it can take a serious toll on your daytime energy, productivity, emotional balance, and even your weight. Yet many of us regularly toss and turn at night, struggling to get the sleep we need.
Getting a good night’s sleep may seem like an impossible goal when you’re wide awake at 3 a.m., but you have much more control over the quality of your sleep than you probably realize. Just as the way you feel during your waking hours often hinges on how well you sleep at night, so the cure for sleep difficulties can often be found in your daily routine.
Unhealthy daytime habits and lifestyle choices can leave you tossing and turning at night and adversely affect your mood, brain and heart health, immune system, creativity, vitality, and weight. But by experimenting with the following tips, you can enjoy better sleep at night, boost your health, and improve how you think and feel during the day.
Tips To Better Sleep
To have a good night’s sleep, we should work to create healthy habits and a sleep routine. Just as you brush your teeth to maintain good dental health, there are things you can do to improve nighttime sleep and daytime alertness.
When we don’t get good sleep, it can contribute to a range of problems including depression and anxiety. But it can sometimes feel hard to achieve amid the pressures of daily life. To help, we have come up with these on how to get a good night’s sleep.
Go to bed and get up at about the same time every day, even on the weekends.
Sticking to a schedule helps reinforce your body’s sleep-wake cycle and can help you fall asleep more
easily at night.
Don’t eat or drink large amounts before bedtime.
Eat a light dinner at least two hours before sleeping. If you’re prone to heartburn, avoid spice or fatty foods, which can make your heartburn flare and prevent a restful sleep.
Move/Exercise at the right time for you.
Regular movement or exercise can help you get a good night’s sleep. The timing and intensity of this seems to play a key role in its effects on sleep.
Avoid nicotine, caffeine and alcohol in the evening.
These are stimulants that can keep you awake. Smokers often experience withdrawal symptoms at night, and smoking in bed is dangerous. Avoid caffeine for eight hours before your planned bedtime.
Make your bedroom quiet, dark, cool, and comfortable.
Create a room that’s ideal for sleeping. Think about lighting: if you need to get up during the night, don’t use an overhead light, but rather a lamp or night-light.
Go to bed when tired and turn out the lights.
If you don’t fall asleep within 15 to 20 minutes, get up and do something else. Go back to bed when you’re tired. If you lay in bed agonizing over falling asleep, the stress will only prevent sleep.
Use sleeping pills as a last resort.
It is best to consult with your doctor before taking any sleeping pills to ensure the pills won’t interact with any other medications you might be taking.
Sleep deprivation is a very common issue in modern society, leading to numerous health issues. It occurs when a person experiences interruption in sleep patterns by keeping awake because of numerous reasons. Children, adults, and senior citizens are all susceptible to the effects of sleep deprivation.
Sleep loss significantly has effects on your physical wellness, mental health, memory, feeling, and many others. Occasional modifications in sleep patterns are often not a subject of concern. However, prolonged inadequacy of sleep can lead to low productivity, not enough focus, extreme daytime drowsiness, obesity, emotional complexities, bad work performance, and a lowered perception of the quality of life.
Causes Of Sleep Deprivation
Medical Conditions – Medical Conditions such as stomach ache, upper respiratory illness, as well as pregnancy. Some other medical issues which could make it difficult to sleep and are made worse by sleep deprivation include irritability, depression, paranoia, and also anxiety. Sleep Disorders – Issues, such as periodic limb movement condition, disrupt the sleep because it brings about jerking movements of the legs while in sleep. Uncomfortable Environment – Although overlooked often, this could also impact your relaxing sleep. Resting in rooms which are very hot or very cold, a lot of light and noise within the room could wake you up from the sound sleep. Pets – Having pets on the bed could be a cause of disrupted sleep. Alcohol – Although alcohol may help you to fall sleep quicker, it awakes you up the moment the sedative action of alcohol has expired. This influences the sleep cycle or movement of stages of sleep. Medications & Supplements – A few medications, such as steroids and beta-blockers, are recognized to keep you awake in the evening. Exhaustion – One more common reason behind sleep deprivation. Relaxing and enabling the mind to rest is essential when the body is very tired following a stressful day. Hot flashes – specifically in women in the menopause.
Symptoms Of Sleep Deprivation
Mood and behaviour changes, that might consist of anxiety, and depression
Issues with performance such as planning, organization, as well as judgment
Psychiatric symptoms including fear, disorientation, as well as hallucinations
Trouble focusing. This could lead to reduced reaction times, reduced work/school performance, or greater risk of vehicle accidents
Physical effects, like gastrointestinal symptoms, including upset stomach or diarrhea and generalized pain, discomfort and aches.
Any disturbance on the natural flow of the sleep cycle could affect hormones like growth hormone and thyroid hormone leading to infertility
Greater risk for stroke, heart problems, and asthma attack
Reduced capability to combat infections
A little reduction in the body temperature, because of cold
Treatments for Sleep Deprivation
The main treatment of sleep deprivation would be to expand total sleep time. Managing the cause of sleep deprivation is often the remedy to the problem. In case a sleep disorder is interrupting sleep, the issue should be addressed so as to boost sleep period and quality. Insufficient sleep hygiene or not enough sleep is usually a cause which should be resolved.
While sleeping pills or sleep aids could be helpful for short-term use, they’re not really a cure and don’t target the underlying causes of the sleep problem – and with time might even make your symptoms even worse. Rather, you can find a number of lifestyle and behavioral modifications you could do to cope with sleep deprivation and have your sleep schedule back to normal.
Relaxed your anxious mind in the evening.
Postpone being worried.
Deal with stress.
Have frequent exercise.
Sustain a regular sleep schedule.
Observe what you drink and eat.
Boost your sleep environment.
Get caregiving support.
Find professional help when you suspect a medical cause for your sleep deprivation.
Loud snoring – particularly when combined with daytime drowsiness or fatigue – can be a sign of sleep apnea, a typical yet serious disorder which has an effect on breathing. Here’s what you should know.
What is Sleep Apnea?
Sleep apnea is a sleep problem by which your breathing is repeatedly disrupted while asleep. These breathing breaks usually last in between 10 to 20 seconds and could occur from 5 to over 100 times each hour.
The deficiency of oxygen in a sleep apnea event jolts you awake – typically so briefly that you don’t even remember it. However these interruptions to your natural sleep rhythm imply that you spend more hours in light sleep and fewer in the deep, restorative sleep you have to be energetic, mentally sharp, as well as productive the following day.
Sleep apnea also can result in a lot of health problems – in certain cases lethal. Thus it’s vital that you take seriously. In case you or your bed partner suspect sleep apnea, speak to your doctor immediately.
Types of Sleep Apnea
Obstructive sleep apnea is among the most common type of sleep apnea. It happens when the muscles which support the soft tissues on the upper air passage relax while asleep and obstruct the normal flow of air inside and out of the nose and mouth. This generally leads to loud snoring and disrupted breathing.
Central sleep apnea is a a lot less common type of sleep apnea which involves the central nervous system. It happens when the brain briefly stops transmitting signals to the muscles which regulate breathing. It is usually due to an underlying health problem. Individuals with central sleep apnea rarely snore.
Complex or mixed sleep apnea is a very rare blend of obstructive sleep apnea as well as central sleep apnea.
Signs and Symptoms of Sleep Apnea
It could be difficult to detect sleep apnea all on your own, as the most prominent symptoms simply happen whenever you’re asleep.
However you could get around this problems by requesting a bed partner to watch your sleep habits, or by documenting yourself throughout sleep. If pauses happen when you snore, and when choking or gasping comes after the pauses, these are generally major sleep apnea indicators.
Main symptoms of sleep apnea:
Repeated, loud snoring
Choking, snorting, or gasping while in sleep
Day time drowsiness and fatigue, regardless of how long you would spend in bed
Other symptoms:
Getting up with a dry mouth or a sore throat
Daytime headache
Disturbed sleep, night time awakenings, or insomnia
Waking up at nighttime having shortness of breath
Going to the bathroom often throughout the night
Sleep Apnea Causes and Risk Factors
Though anybody can have sleep apnea, specific factors raise the risk:
Sex – Men are more likely to have sleep apnea compared to women, though right after menopause, rate of recurrence in women rises. Older age – While sleep apnea can happen at all ages, it’s a lot more common when you grow older. Weight – The risk of sleep apnea is a lot greater in people who are overweight, and higher still in people who are obese. Anatomical differences – Physical attributes which could bring about sleep apnea include a little upper airway, a tiny or receding jaw, a long soft palate, a high tongue position, a deviated septum, as well as enlarged tonsils and adenoids. Smoking – Based on a study carried out by Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention, University of Wisconsin, Madison, people who smoke are 3 times more prone to have sleep apnea compared to those who have never smoked. Neck circumference bigger than 17 inches (43.2 cm) in males or 16 inches (40.6 cm) in females. Allergies or other health conditions which bring about nasal congestion and blockage may also give rise to sleep apnea.
