Top Tips For A good Nights Sleep
What constitutes a good night’s sleep, 8 solid hours, sleeping on your own, having a totally darkened room, everyone is different. I know from my own experience there is nothing worse than lying in bed tossing and turning trying to force yourself to sleep with your mind in overdrive mode, then you fall into a deep sleep in the early hours of the morning and have to drag yourself out of bed at 6am feeling like crap!!
Researchers have identified a variety of habits known as sleep hygiene that can help you experience restful quality sleep. Try to implement the following tips regardless of what your sleeping problem may be – you just get the good night’s sleep you need.
Best Tips For Good Night’s Sleep
- Get up and go to bed the same time each day. Try and stick to this routine even if your previous night’s sleep was poor.
- Getting up the same time every day including week-ends will help keep your body clock synchronised. Sleeping will feel more natural and come more easily.
- Make your bedroom as quiet and comfortable as possible.
- De-clutter your bedroom, and avoid bright lights, noise, and extreme temperatures.
- Do you need a new mattress? It’s incredible how some people keep the same mattress for 15 years or more, then wonder why there back aches when they get up.
- Experiment with different kinds of bedding, pillows, and even sleepwear. If you don’t feel totally comfortable how can you expect a good night’s sleep.
- Use your bedroom for only sleep and intimacy.
- Remove the television from your bedroom, and never do paperwork, study or use the computer in bed. The brain makes connections between places (the bedroom) and events (sleeping) and you need to reinforce these connections.
- Don’t watch the clock – Clock watching will make it more difficult to sleep. Either remove it from your bedroom or face it away from you. A glary digital clock is the last thing you should be looking at if you want a restful good night’s sleep.
- Exercise regularly and spend some time outdoors in natural light
- Try and get at least 30 minutes of physical activity every day, ideally in the morning. This could be the key to helping you sleep soundly. Likewise don’t exercise within 3 hours of bedtime, this gives your body time to wind down.
- Don’t rely on sleeping tablets to help you sleep, sleeping tablets are a temporarily fix if you are going through a stressful event or time in your life. Don’t take them longer enough to become addictive.
- Watch what you eat and drink, albeit drink enough water so you don’t wake up thirsty, but not so much that you’re making several toilet trips throughout the night.
- Avoid large heavy meals late at night, but don’t go to bed hungry either. A light snack before bed can help promote a good night’s sleep. Don’t use alcohol to help you sleep it can disturb your sleep patterns and decrease the quality of your sleep. Also stay away from stimulants such as tea and coffee – the last thing you want is high doses of caffeine just before bed.
- Balance your fluid intake
- If you must read in bed on an electronic device, turn down the screen brightness so less blue light is emitted. You will have a better nights sleep as blue light suppresses melatonin production.
It’s so important for our health and well being to get good quality sleep. Many people think they can make do when sleep deprived, but overtime this can lead to stress, and debilitating health problems. Even if you don’t get the touted 7-8 hours per night, make sure the hours you do get are deep and satisfying.
I hope these tips are helpful to you. De-cluttering the bedroom and making it as comfortable as possible, plus cutting out my late night cups of tea has certainly helped me towards my goal of a good night’s sleep.