Are you tired? 5 tips for a better sleep!
If you are feeling fatigued during the day, waking up unrefreshed or waking up in the early hours of the morning and unable to get back to sleep, then you will benefit from making a few small changes to your sleeping routine. Here are 5 very simple and easy changes that may help you feel less tired!
- Wind down for an hour before going to bed. Turn off those screens! Nighttime exposure to the blue light emitted from your smartphone, laptop and television suppresses the production of the hormone melatonin and effectively tells your brain and body to stay awake instead of sleep.
- Create a regular sleep routine. Try to go to bed and get up at the same time each night and morning. A regular sleeping routine helps your body’s own internal body clock and hormones function optimally to make for a good sleep/wake cycle. But if you have a late night, do have a short nap – just try to keep naps less than 45 minutes so they don’t affect the following nights sleep!
- Avoid using a sleep app or activity tracker. These tend to give you either a false reassurance of your quality of sleep (e.g. in people with sleep apnoea) or alternatively create more anxiety about not getting enough sleep, which can become a vicious cycle and disturb your sleep even more. If you do snore or suspect you may have sleep apnoea, having this properly assessed via a sleep study is important. Sleep apnoea is common and often goes undiagnosed with many long-term health implications, so speak to your GP.
- Good hydration is important. Aim for 8 glasses of water per day. Also, limit caffeine consumption after 4pm and alcohol consumption in general.
- Try progressive muscular relaxation if you are having trouble settling your mind. The aim of this is to progressively relax every part of your body from your toes all the way up to your face and head. Try to do this very slowly, this process should take you about 10 minutes.
Start with your toes – slowly wriggle or gently tighten your toes then completely let go and relax them. Then refocus your mind scanning up your shins to your knees – repeat the process – gently wriggle and then relax your knees. As you scan further up your body you’ll notice that the parts you have already relaxed and moved on from remain feeling very heavy. Keep going up each leg, then your abdomen and torso, then up both arms and neck until you reach your face – don’t forget to relax your jaw, tongue and facial muscles! Enjoy the heaviness that this relaxation has given you and if you are still not yet sleepy just focus on keeping calm and maintain your relaxed breathing and muscles. This is still very restorative for the body and mind.
We hope that you’ve found these 5 tips for a better sleep helpful. If you are having trouble sleeping due to pain please call and ask for our help! We can help with hands-on Osteopathic treatment to help make you feel more comfortable and give advice on pillow selection as well as helpful stretches and exercises.
