To help you get at least seven hours of sleep a night, here are some tried and true ways to make sure you get the quality sleep you need
It’s official. A new study in the journal Sleep has confirmed your health will suffer if you don’t get at least seven hours of sleep a night. We probably all knew that but getting at least seven hours of sleep a night is sometimes not easily done. So take a look at our Top 10 ways to get a better night’s sleep and start getting some really good quality zzzzzzzzz…
- Relax before you go to bed. Do some yoga, stretching exercises or just some quiet breathing exercises. All of these will help you get to sleep. Remember though, it does take you 15 minutes or so to fall asleep, so don’t panic if you don’t nod off straight away.
- Don’t use electrical devices before you go to bed. A recent Harvard study shows it’s best not to read from your e-reader if it is backlit, for 90 minutes before bed. This applies to your TV, computer, tablet and smartphone as well. Not only do these electronic devices make you more alert, the blue light emitted from them can disrupt your circadian rhythm, and thus your sleep.
- Keep a pad and pen at your bedside table. This is so you can write down any ‘to do’ items that are worrying you. When you write something down you don’t have to think about it anymore and you can drift off to sleep more easily.
- Do some physical exercise early in the morning. The latest research shows a morning walk or exercise session at 7am in the morning triggers a 25 per cent reduction in blood pressure later that night which will help you get a better sleep. If you exercise during the day or at night you’ll gain some benefit of course, but not quite as much as if you exercised at 7am.
- Read a book – preferably fiction. Research has found reading allows your mind to get distracted and enter a fictional world. This eases the tensions in your muscles and heart. In a study carried out by Mindlab International at the University of Sussex in the UK, those who read for just six minutes before bed reduced their stress levels by 68 per cent. If you want to use an e-reader, go for the Kindle Paperwhite or something similar which has been designed with the light pointing away from your eyes so it can be read at night and not keep you awake.
- Listen to relaxing music. The same study mentioned above found listening to relaxing music for six minutes before bed reduced people’s stress levels by 61 per cent.
- Cut out caffeine for six hours before bed. If you do this, you’ll get a much better sleep. Caffeine stays in your system for quite a number of hours, so by mid-afternoon you need to cut out the tea, coffee, dark chocolate and energy drinks.
- Eat a light dinner. If you eat a smaller dinner you’ll avoid any indigestion upsets later on. Leave your bigger meal for lunchtime and keep your evening meal simple and healthy.
- Have a light snack before bed. If you are still hungry before you go to bed, it’s OK to have a light snack. A handful of crackers with nut butter is recommended or cereal with almond milk, because nuts contain tryptophan, which will help you sleep. Bananas are also high in tryptophan so they are a good choice as well.
- Smell some lavender. The age-old advice to smell lavender just before going to bed has now some science to back it up. A study carried out in 2005 at Wesleyan University in Connecticut has found if people sniffed lavender intermittently for eight minutes before bedtime, it increased the amount of deep sleep they had and was shown “to slow down heart rate” and “slow blood pressure.” Smelling lavender essential oil should be just good so give this a try.
