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The relationship between sleep and creativity has a well-established history. This link is prominently acknowledged in diverse cultural narratives, with many artists crediting their work to either sleep deprivation or intense dreams. The common counsel to “sleep on it” embodies the concept of delaying decisions until the following day. It is a longstanding belief that the right hemisphere of the brain is linked to creativity, while the left hemisphere is related to logical and analytical thought. Let’s delve into how creativity and sleep are interconnected.

The Science of Sleep and Creativity

Many studies on sleep and creativity demonstrated how sleep could promote flexible reasoning and insightful behavior. Scientists have made objective tests that measure the creativity of a person during sleep to prove the correlations between sleep and creativity. A study done by European scientists showed that the right side of the brain is more active after rest. The boost of the brain’s right side happens during slow-wave sleep or deep sleep because of the restructuring of memory. This synthesis of fresh information causes creative insights when you wake up. It is speculated that there might exist a link between the two stages of sleep and creative problem-solving. The main phases of sleep could boost your problem-solving skills if they cooperated. There were even several theories about dreams and their creative function. But, some recent studies focused on the theory of creative insomnia and showed that sleep deprivation and creativity are linked.

Creativity and Insomnia

There could be a possible link between creativity and insomnia. Many artists have credited their work to their insomnia. Famous writers, like Emily Brontë and Marcel Proust, have confirmed that they worked through many sleepless nights. Sleepfulness seems to help certain people create new art or work. It is possible that the undirected time you have during an episode of insomnia needs to be filled and a mind of a creative person will want to fill it with productivity and art. Some studies have suggested that nighttime insomnia had a positive impact on creative behavior and creative thinking. Additionally, one study found that creative children have elevated sleep disturbances. However, no studies have provided proof that insomniacs are naturally more creative. Apart from that, sleep deprivation caused by long-term insomnia leads to a decreased mental activity which means that a person who hasn’t slept for a more extended period can’t necessarily be creative or even function correctly.

Creativity and REM Sleep

Many people claim they were able to conduct their best work right after waking up. There is even a story about Otto Loewi who abruptly woke up one night obsessed with an important idea. He wrote that idea on paper and continued sleeping, but what he ended up writing were illegible scribbles. But, the next night the same thing happened, and it was a design of an experiment involving neurotransmitters. He proved that nerve cells communicate by exchanging chemicals and even won a Nobel Prize in medicine in 1936. This was just one of the examples that showed how sleep promotes creative problem-solving, especially early in the morning (after the sunrise).

Researchers have advocated that the proximity to recent sleep is what drives this inspiration. Most people experience their longest periods of REM (rapid eye movement) sleep right before waking up in the early morning or for some during the night. While you are in your REM sleep, the brain waves simulate the activity you have in your waking state, while your closed eyes rapidly move from side to side. In this stage, your brain is more active, and intense dreams happen. For the majority of adults, this stage occupies 20 to 25 percent of total sleep.

During your REM sleep, acetylcholine – the neurotransmitter Otto Loewi found with his idea, floods the brain and interrupts the connection between the hippocampus and the neocortex. Both of these regions end up being in a flexible state which means the connections between the neurons can be stronger or weaker. This is what occurs during REM sleep. The brain searches for analogies between some unrelated ideas and straightens their connections with other things.

REM sleep enhances the development of the associative networks and the assimilation of unassociated information. Scientists have shown that REM sleep improves creativity. By using Remote Associates Tests (RAT) in their studies, they have proved that REM sleep increases the capacity of creativity, while NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep does not increase creativity. Italian research about sleep duration during different sleep stages also showed that there is a positive connection between originality, creativity, and deep sleep, but a negative association between the length of REM sleep and innovation. However, certain studies have hypothesized that low levels of cortisol (a hormone that helps the body respond to stress) during NREM sleep are responsible for making unexpected connections and controlling deep memories.

Using Dreams for Creativity

Throughout times people have reported using dreams as inspirations in their creative process. The famous English poet, literary critic, and philosopher, Samuel Taylor Coleridge claimed that his poem Kubla Khan was written after he woke up from a dream induced by opium. The famous surrealist, Salvador Dali painted paintings that were inspired by dreams. Mary Shelley got her inspiration for Frankenstein in a dream, and Paul McCartney got the melody for the song Yesterday the same way.

Dreams make connections between things that you would never connect. They imitate the creative process and allow our unconsciousness to explore different combinations among things. Some believe that during sleep our minds try to sort out issues, problems, and questions that we have when we are awake.

Hypnagogia

Hypnagogia is the dreamlike transition state between waking and sleep, typically experienced when the person is falling asleep. The condition imitates REM sleep, but the name itself is derived from the Greek words for sleep and guide. This state usually lasts only a few minutes, but people can have visual or auditory disturbances or hallucinations while in hypnagogia. It causes your brain to process information and thoughts as if it was in the REM sleep stage, but you are awake. The alpha and theta brain waves happen at the same time while in hypnagogia, even though they usually appear separately in sleeping or waking phases.

Many individuals don’t know they experience hypnagogia, but it is actually fairly common. About 5 percent of individuals have hallucinations when they are awake, but about a third of people have sleep hallucinations. Hallucinations caused by hypnagogia are more common with adolescents and for individuals that have sleep disorders like insomnia, shift work sleep disorder or narcolepsy. Hypnagogic hallucinations are only dangerous if they happen during the daytime, and you can see things that are not there because your brain is not acting like you are awake. And any vivid or disturbing imagery may also be caused by narcolepsy.

However, in some cases, hypnagogia is known to help boost creativity. Many artists and even innovators have claimed that hypnagogia assisted them. Benjamin Franklin argued that his early morning creativity happened because of hypnagogia, and famous artist Salvador Dali even gave his hypnagogia a nickname and called it “the slumber with a key.”

Dream Recall and Creativity

The dreams in REM have best coherent narrative during the night. They are the dreams we usually remember when we wake up and the ones that contribute to your creative inspiration. Swiss research conducted on adolescents showed that the participants of the study were able to summon their dreams and be more creative because of it. And the better the sleep quality was, the better was the dream recall.

Sleep Hacks that Can Help with Creativity

Sleeping is a good way to get better creativity. You need to look into the right side of the brain and let your dreams explore many different ideas and solutions. Here are some useful tips that can boost your creativity.

Sleeping on it for tough problems – Researchers found evidence that having an incubation period can aid problem-solving. During this incubation period, the brain does not focus on the issue and can have a better approach to solve any difficult problems. If the incubation period overlaps with sleep time, you will be able to make connections with different facts, information, ideas, and situations. When trying to solve a difficult problem, you are likely to get a solution after periods of relaxation or even mind-wandering. This wandering is a useful technique that will help your psyche go down many paths that can lead to a solution, as opposed to the conscious brain which can get too focused on the problem and might not explore all options and possibilities to find a solution. Additionally, focusing on the problem before sleep can trigger the unconscious mind to try and solve it during sleep.

Read something before bed – Reading always provides a good creativity boost, especially before sleep. You can read anything that inspires your mind, fiction or nonfiction. Any reading material will inspire your mind to think of new, different ideas while sleeping and suggest new things and ideas to try out when you wake up. The brain synthesizes the information you get before sleep and processes it during sleep to help you with your creative thinking when you are awake.

Experiment with naptime – Naps are beneficial for improving creativity as they help with the mental performance that will be directed towards producing new ideas. Even though you only experience light sleep when taking a nap, you can also get deep sleep with longer daytime naps, which can improve idea-making in originality and volume.

Establish a sleep routine – A sleep routine is an excellent way to get a good night’s rest, but it might also help with your creativity. Experts have found that you can schedule creative activities for the opposite times of when you are most productive. When you are tired, your brain can wander and explore many ideas and thoughts, and you get better creative thinking flows. Morning people should get creative in the evening, while night people should get creative in the morning.

If you are lying in a bed for more than 15 minutes without sleeping, the best thing is to leave the bedroom so that your mind can treat it as an environment dedicated to sleep. Leaving the room and doing something productive and creative will tire your brain and you can get a good night’s sleep after that, along with the creative project you did. Even though it is not good to collect sleep debt, if the need for a creative jolt arises, you can wake yourself up 30 minutes earlier to trigger your creativity. You might feel groggy at first because you interrupted your sleep cycle, but you should end up being more creative.

Keep track of your dreams – To find inspiration for your creative project, it is essential to keep track of your dreams using a pen and paper or a smartphone app. Sleep tracking apps are used to track your sleep patterns, the collected sleep debt, and dreams. They can even help you get better rest at night, or check if you are at risk of acquiring or if you have sleep disorders.

Daydream – As we previously mentioned, our dreams explore many ideas and paths. Many famous people have credited their work to periods similar to dreams. Daydreams are connected to the synthesis of existing ideas and creation of new ideas. It is not the same as dreams during the night, but it helps the mind be unfocused and wander through many things. If you are tired, this has a slightly better chance of happening, but it can happen in other periods during the day as well.

It’s undeniable that having excess weight or being considerably overweight can have negative impacts on your health. There is a strong connection between additional body fat and various health complications, such as increased blood pressure, heart diseases, respiratory problems, stroke, diabetes, and many other conditions. While the role of nutrition and exercise in managing body weight is well recognized, we are particularly interested in examining the relationship between sleep patterns and an individual’s body weight.

There is a rise in obesity and sleep problems in the world, and it didn’t take us long to make a connection between those two. This rise is mostly attributed to less exercise and eating more unhealthy food.

The interactions in our body are quite complex, and while a lack of sleep can lead to gaining weight, being overweight also leads to disruptions in your sleep. Excess weight can lead to snoring and sleep apnea, and obesity is linked with increased chances of developing restless legs syndrome. Poor sleep leads to changes in your metabolism, hormone expression and it also affects parts of your brain, making you more hungry and less satisfied after a meal.

The Risks Based on Your Body Weight

Body mass index (BMI) is often used to estimate your relative body fat based on your height and weight. While it is not a completely precise system, it can give you an idea if you should pay more attention to your weight. There is a number of online calculators that you can use to identify your BMI, and then find out where you stand.

• Underweight (BMI <19)
• Healthy weight (BMI 19-24.9)
• Overweight (BMI 25-29.9)
• Obese (BMI 30-34.9)
• Morbidly obese (BMI over 35)

The results are based on the average body construction, so they can be off for athletes who have more muscles, or older people that have lost muscles on account of body fat.

You don’t have to worry if you are a few pounds overweight, as it might not have a negative impact. However, the more you weight, the more likely you are to get one of the medical conditions linked to excess body fat.

Impact of Sleep Deprivation on Hormones Responsible for Weight Gain

Sleep deprivation negatively impacts your body’s ability to use insulin. Insulin is crucial for removing glucose from the bloodstream and bringing them to cells that later use these molecules to get the energy they need to function correctly. Insulin resistance is linked to sleep deficit, and when our body is less sensitive to insulin, it produces more of it. That leads to storing fat in the wrong places, like your liver, and that is exactly how you become obese and more prone to suffer from a disease like diabetes.

The interactions between the two hormones, leptin and ghrelin, control hunger. Ghrelin is a peptide produced by the stomach, and its primary role is to stimulate appetite. The levels of ghrelin are high before the meal, and then they drop afterward. Ghrelin also has a long-term effect on body weight regulation, and its levels are usually higher in obese people. Ghrelin also promotes lower metabolism and increased storage of fat. The other hormone responsible for hunger is leptin. It is produced by fat cells (adipocytes), and increased levels of leptin is a signal that you are full. Decreased leptin levels stimulate hunger, so it is pretty clear how these two hormones work together to signal your brain that it is time to eat.

Sleep loss makes your daily leptin levels drop, while it increases ghrelin, making it nearly impossible to lose weight. In addition to that, sleep deprivation also increases the levels of cortisol, a stress hormone that among many other functions, controls how your body uses different nutrients. It is associated with fat gain and activation of reward centers that makes you want more food. Increased levels of ghrelin and cortisol turn off the parts of your brain that indicate satiety, so you’re going to feel hungry all the time, even if you just had a lunch that should be satisfying.

To make things even worse, sleep deprivation impairs the activity of your frontal lobe, an area in charge of complex decision making. When you are over-tired, the activity of your amygdala is increased as well. That makes you want to eat high-calorie food more. And since your decision making is disturbed by the lack of sleep, you are more prone to give in to those urges and forget about eating healthy.

Orexin or hypocretin is a hormone responsible for keeping us awake, and it also plays a role in appetite cycle. The interactions between orexin and other hormones are yet to be researched, but it just shows how complicated our bodies are, and how hard our brain is working to keep everything in place.

Evolutionary Explanations for Links Between Sleep and Body Weight

Large meals make you sleep, which makes a lot of sense evolutionary since our ancestors were always in the search for food. When they were full, it meant that they had time to sleep. Sleep conserves energy and also gives the body time to repair and grow. Growth hormone is released during deep sleep, so it is essential that children get sufficient sleep. Hunger, on the opposite, can prevent rest, and our ancestors had to make sure they found food before going to sleep.

A potential evolutionary explanation to the relationship between weight gain and sleep may be explained by the availability of food-induced by seasonal changes in daylight. Our ancestors ate more during the summer when there was plenty of food, and they also slept less because of the shorter nights. During the winter, there was less food available, so they had to sleep longer to conserve energy better. Now, we had plenty of food available all year long. But when we get less sleep, our brain can still perceive it as a season when we eat more, and that’s why we gain weight.

Sleeping Conditions Caused by Excess Body Weight

Gaining weight can lead to snoring, sleep apnea, hypoventilation, and restless legs syndrome. Extra weight can lead to larger neck size, and also to a reduced lung volume due to the increased stomach. This can cause problems and collapse the airway.

Snoring is often the first sign that something is off with your sleep. Snoring is merely disturbed airflow, but it can lead to more damaging conditions. Storing extra fat in the tissue around your airway often leads to snoring. Other obstacles can induce snoring, such as enlarged tonsils and adenoids, a smaller lower jaw (retrognathia), a deviated septum in the nose, or large tongue (macroglossia). Children particularly have problems with enlarged tonsils.

Sleep apnea is a condition of blocked airways that lead to nightly pauses in respiration. When the airflow completely stops, it is called apnea, while partial cease of airflow is called hypopnea. The symptoms of sleep apnea are fatigue, excessive daytime sleepiness, impaired memory, concentration, and mood. Sleep apnea can lead to more severe consequences. It can increase the risk of heart failure, hypertension (increased blood pressure) and diabetes. It’s also correlated with a higher risk of a stroke and sudden death. If you are experiencing any of the mentioned symptoms and suspect that you are suffering from sleep apnea, pay a visit to your doctor. They’ll refer you to a sleep specialist who will run a series of test and give you a diagnosis. If you are suffering from sleep apnea, don’t worry, continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) therapy is highly effective.

Hypoventilation is another respiration-related condition that affects obese people. People usually exhale carbon dioxide, but being overweight can prevent that during the night. It can be so severe that some people can’t even catch up and get rid of all the carbon dioxide during the day. That can lead to a lot of cardiovascular problems as well as death.

Restless legs syndrome is a sleep disorder described by the strange sensation of discomfort in legs during the night. People who experience this often have an urge to move and relieve the pain. There could be many causes behind the restless legs syndrome including iron deficiency and pregnancy. Being obese is also one of the factors that highly increase the chances of obtaining this condition. The relationship between those two is not fully understood, but it is suspected that chemical messenger in the brain called dopamine is involved.
People with restless legs syndrome often find themselves grabbing a midnight snack. This is shown to relieve the symptoms temporarily but can lead to more weight gain.

Sleep-related eating disorder is a condition of abnormal sleep behavior or parasomnia. People affected by this disorder are repeatedly found eating during their sleep. This action is involuntary, and they can even consume inedible food. They often realize what happened after they found missing food or mess in the kitchen when they wake up in the morning.
While it is not shown that overweight people are more likely to suffer from this condition, it is evident that this disorder can lead to gaining weight.

Lack of Sleep and Exercising

Besides affecting your diet, sleep deprivation also has an impact on your exercise. Lack of sleep leads to more sleepiness and fatigue during the day, as well as less motivation to do things. That will make a hard task of going to the gym even harder.

Sleep also affects gym performance, and more rest means increased gains. Remember that during the deep stage of sleep, your body releases growth hormone that is important for your muscles. Sleep also lets your body restore properly after an exercise.

Lack of sleep means higher production of cortisol, a stress-inducing hormone. More cortisol means less growth hormone, so it seems like a never-ending cycle.

More muscles mean more fat burning, so make that first step and start exercising. It will impact every aspect of your life. You’ll lose weight, improve your health and sleep, increase your circulation leading to better concentration and memory. With so many positive effects, there is no reason why you shouldn’t try being active.

Can Sleeping More Help You Lose Weight?

A large study was done at Case Western Reserve University, and it included more than 68,000 women. Women were all nurses, and first, they filled the questionnaires about their sleeping and other life habits, and their weight was measured. Over the next 16 years, researchers tracked how different parameters changed in relation to how much sleep each woman got during the night.

During those 16 years, 10.5% of women in this study experienced weight gain of 15 kilograms. Nurses who slept for seven to eight hours on average had the lowest risk of 15-kilogram weight gain. Women who slept five hours or less were 32% more likely to experience 15kg weight gain, while those who slept 6 hours on average had 12% more chances of gaining 15 kilograms.

Other variables were included in the statistical analysis, and still, sleep time was the key factor to weight gain. Nurses who slept for less than seven hours were 15% more likely to suffer from obesity.

There are many more studies with similar results, including this study done in the Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine in Prague.

The Bottom Line

Sleep deprivation can lead to an increase in appetite and can impact your metabolism and the way your body responds to food. It also impairs your decision making and makes you crave high-calorie food while leaving you less satisfied after a meal.

Along with a healthy diet and exercise, healthy sleeping habits play a significant role in weight maintenance. If you are struggling to lose weight, it would be best for you to try and change all of these aspects of your life. That will lead to better and faster results.

Fighting against insomnia can be both a daunting and frustrating endeavor. Often times, the advice you get might be either too general or simply not effective for you. The most common approach to combat insomnia, without the need to spend a lot of money, is through lifestyle changes. Yet, identifying the exact adjustments needed can be tricky. Some people focus on tracking their sleeping habits or sticking to a rigid bedtime routine; others opt to boost their physical activity hoping it’ll make them tired enough to improve their sleep. In more severe scenarios, individuals may resort to using alcohol as a makeshift remedy, which can lead to a range of complications. Additionally, pinpointing the exact cause of your insomnia is challenging, considering the vast number of possible lifestyle and biochemical factors involved.

Prescription and over-the-counter medication often lead to undesirable side-effects. Some sleep medication has side-effects that ruin your sleep cycles, which is about as counterproductive as it sounds. To avoid this, a lot of people seek out all-natural sleep aids and dietary methods to fight off insomnia without risking their health in some unforeseen way. A common ingredient mentioned in a lot of recipes and medical articles is tart cherry juice. If public opinion is to be believed, it’s supposed to help deal with insomnia (and some other health-related issues, like muscle repair), both when consumed regularly and when ingested as part of a diet supplement or sleep aid. In this article, we will examine these claims to see if tart cherry juice really does help insomniacs sleep easier. Let’s begin.

Tart Cherry Juice as a Melatonin Supplement

The vast majority of natural sleep aids try to affect your melatonin production. Melatonin is typically called the “sleep hormone” in layman speak, as it helps your body regulate your natural sleep cycle. When your body decides it’s time to go to bed, more and more melatonin starts getting produced to induce drowsiness so you can fall asleep. Once you wake up, cortisol is instead produced to get you properly energized for daily activities.

Insomnia and other sleep-related problems can often stem from disrupted melatonin production. For example, alcohol consumption can seriously slow down melatonin production, crippling it by as much as 20% after moderate drinking. Other habits or conditions can affect how fast you produce melatonin, which can keep you awake for longer and thus make you tired during the day, forming a sort of vicious cycle of sleep deprivation. So how do tart cherries fit into all of this?

Semi-recently, melatonin was discovered in concentrated amounts in a variety of edible plants. Tart cherries are one of them, especially the Montmorency variety, which boast a six times higher melatonin percentage than another good candidate (Balaton cherries). Logically, this would make tart cherry juice a good substance for inducing sleep faster. This beneficial effect was confirmed in several studies where patients with insomnia were given tart cherry juice. It even performed better than most melatonin and valerian root supplements. However, we were just talking about sleep onset. What about the quantity and quality of sleep among people who consume tart cherries?

Tart Cherry Juice and Sleep Quality

Most of the time when sleep aids are talked about, the only thing anyone mentions is sleep onset latency – the time it takes a person to fall asleep. However, if that were all that mattered, then getting drunk would be an even more popular option for insomniacs and people with sleep deprivation in general. The main reason alcohol is considered counterproductive is that while it certainly does help you fall asleep faster, it ruins the quality of that rest and leaves you feeling drained and exhausted when you wake up. You want to make sure that your diet supplement or sleep aid also enhances the restorative function of sleep so that you can remain energized and healthy during the day.

Tart cherry juice has recently been tested for effectiveness as a natural sleep enhancer, and its performance has been noted in more than one area. Patients aged 50 or older had a staggering 84-minute increase in total sleep time after drinking two glasses of tart cherry juice per day (once after waking up, and once in the evening, right before bed).

Apparently, it’s not just the melatonin component that makes tart cherries and their juice a good sleep aid. They also contain strong amounts of procyanidins and anthocyanins. These chemicals aren’t exclusive to tart cherries, but they contribute to this healthy cocktail of sleep-enhancing properties, as they have an anti-inflammatory effect. A theory has popped up claiming that chemicals inside tart cherries prevent tryptophan from being fully broken down. Tryptophan assists in melatonin and serotonin production, so the effects on the consumer’s melatonin levels are strong enough to make a difference in their sleep quality. The degradation of tryptophan has been directly linked to insomnia in the past.

Are There Any Downsides to Tart Cherry Juice?

All of this sounds amazing so far, we know. And when you’re presented with an option this good, the first question in a lot of people’s minds is often “So what’s the catch?” Well, the studies we’ve told you about have not examined any potential risks with frequently drinking tart cherry juice. For example, if you have diabetes, the sugar found (in small but not insignificant amounts) in tart cherry juice could pose a problem.

Additionally, the studies were mainly focused on middle-aged and older adults with insomnia. Although they’re not entirely representative of the general population, these demographics experience the biggest inconveniences and problems as a result of insomnia. Their immune system gets compromised, and conditions such as Alzheimer’s or dementia get worse. Younger people don’t have these problems, or they’re much less severe, so treating seniors is considered a high priority due to those health risks.

Consuming too much tart cherry juice or including tart cherries in your cooked dishes too often can result in digestive problems, as the cherries contain sorbitol. Sorbitol is a sugar that is naturally indigestible and can have a laxative effect if consumed in excess. Additionally, you can experience gas and stomach cramping, which is obviously not something you want while you’re trying to fall asleep through insomnia.

Extra Benefits of Drinking Tart Cherry Juice

Being able to fix your sleep cycles by itself is already a huge selling point for tart cherry juice. But there are more upsides to consuming this juice, especially if you’re an athlete. For example, weightlifters often have to deal with muscle damage, as their strength exercises are very intense. Montmorency tart cherry juice helps attenuate the oxidative damage caused to the muscle by the intense exercise. The chemicals inside tart cherries also help alleviate joint pain and inflammation for patients dealing with osteoarthritis. Long-distance runners such as marathon runners often have to deal with acute muscle pain. As a result, they suffer from inflammation, and their legs can’t put out as much force as they normally would. The chemical compounds inside tart cherries have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties that directly counter this hindrance if the tart cherry juice is consumed regularly for a period before the strenuous exercise. The result is significantly reduced pain after each run, and since this is a primary point of concern for many runners, tart cherry juice is a welcome addition to their diet. Keep in mind, no matter what your athletic discipline, don’t treat tart cherry juice as a pre-exercise power-up drink. It has to be a regular part of your diet for at least a week straight before your sports event. The longer you can maintain the habit, the better the effect is.

If you regularly have to deal with jet lag, tart cherry juice can serve as both an all-natural remedy and a way to stay refreshed while traveling. It is also considered helpful in cases where the person is dealing with gout.

Here’s the thing, though. Not every cherry is a good melatonin supplement, and there are many brands that may declare massive health benefits on their packaging, without being able to back that up in testing. Tart cherries such as Montmorency (our recommendation), Balaton, Richmond, and English Morello cherries provide the best results. Avoid sweet cherries if you’re simply looking for health benefits as their effects are minor at best. Additionally, steer clear of any package that says “cocktail” on it. Even if there is some tart cherry juice in there, there are also some other varieties that weaken the sleep-enhancing effects you want. Always go for sugar-free juice.

Note: While tart cherry juice is an excellent food item to include in your diet, make sure it fits in with the planned caloric intake if you’re worried about weight loss. It’s not too hard to plan ahead for it since an 8-ounce serving of tart cherry juice contains around 128 calories. Regardless of your weekly caloric intake, don’t expect tart cherry juice to act as a miracle fix-all medicine if your diet is normally unhealthy. For example, it won’t help you sleep if you have a nasty alcohol habit or if you consume way too many caffeinated products such as coffee, tea or chocolate. Every major change in how healthy you are demands a sacrifice somewhere else.

Tart Cherry Juice Versus Other Sleep Aids

Tart cherry juice is far from the only recommended sleep aid out there. If you consult your doctor (which you should always do if you’re dealing with insomnia), you will be pointed towards an extensive list of options, including prescription medication. Natural sleep aids often come without nasty side-effects and aren’t extremely costly. And the best ones often include tart cherry juice to some degree, as it’s an all-in-one package of sleep-enhancing effects. This makes those natural sleep aids the best of both worlds, in a way.

OTC and prescription medication tend to have the strongest effect, but it can cause unwanted side-effects or addiction. The general rule with this type of sleep aid is to start with a lower dosage at first. Consult your doctor to figure out a nice dosage to use, and then gradually increase if the problems persist or you stop feeling the effect of your medicine. If the drug has an addiction risk, we strongly recommend switching to something else.

If you’re at your wit’s end after fighting with insomnia for a long time, nothing can help you as much as CBT-I therapy. This is a special technique used to isolate the problematic factors in your sleeping environment that cause or strengthen the effects of insomnia. It involves maintaining a sleep journal and, once the underlying causes of insomnia are identified, steps are taken to improve the quantity and quality of the patient’s sleep. These steps include stimulus control, sleep restrictions, and may or may not include taking special medication. CBT-I therapy isn’t something you can just do without making a commitment, so if your schedule is overbooked, consider sticking to simpler methods until you can afford the time.

Important Note: Always consult your physician about any sleep aid you wish to try. You can do an ingredient check together to find anything you may be allergic to, and make sure any medications you’re already taking won’t make a bad cocktail with this new sleep aid. Most doctors get asked about sleep aids a lot, so you’re almost guaranteed to be recommended something that works extremely well. If you feel any discomfort as a result of these medications, alert your physician immediately so that you can swap as soon as possible.

Conversations often focus on adult conditions and the difficulty in understanding and recognizing them. Yet, we fail to consider that sleep disorders can affect children as well. This is particularly challenging since kids might not have the ability to fully articulate their experiences, which can result in misunderstandings of the problems they face. 

During their childhood, kids can frequently experience parasomnias like sleepwalking, talking during sleep, etc and it might be connected to the anxiety of separation. Dyssomnia, on the other hand, causes difficulty in falling and staying asleep. It includes sleep disorders such as insomnia and sleep apnea.
 

Sleep Apnea in Children 

As the rates for obese children go up, sleep apnea is becoming a common sight, and it can cause significant damage for a brain that is still developing because lack of oxygen can lead to possible problems in cognitive abilities. Here are the most common symptoms: 

During the night:

• Regular snoring 
• Heavy sweating during night time 
• Restless sleep 
• Stops or pauses in breathing as well as experiencing snorts that can cause disruptions during sleep 

During the day:

• Experiencing difficulty to wake up 
• Social and behavioral problems 
• Cranky and aggressive 
• Headaches in the morning and throughout the day
• Breathing through the mouth on a regular basis
• Nasal voice 

If you notice one or more stated symptoms you should go to your child’s pediatrician for a checkup. During the examination make sure you explain your child’s behavior in detail. The doctor might give you a reference for a specialist or recommend a sleep study. Polysomnogram or sleep study is a helpful diagnosing tool for sleep disorders. It’s risk-free and painless, but your kid will have to spend one night in the sleep center or hospital.  

During the study specialists usually check:

• Sleep positions and movement during sleep
• Snoring
• Patterns of breathing
• Waves of the brain
• Heart rate
• The levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide 

Sleep Apnea Treatment 

The treatment depends on the cause and effect of it on sleep. If it has a mild impact on sleep, doctors might still want to check your child’s sleep until they determine the appropriate treatment. If the cause to sleep apnea is big tonsils, the physician might recommend ENT doctor. The ENT specialist often suggests two types of surgeries – removing adenoids or tonsils. Both treatments have been proven successful to resolve the struggle with sleep apnea. 

In case the cause was due to something else CPAP therapy is recommended. During continuous positive airway pressure therapy, your child will wear a mask over the nose or mouth while sleeping. The mask is connected to a machine that opens the airways by pumping the air. 

Many times weight that is highly above average can cause sleep apnea to worsen. When that is noticed it is essential to consult the pediatrician for advice on exercise, change of diet and other weight loss measures that are safe for your child. 
 

Obesity and Short Sleep in Children 

Studies have found that the quantity of fat in kids bodies is in correlation with sleep just like it is in the case of adults. Lack of sleep results in higher levels of fat. If only one hour was added every night, it could reduce up to 61 percent risk of a child becoming obese at the age of seven.  

Although many people believe that kids should eat whatever they want cause they grow and that will help them lose the additional weight, the truth is that childhood is the perfect time to create a healthy eating habit.  If you become obese as a child, the chances are that pattern of thinking and eating will continue later on during your adulthood.
 

Limit-Setting Insomnia 

It is a behavioral disorder when a child continuously makes up excuses or stall bedtime by asking random questions and as a last resort they might scream and act out to delay going to sleep. How does insomnia fit into all this? Insomnia is defined as having trouble falling asleep and staying asleep. If this patter frequently occurs, it can lead to behavioral disorders. For children to obtain healthy sleep hygiene, a regular bedtime routine is necessary as well as a relaxing environment. If the parents don’t set boundaries, the bedroom can become a place where you set bed wars. 

Since kids don’t recognize how much sleep they need or if they had enough, if you leave them unsupervised, they will find a way to keep themselves awake as the kids will feel that they will miss something because everyone else is awake. Even though they will eventually fall asleep when sleepy, they will create an irregular sleeping pattern that can lead to circadian rhythm disruption. 

When appropriate bedtime is set, and you help your child to stick to it even during the weekends, it will satisfy the sleep needs of a child in a healthy manner. The boundaries help the child know what to expect from you and what not to expect. Kids might take advantage if there is inconsistency, which can include demands for food, attention, playtime, etc.  

If you indulge those requests, the bedtime will extend, and your child won’t get the proper rest it needs. 

Three simple guidelines can help you in dealing with limit-setting insomnia 

• Thirty to twenty minutes before bedtime, you should engage your child in relaxing activities such as taking a bath and reading bedtime stories. Bear in mind that you should set a limit for that too so that it doesn’t become a delaying factor that kid will try to use against going to bed.
• Pay attention to the sleep needs of your child when you create a bedtime routine. If you put your children to sleep too early, they might wake up early in the morning and disturb the rest of the family.
• Do not indulge your child requests after or around the bedtime. 

Limit-setting insomnia is a form of insomnia because it can cause a shorter sleep as well as consecutive sleepiness during day time. Therefore, experts consider this to be behavioral insomnia. 
 

Sleep Anxiety 

Stress and headaches can cause struggles falling asleep. The body reacts to stress in different ways, and our brain can’t see the difference between what is real and what isn’t. For kids, many things might trigger the fight-or-flight response. Perhaps it can be nightmares, fear of the monsters or dark, and over-worrying. 

In these scenarios here are some things that can help your child feel at ease before falling asleep 

• Firstly, make sure there are no toys that look scary, and if there are, put them away.
• Don’t talk about scary monsters during bedtime. Instead, you should do relaxing activities such as reading a bedtime story to redirect their thoughts and create positive ones.
• Turn off screens that can disrupt the production of melatonin. 
• If the child is afraid of the dark try using a nightlight.
• Pillow talk is essential so don’t skip it. This is the time where your child wants to snuggle up with you and maybe share their troubles. You should listen more and talk less.  

Bedtime and Cognitive Abilities 

Many researchers have found that children who are exposed to irregular bedtime have lower levels of cognitive development. Routine is a good way for a child’s mind to reduce worry and stress, and it might make getting ready for school easier. 

Medicine and Children 

It is not advised to use medications that are not FDA approved for kids as they can have side effects on a child’s development. Labels by FDA influence the use of medicine, but doctors can prescribe a medication that is certain to help with a specific problem, based on previous experience and studies. 

A lot of individuals don’t think about sleeping naked, and they don’t connect it with any health benefits. Yet, against common belief, sleeping in the buff can come with numerous perks that might greatly enhance how well you sleep. If you haven’t tried sleeping undressed before or you’re skeptical about its advantages, this article is directed at you. The best way to figure out whether going to bed in the nude works for you is to try it out for yourself!

Why should you sleep naked?

Before getting into the full benefits of sleeping naked, let’s go over some general information. Sleeping naked can positively affect your sleep, health, relationship, mood, and appearance. Many factors contribute to your health, and clothes or lack of them in this case, are one of them. Clothes can impact your sleep quality a lot. At some point, you were probably awakened by excessive heat or sweating that was caused by uncomfortable sleepwear. Sure, you might get cold when sleeping naked, but that is solvable with the right blanket. Additionally, a decent sleep can improve your stress level, and sleeping in clothes and under heavy covers prevents the production of hormone IHG that is responsible for muscle, skin, bone, and even hair repair. Since the IGH decreases over time, you need to be careful not to speed up the process.

Health Benefits of Sleeping Naked

Temperature

The biggest reason why sleeping naked is good for you, is that it helps you with thermoregulation, a natural process of the body that involves temperature changes during the night. Our body temperature is regulated by balancing heat production, gain, loss, and absorption. We regulate heat production and the preservation of our core temperature and shell temperature. The internal one is regulated by the brain, while the shell temperature is mainly affected by the temperature of the skin, muscles, and subcutaneous tissues. The average core temperature for humans is around 37 degrees Celsius or 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, but this varies during the day and night. Your hypothalamus works and your body temperature increases during the day to help you stay alert. If your internal temperature changes from the normal range, your body will handle it, and that’s thermoregulation.

When we sleep, both the brain’s and the body’s temperature vary during the whole night. When you experience non-REM sleep, both temperatures fall, but when you are in REM sleep the brain temperature increases. The control of brain and body temperature is linked to sleep regulation. Recent studies about temperature manipulation are showing the influence temperature has on our sleep quality and duration. The perfect temperature for sleep is between 15.5 and 19 degrees Celsius or 60 and 67 degrees Fahrenheit.

During the night, your temperature decreases and that stimulates the production of melatonin, a sleep-inducing hormone. Melatonin is also known as the night hormone because it is in charge of sleep.

Wearing pajamas, underwear or even just a shirt and trousers can disrupt your body temperature and sleep. To help your body have better regulation of temperature, sleeping naked is an excellent way to improve your sleep quality. Sleeping with nothing on contributes to your sleep by reducing the number of times you can wake up during the night and by increasing the depth of your shut-eye. Of course, many technological advancements can help you lower your body’s temperature, like cooling pillows, cooling sheets, cool comforters and special mattresses for hot sleeping, sleeping naked is considered to be a more cost-effective option. However, be sure to keep your hands and feet warm. Having cold hands and feet can interfere with this process.

Stress

Stress is a huge health risk that can cause many problems, including sleep issues. It can suppress your immune system, increase the risk of heart disease, lower cognitive performance, and it can lead to obesity and depression because it makes your cortisol levels go crazy. Getting proper rest will restore these levels to normal. Sleeping naked relaxes you meaning it can help with decreasing your cortisol levels. There are numerous benefits of sleeping next to someone. Having any kind of contact with your partner causes the release of oxytocin, a hormone that helps you feel calm and relaxed. Any pleasant touch, massage, and cuddling will most likely result in an oxytocin response, which helps to calm down.

Bacteria and Infection Risk

Wearing underwear can lead to bacteria. How? As we previously discussed, sleeping causes an increase in temperature and clothes can increase it even further. A warm environment is a breeding ground for bacteria. If you wear underwear, especially tighter models, during the night, you create a warm ground that is ideal for the development of bacteria and infections. Apart from being warm, due to the excessive heat and sweat, you also create humid and moist conditions, in which yeast infections thrive. Of course, this does not always happen, it is just a possibility. However, airing your private areas may help to prevent this, and wearing fewer layers will also help to reduce the excessive moisture.

Additionally, wearing your birthday suit also increases fertility in men. A recent study that included 500 couples was conducted about this particular issue. The study showed that men that slept naked and only wore boxers during the day had higher quality sperm, with the additional 25% less genetic damage than men that wore their underwear during the day and night.

Diseases

Sleep is essential for life and optimal health, and it has a vital role in our systemic physiology and brain functioning. Insufficient sleep has been linked to many diseases, such as diabetes and even heart conditions. Many factors can impact your sleep disruption, from the environment and lifestyle to medical conditions and sleep disorders. Having sleep disruption causes many short-term and long-term consequences for your health. Among the short-term effects are a reduced quality of life, increased stress responsivity, emotional distress, mood disorders, and cognitive, memory, and performance problems. Long-term problems are more severe, and sleep disruption can cause healthy people to get cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia, weight-related issues, colorectal cancer, hypertension, and metabolic syndrome, among others. Sleep loss can also lead to obesity that contributes to many other medical problems. There is also a higher risk of having a heart attack or a stroke. To avoid all these risks, you need to have proper sleep. The best way to avoid them and possibly improve your sleep is by sleeping naked, just like mother nature intended.

Weight Loss

Many studies have shown that keeping yourself cool while sleeping impacts your metabolism. The body creates more brown fat that will keep you warm, and this heat will burn calories very fast. People that have more brown fat are lightweight. Brown fat, also called brown adipose tissue is responsible for burning energy and producing heat. When you feel cold or are in a cold environment, brown fat is more active because it defends the body from the cold. So sleeping naked will help your metabolism work right and you can enjoy the benefits of losing weight because of it.

Confidence Builder

You may think this is just some cheesy line, but it is actually true. Clothes have often been attributed to a lack of body confidence. To get past this, you need to get used to seeing your body without any clothes and accepting the way it looks. Sleeping naked may help you become more aware of your body and in the end, accept it as it is, and gain more confidence and self-esteem.

What if you don’t want to sleep naked?

After reading this, you will either want to try sleeping naked or not. We’ve seen how sleeping without clothing is good for you, but those of you who do not want to sleep naked, it’s best not to force yourselves. Ultimately, your sleep quality depends on you feeling comfortable and relaxed, and doing something against is not good. Instead, let’s talk about some alternatives.

You need to think about what you are wearing to bed. When choosing the outfit, whether it is pajamas, underwear, or shirt and trousers, you need to consider the materials. Your sleeping clothes need to be made out of breathable, natural and lightweight fabric. Silk, flannel, and bamboo are excellent choices that will provide a good and uninterrupted night of sleep. They have extreme moisture-wicking abilities. On top of that, bamboo is also antibacterial and hypoallergenic, making it a great option for allergy sufferers. Fabrics that you should avoid are fleece, cotton, and wool. They are somewhat lightweight, but they affect your circulation, which is not good for your body or sleep. And they have terrible moisture-wicking qualities.

The bottom line is to make sure you sleep in comfortable clothes that won’t interrupt your sleep or cause increased levels of warmth. And make sure to wear socks.

There has been ongoing discussion about the impact of physical exercise on our sleep habits. It has been widely questioned whether engaging in physical activity aids or hinders one’s capacity to drift off to sleep, with common recommendations typically advising against working out before bedtime due to its possible adverse implications. However, the issue is complex. Working out promotes both psychological and physiological well-being. For some, it may improve their sleep quality, while for others, it could interfere with their rest. On the whole, participating in physical activities is advantageous for both your sleep and general health.

Many current recommendations are against any evening exercise. However many studies have shown that there are no adverse effects on sleeping caused by exercising before bed. In some cases, it can help you fall asleep faster and have an uninterrupted sleep during the whole night. Of course, vigorous exercise an hour before sleep is not recommended because it can disrupt your sleep quality temporarily.

Any form of exercise during the day and evening can improve your nighttime sleep quality and reduce the risk of sleep disorders. Even 10 minutes of walking will have a significant impact on your sleep. Exercising in the morning or afternoon helps reset the sleep-wake cycle, and exercise in the evening helps you fall asleep easier and have more prolonged periods of deep sleep.

How Exercise Aids Sleep

The effects of exercise are very individual. As we mentioned, it can have either a positive or negative impact on your sleep depending on the person. However, most of the times and for the majority of people, it benefits your night routine.

Morning and afternoon exercise slightly raise your body’s temperature to keep you awake, and as the evening comes, the temperature drops and your mind and body trigger sleepiness. If you have a chance to exercise outside, your body can absorb the sunlight and have a better routine, which is very beneficial to your sleep and health as it helps your body get used to doing certain activities at specific times.

Improving sleep quality

Exercise increases the time you spend in deep sleep and contributes to a restful and more sound sleep. Deep sleep helps maintain and even boost your immune function and prevent any cardiac health risk, stress or anxiety. Apart from a deep sleep, exercise also increases your sleep duration. Physical activity can bolster sleep by reducing stress and tiring you out because any kind of activity or training makes you spend energy and feel tired. As the day ends, you will be ready to rest.

Reduce stress and anxiety

As we all know stress is a big problem, if not the biggest, for sleep. It can cause restless sleep or troubles falling asleep. A good way of fighting against this is with exercise. Any amount and type of activity can cause anti-anxiety responses in the body. Maintaining a regular exercise routine is an excellent way to lower your stress levels, handle anxiety and get quality rest.

Insomnia and other sleep disorders

Many studies have shown that exercise can help with different sleep disorders. There is evidence that exercise is great natural therapy for insomnia. Insomnia causes irritability, lack of coordination, focus and concentration, daytime fatigue, depression, anxiety, tension headaches, and of course it prevents you from falling asleep. There is an increase in your body’s temperature when exercising and the fall after it helps you fall asleep. It reduces the symptoms of insomnia by lowering arousal, depressive moments and anxiety. Keeping a healthy exercise routine is very beneficial for those who suffer from insomnia because it maintains a circadian rhythm.

Sleep apnea and exercise have been linked through numerous studies, through the physical improvements that training gives. It amplifies and straightens the airway muscles that will prevent any potential breathing collapse during sleep. Exercise improves your breathing and reduces the severity of sleep apnea.

Sleep deprivation

Sleep and exercise are vital in maintaining health, but people have always struggled with engaging in physical activity without realizing all of its benefits. Sleep deprivation means that a person has less sleep than needed to be awake and alert. Many do not know, but sleep deprivation can impact your health severely, and cause problems such as microsleep. It has been linked to increased metabolism, which is not a good thing. If your metabolism gets a boost, you can have an increase in expenditure energy and body inflammation. Many things can help you overcome this and get your well-deserved sleep, but the best way to fight sleep deprivation is by exercising. Listening to relaxing music or specialized audio recordings can also help. However, when you experience symptoms of sleep deprivation, it is important not to engage in physical activity that will exhaust you too much. Although our bodies can do great things in a sleep-deprived state, you shouldn’t exercise for more than 30 minutes if you are deprived of rest.

What types of exercise are good for sleep?

Doing light exercises, both aerobic and anaerobic, are enough to increase the quality of your sleep. These types of exercise are a good way to stimulate the release of hormones during the night. Different activities such as breathing exercises, meditation techniques, pilates, yoga, light jog, swimming, incline walk, or light Turkish get-ups can help you sleep better at night. Even some minor exercises that involve low-intensity movement can help.

However, aerobic exercise significantly impacts and contributes to your sleep quality. Cardio workouts, running on the treadmill, pedaling or even walking are excellent ways to get your daily dose of exercise. Moderate-intensity aerobic training aids sleep and increases your sleep duration because your body temperature increases with any cardiovascular exercise and the cooling after helps to sleep better. Some research done by the CDC showed that apart from aerobic activities, yoga is also very beneficial for healthy sleep.

Sleep Tips for Fitness Enthusiasts

When exercising, sleep is very important for muscle gain and recovery, as well as for weight loss. Therefore, you should make sure you sleep undisturbed every night and get at least 8 hours of rest.

First of all, it is essential to have a daily plan and try to stick with it. You need to develop a routine for all your daily activities. A continuous routine will balance your hormone production, and as a result, your circadian rhythm will sync with your regular sleep/wake up time. It will shorten the time you need to fall asleep in the evening and make getting up in the morning easier. Exercising close to bedtime can keep you alert and make it harder to fall asleep. Therefore, it is best to avoid working out four or five hours before bed.

To improve your sleep quality, you also need to pick the right mattress model, sheets, pillow, and any additional sleep products that will make you feel extra comfortable. When it comes to picking the right mattress or pillow, apart from focusing on the firmness and thickness preference, make sure your chosen model has proper support and conforming ability, as well as a sleep trial and a warranty. Additionally, you can create improve your sleep by creating your own little sleep sanctuary – set the right temperature, take care of any distractions, minimize noise, etc.

Avoid drinking any liquid. Most of us drink water before bed, so we don’t wake up thirsty during the night, but drinking too much will wake you up to go to the bathroom. In the end, you will get the same result, interrupted sleep and a severe impact on your overall sleep quality. It is best to limit fluid intake close to your bedtime, especially avoid any caffeine intake in the second half of the day, or at least four to six hours before bed. Except for coffee, caffeine can also be found in soda drinks and tea. Along with that, you also need to avoid alcohol and cigarettes before sleep. After alcohol consumption, you feel sleepy and may think that you will sleep better, but alcohol prevents you from transitioning to deep sleep. All of these harm your exercise routine, and they can also impact your sleep. It is also not recommended to eat any heavy meals for less than three hours before sleep. Heavy food can cause you discomfort because of the bowel movement that will keep you up. In case you get hungry before bedtime, a light snack will not disturb your sleep.

Taking naps during the day is also not a good idea. In most cases, they can refresh you a bit if you are very tired, but falling asleep at night may be harder. To have a good night of sleep, it would be best to avoid any forms of naps during the day, or at least limit them to thirty minutes.

Conclusion

There is no right amount of exercise to do, it’s all individual. However, it is recommended to get at least 150 minutes of activity during the week, which equals to 30 minutes for five out of seven days. The key is to create an exercising routine. Also, don’t overdo it as too much exercise can cause sleep problems.

To some, it may seem like a fabricated problem, invented to trick unsuspecting people into buying drugs they don’t need. It’s considered a common occurrence that pretty much everyone has faced at some point. However, Excessive Daytime Sleepiness (EDS) is indeed more critical than it may look – it signals various sleep disorders, and the resulting tiredness interferes with your enjoyment of free time, your productivity at work, and your ability to keep a lively and cheerful demeanor at home. For those who drive, excessive daytime sleepiness is seriously dangerous due to the risks linked to drowsy driving.

It’s important to know what causes EDS and what its effects on people and consequences are. Once you understand the seriousness of the issue, we will go over treatment methods that have been proven effective in the past. Remember that if you’re constantly sleepy during the day, or you interpret what we’re about to explain as a chance that you have excessive daytime sleepiness – it’s best to consult your doctor. They will be able to provide an accurate and helpful diagnosis and suggest solutions. Let’s examine this issue together, first.

Methods of Diagnosing Excessive Daytime Sleepiness

A common way people dismiss EDS as a non-issue is by claiming that it’s subjective. How can you tell if someone is sleepier during the day than they should be? A test being subjective doesn’t immediately discredit the method. While it’s hard to quantify how sleepy someone feels, subjective tests have historically been useful enough to help doctors reach a precise diagnosis, when coupled with blood tests, urine tests, and other lab examinations. We will list a few diagnosis methods that are used to determine whether a patient is dealing with excessive daytime sleepiness. All of them are commonly used, and while subjective, they provide enough insight to steer the tests and examinations towards uncovering specific sleep disorders, which can result in a very accurate diagnosis.

Epworth Sleeping Scale (ESS)

The Epworth Sleeping Scale (or ESS for short) was developed by Dr. Murray Johns at the Epworth Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. The way it works is, the patient is given a questionnaire to fill. There are eight questions in total, each having four possible answer options. These answers give 0-3 points based on which option you selected, and the points are added up in the end. If the patient has 10 or more points after completing all the questions honestly, it indicates the presence of a sleeping disorder. Scores of 11-15 generally hint towards moderate or mild sleep apnea. A score of 16 points or more could point towards narcolepsy or a more severe case of sleep apnea.   

In general, the ESS has been primarily used to detect and diagnose obstructive sleep apnea. However, doctors have had success using this method to find narcolepsy and idiopathic hypersomnia. As a rule, the patient will repeat the questionnaire after treatment methods have been applied, to measure their progress and check for improvements.

Pittsburg Sleep Quality Index (PSQI)

This very accessible questionnaire helps track a patient’s sleep quality over the course of a month. It takes roughly 5-10 minutes to complete and produces seven components that combine to create one global score. It was developed at the University of Pittsburg as an easy-to-use, accessible diagnosis method for clinicians to use with various demographics. While it has since been used in research (specifically in studies trying to connect sleep with problems like bipolar disorder or depression), the main application has been the diagnosis of sleep disorders. As a whole, the PSQI is particularly effective when it comes to detecting depression-related sleeping problems and self-reported issues.

The main downside is the same as most other subjective diagnosis methods. It’s very easy for a patient to exaggerate or misremember things, which creates unintentional false answers and muddies the issue further, potentially leading to inaccurate diagnosis. However, its ease of use and accessibility have resulted in it seeing use in clinical practice, as well as for research purposes, primarily focusing on patients who have at least hit adolescence.

Multiple Sleep Latency Test (MSLT)

This test is a much more complex diagnostic method than the questionnaires we’ve covered thus far and takes quite a bit more time. The purpose of the MSLT is to measure how long it takes for the patient to fall asleep during predetermined daytime nap periods. It is commonly used to test for narcolepsy and to differentiate between excessive daytime sleepiness and simple physical exhaustion. This method has also seen niche use in assessing the effectiveness of breathing breathing treatment. The test consists of 4-5 nap windows, each lasting 20 minutes with a two-hour break in between naps. It takes place over roughly seven hours during a single day, during which the doctors monitor the patients’ brainwaves, EEG patterns, eye movements and more. Here’s how it works:

Before you go to the test facility, you are asked not to consume chocolate, coffee or similar stimulants. In most cases, a formal sleep study takes place the night before the MSLT. You may be asked to submit a urine sample so they can make sure you don’t have any substances in your body that could muddle the test results. After a short questionnaire, electrodes are attached to your head, near the eyes and to the chin to measure and record eye movement, brain waves and muscle tone. By doing this, they can detect when or if you enter REM sleep. After 20 minutes, you’re woken up and wait two hours before doing the test again. The idea is – the easier it is for you to fall asleep (measured by how long it takes), the more signs point towards a sleeping disorder such as narcolepsy. Once you’re done, a neurologist or sleep specialist reviews the results and informs your primary care physician.

Causes of Excessive Daytime Sleepiness

A staggering amount of conditions and factors can bring on EDS. We will present a general list, but not every possible cause will be on it. Because the number of causes is so huge, it’s important to get a diagnosis as soon as possible, to prevent things from getting worse or problems from going undetected. Here’s the list:

–          Insufficient sleep quantity or quality during the night. This is particularly troublesome for shift workers or people with nocturnal habits

–          Any source of circadian rhythm disruption. Your biological clock can be put off-schedule by problems such as jet lag or shift work, but it may also indicate a full-blown circadian rhythm disorder

–          Clinical depression or similar disorders can cause EDS. Poor sleep quality (and all the resulting consequences) are very common in depressive patients

–          A variety of sleep disorders, including narcolepsy, restless legs syndrome and sleep apnea

–          Side-effects of OTC (over-the-counter) and prescription medication can include or contribute to EDS. If this is the case for you, quickly consult your doctor to receive alternative recommendations, so you can get rid of EDS before other problems crop up. Remember, having a bad sleep schedule can impact your immune system and lead to more complications

–          Drug abuse

There are more, but this is enough to paint the picture. The sheer number of possible causes makes your medical history a crucial component of the diagnosis. Make sure the people conducting your tests know every relevant piece of information about your health. Even if your statements are subjective and they revolve around your personal experience, they could be more than enough to eliminate certain causes and speed up the diagnosis.

Consequences of Excessive Daytime Sleepiness

If you’ve ever tried to stay awake for a full day or two, you are familiar with most EDS symptoms. People who are running on an empty sleep tank are far more irritable and difficult to deal with, as their cognitive sharpness and emotional stability are worsened. EDS is also one of the primary factors that lead to drowsy driving, and drowsy driving is as bad as drunk driving when it comes to the risks involved. EDS also amplifies problems like depression and makes the patient less productive, happy and safe as a result. It can feel like all your motivation and energy got flushed away.

It can be hard to distinguish simple physical fatigue from sleepiness, but those are two very different issues. Just because you got a lot of exercise in a given day doesn’t mean you instantly become drowsy and sleepy.

Treating Excessive Daytime Sleepiness

There’s no one reliable cure for excessive daytime sleepiness. The truth of the matter is that in order to get rid of EDS, you have to cure or solve the underlying causes. EDS is a symptom, not a disorder in itself. As a result, EDS treatment can vary greatly depending on where the problem comes from. Sometimes it’s enough to establish and maintain healthy sleeping habits, but often you need proper professional therapy. For example:

Narcolepsy is a very common sleeping disorder since it affects roughly 1 in 2000 people. It makes the brain unable to regulate the cycle of when we sleep and when we’re awake. Normally we spend about 75% of our sleeping time in the NREM stage. That stage is where the body works on repairing and building new tissues and bone structure or strengthening our immune system. REM is essentially the mental counterpart to NREM, as it helps consolidate memories and develop or strengthen cognitive functions. A person suffering from narcolepsy has way more REM sleep than normal, as it starts almost immediately upon falling asleep. On top of that, they can experience REM outbursts during the day, potentially getting into danger.

Other symptoms of narcolepsy include sleep paralysis, hallucinations, and cataplexy (when a patient can fall unconscious after experiencing laughter, terror or crying). Most narcoleptics will have more than one of these four symptoms, but not all of them. Depending on which symptoms they exhibit, treatment may include one or more of the following:

–          Antidepressants are often very effective. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) are prescribed to people suffering from hallucinations and cataplexy. They’re also known for suppressing REM sleep, which is necessary for a narcoleptic patient to get back to a normal sleep schedule.

–          Sodium Oxybate is a strong sedative. Contrary to popular belief, narcoleptics have problems sleeping at night, and treatment like this can help balance their sleep/wake cycle.

–          Stimulants are often used to keep patients awake during the day. Alternatively, drugs similar to amphetamine also show good results.

Restless legs syndrome is treated slightly differently. The first step is always to stop all caffeine, nicotine and alcohol intake, as these substances can amplify the problem. While caffeine can help alleviate the feeling of drowsiness during the day, you solve nothing by contributing to the underlying cause of EDS. Check your diet (ideally together with your doctor) for any ingredients that could be contributing to this disorder. Depending on whether it’s primary RLS (for which there is no true cure; you can only alleviate symptoms) or secondary RLS (similar situation to EDS – you want to solve the underlying issue), treatment options may vary, but you can and should introduce physical therapy into your daily routine. For example, getting good amounts of exercise each week, along with proper stretching, can really help you deal with the symptoms. The same applies to massage therapy, ice packs, whirlpool baths, etc.

If you experience RLS symptoms more than twice a week, or your doctor calls for it, you should get medication to help fight these symptoms. If you only sometimes suffer from them, you can take medication only during those days. Here’s a brief list of common medication prescriptions used to treat RLS:

–          Anticonvulsants are used to relieve chronic pain, or in some cases, nerve pain. They also relieve RLS symptoms

–          Alpha2 agonists stimulate the brain stem’s alpha2 receptors. This is done to dull the part of the nervous system in charge of involuntary muscle movement.

–          Dopaminergic agents increase dopamine levels in the brain and improve leg sensations during RLS. However, do not take these drugs daily, as it can often lead to your symptoms getting worse.

–          Opiates are a last resort option if nothing else works. They’re normally used to treat pain, but also help relieve RLS symptoms in most patients. Beware, however; opiates are highly addictive.

Note: Even without medication and direct therapy, you can improve your sleep quality and quantity by taking a look at your lifestyle and habits. If you have bad habits that deprive you of sleep, focus on eliminating them as soon as possible. You can make a big difference for yourself that way, and make any other treatment much more effective.

Shift work sleep disorder (SWSD) manifests as difficulties in falling asleep, staying asleep, or reaching a state of deep, restful sleep for a period of at least one month. This disorder is often compared to jet lag, experienced by people who travel across different time zones. Jet lag is characterized by a pronounced sense of fatigue and an overwhelming desire to sleep.

Not getting enough quality sleep can affect your overall health, mood, concentration and learning abilities, sex drive, mental health, and can lead to a series of medical conditions.

In this article, we review shift work sleep disorder, how it affects people and how to prevent it or treat it if you have already been diagnosed with SWSD.

What Is Shift Work

In the US, shift work is considered for any job that falls out of the regular nine to five schedule. It mostly refers to night or graveyard shifts, that start in the evening and span during the night, or it can also refer to continuous shifts that can last for an extended period of time, somewhere as much as 40 hours. There are also semi-continuous shifts, they are usually short, but you can do two or three of them each day. Continuous shifts are frequent in healthcare, law enforcement, security, firefighters, military, hospitality, pilots and aircrew industry and many more.

Most shift workers follow the same day to day schedule, and this is known as the same shift pattern. Multiple shift pattern means that people working certain jobs are changing shifts, and can work day or night shifts, depending on the schedule.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report from 2004, around 15% of workers in the US followed some shift work pattern.  4.7% of people reported to work evening shifts, 3.2% said to work night shifts, 3.1% reported working a multiple shift schedule, while 2.5% had a rotating shift schedule.

In many industries, jobs with irregular hours are standard so that shift work might be the only option. Some people who have kids find it easier to sync with them while working shifts. Shift work is usually paid more, due to not working regular hours, so people who seek a financial aspect of a job may find that tempting. Employers also love shift work, as that enables them to be active and profitable for 24 hours a day, so many will choose this option.

However, working shifts have been linked to a series of health problems and sleep disturbances. SWSD disrupts your circadian rhythm, that is in charge of telling you when is the time to do things during the day, and when is the time to go to sleep. Even though the circadian clock is built-in, and there are molecular mechanisms that keep it in place, our environment can significantly affect it. That is why maintaining a good sleep pattern is very important.

Symptoms of SWSD include headaches, excessive sleepiness and fatigue, insomnia, irritability, lack of focus, memory problems and many others. As a result, it can lead to some mental health problems such as anxiety and depression. Lack of alertness can lead to some work-related and non-work related injuries, mainly if you are operating heavy machinery or driving. Sometimes, the results can even be fatal.

How Shift Work Affects Sleep

Your body is in homeostasis, meaning it keeps all the inside processes and parameters inside some range. When some parameter falls out of that range, it says that something is wrong and it damages the body. Getting the regular required sleep lets our brain do a little housekeeping and keeps everything running smoothly.

Our brain has a built-in mechanism to control our circadian rhythm, which is crucial to our sleep patterns. Outside stimuli, such as light and temperature are sensors that give us important information about our environment. The brain processes this information and then regulates and synchronizes the hormone secretion with night/day cycle. The suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) is a part of the hypothalamus, and it controls many homeostatic processes, including the production of melatonin, a hormone that is in charge of feeling sleepy and falling asleep. Typically, melatonin is produced in the evening and throughout the night, making sure that you stay asleep during the night. But shift workers are required to sleep during the night, so different needs will change the patterns of melatonin production.

In humans, sleep consists of two different stages, rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM (NREM) sleep. REM phase is usually when dreams occur. NREM sleep consists of three stages. First one is the transition between being awake and falling asleep, second is the stage of light sleep when your heart and breathing rate slow down, and your muscles relax. The third stage is characterized by the slow brain waves, deep relaxation, and that is when your brain does the maintenance, repairing itself, as well as muscles and other tissue in your body. This stage is crucial, and unfortunately, it is mostly disturbed by the shift work sleep disorder. That is why SWSD can lead to many health problems, as your body can not restore properly, and when this becomes chronic, medical conditions are inevitable.

SWSD can have different effects on people. Some are entirely unaffected by it, especially the “night owls,” while others have many consequences. However, there are some trends noticed.

• Many shift workers believe they are not getting enough sleep, and while people with regular schedules fall in the same category, the numbers are much higher with shift workers.
• A massive portion of shift workers reported that they are suffering from excessive sleepiness and insomnia.
• According to a 2009 study, 10 to 20 percent of shift workers reported falling asleep during the job. An estimated $40 billion is lost every year due to the alertness-related incidents and poor job performance because of the decreased focus.
• More accidents happen during the night shift.
• Drowsiness and falling asleep are the most significant cause of car crashes.

It is advised that everyone should get seven to nine hours of sleep each day. However, shift workers reportedly get only five to six hours each day, which is one to four hours less than recommended. They also tend to work more than non-shift workers, which can additionally reduce sleep.

Symptoms

While signs of SWSD vary between individuals, here are some most common symptoms:

• Insomnia. Whether it is the difficulty to fall asleep or inability to stay asleep, insomnia is relatively common for people who suffer from shift work sleep disorder
• Lack of energy, drowsiness, and excessive sleepiness while being awake
• Involuntarily sleep that happens for just a few seconds called microsleep
• Poor concentration
• Decreased learning and memory ability
• Slow reaction time
• Headaches
• Irritability and mood swings
• Disturbed metabolism and nausea

To make things worse, chronic SWSD has been linked to disrupted eating habits, leading to obesity, heart problems, and diabetes. Females with SWSD have also reported menstrual cycle problems. Lack of sleep also affects your immune system, making you more likely to get the flu, a cold, or some other contagious disease.

Mental health is also affected by SWSD, and if not treated it can lead to feelings of depression and anxiety. Shift workers often feel out of sync with their friends and families, which can lead to loneliness, and affect their relationships with others.

Diagnosis

If you suspect that you are suffering from SWSD, pay a visit to your doctor. They will ask you a series of questions about your sleep patterns, disturbances, and work schedule. They’ll also need to know about your medical past, as well as medication use. Sometimes, you’ll need to fill out a sleep diary for a week or two to give them a better insight into your sleeping habits.

Since SWSD has some symptoms similar to other sleep disorders, doctors will need to cross out conditions such as obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and narcolepsy. They might keep you for an overnight study, where they’ll monitor your brain waves, heart and respiration rate, body movements and snoring.

Treatment

Shift work sleep disorder is mostly treated with some lifestyle changes. There are certain things you can do to get rid of the symptoms.

Firstly, talk to your supervisor about your shifts if you are working in an industry where you can’t take the usual nine to five working hours, limit your shifts to a maximum of 12 hours. Also, make sure not to do more than four 12-hour shifts before taking a rest of 48 hours, as it will help you recover and it will improve your concentration at work.

If you are on a fixed work schedule, try to go to sleep and wake up at the same time every day, and get at least seven hours of sleep each day. By doing this, your brain will change the production patterns of melatonin and adapt your circadian rhythm, which will make it easier for you to fall and stay asleep.

If you have a multiple shift pattern, consider taking naps before going to work. Naps can improve your alertness and energize you, so an up to 45 minutes snooze before work can go a long way. You can even consider taking a quick 20-minute power nap on a break if it is allowed. That will help you stay concentrated throughout your whole shift.

Some other things you can try to improve your condition are:

• Keep a sleep diary. That will help you see the irregularities in your sleep patterns and disturbances that caused them.
• Avoid using stimulants such as alcohol, caffeine, and nicotine, especially before bedtime.
• Avoid working extended hours and overtime. Extra money can be tempting, but more extended hours mean an increased chance for work-related accidents.
• Make sure you have enough time for sleep, but also participate in social activities. Stay close to your friends and family.
• Expose yourself to bright light during your active hours. Also, make sure to wear sunglasses if there is sunshine outside, and you are going to sleep. Light exposure will help your brain synchronize your body hormones with the new daily rhythm.
• Keep your room dark, quiet, and set a comfortable temperature. You can get blackout curtains for your bedroom, and use earplugs or white noise machines.
• Ask your household to keep quiet during your bedtime. If you are asleep while they are awake, ask them to use the headphones when listening to music or watching TV. Also, it would be best if they restrained from doing chores such as vacuuming and washing dishes, as they could easily wake you up. Keep the “do not disturb” sign on your door.
• Avoid long commute, or try to arrange to carpool with your coworkers, as it will cut down the time you’ll be spending behind the wheel, and decrease the risk of accidents.
• Keep a healthy diet rich in fruits and veggies.
• While some people rely on caffeinated drinks to help them get through a night shift, be aware, as caffeine has a “crush” effect, when the people feel more tired after the impact of increased alertness have passed

If these lifestyle changes don’t help, your doctor might prescribe you some medications or supplements to help relieve your SWSD. Some prescription drugs can be addictive and have adverse side effects in the long run, so doctors will mainly stick to melatonin supplements. They are natural, non-addictive and with fewer side effects in the long term.

The impact of sound on the quality of our sleep cannot be overstated. For many, achieving sleep is hard enough without the addition of external sounds complicating matters. While some noises might help in calming down, others can disrupt our sleep, making it challenging to fall asleep again. Sleep is critical as it helps the body recover and restore itself. Consistently getting the right amount of sleep can help prevent a range of health problems and illnesses. Thus, maintaining a regular sleep schedule is vital. However, what if our sleep gets disrupted? For individuals residing in cities, securing a quiet place to sleep might prove to be difficult. Being exposed to noise can lead to insomnia, which, over time, increases the risk of cardiovascular diseases and other health issues.

Luckily, there are many things you can do to isolate yourself from unpleasant noise and sleep better. In this article, we will cover how noise affects your sleep, help you handle noisy environments and give you some helpful tips on how to fall asleep despite being in noisy environments.

How Noise Interferes with Sleep

Believe it or not, noise is a significant cause of sleep problems.  Even if you don’t wake up, sounds can affect your sleep cycles, and noisy surroundings are a big influence on sleep quality and quantity.

Noises in your surroundings can be so disruptive that they wake you up, but they can also interfere with your sleep even if they don’t disturb you. While you sleep, the brain is still active and aware of sounds around you. If there is much noise around you won’t be able to go from light sleep into a deep sleep or REM sleep, the two sleep cycles that have the most restorative functions. By staying in light sleep, you will end up feeling tired upon waking up. A research that was conducted has linked cardiovascular disease and noise exposure during the night. The study claimed that because of sleep disturbances, even low-level noises can interfere with your health.

Noises like cars, buses, trains, planes, constructions, or even wind turbines are one of the biggest causes of sleep problems. These noises surround us in our everyday lives, but we give no meaning to them. Even small sounds that are low as 30 decibels affect our sleep. Imagine what traffic with 70 decibels, trains, and subways with 90 decibels, and plains with 100 decibels can do.

Noise sensitivity varies from person to person, and some are more sensitive than others. The most sensitive periods are during light sleep, but if you are a light sleeper, noise can wake you up even from a deep sleep. Generally speaking, noise mostly affects us during the second stage of sleep, the lightest stage and a non-REM cycle. When talking about specific age groups, studies have shown that children and elderly people are the most vulnerable to noise disruptions. But, adults can also be susceptible to these problems. Most people think that they will get used to noise over time. However, one study showed that individuals sensitive to noise have increased cortisol levels and heart rate changes during the night.

Lastly, there are also emotional noises that impact our sleep cycles. Sounds of infants crying tend to wake up mothers easily from their sleep.

How to Deal With Noise

It might be difficult to deal with noise, but there are specific ways that will help you sleep at night, no matter what is going around you.

Ignore the noise

In most cases, if something is bothering us, we tend to focus on it which only increases the nuisance. We have probably done this many times, but this makes it worse. When we put focus on a single thing, we become more sensitive to the stimulus the sound gives. To prevent the sound from bothering you, you need to fortify your mind and switch your focus to something else. Even though it sounds difficult, you need to ignore the sound. The idea is to avoid making your brain active. When you focus on things, your brain is active and concentrating on those things, and that keeps you awake during the night, and causes sleep deprivation.

Distract Your Ears

If you cannot ignore the problem, it is best to switch your focus and distract yourself. One of the ways to drown out external noises is to create your own that will distract you. You need to create relaxing and soothing sounds that will switch your focus but also relax your still active brain. Avoid making any agitating noise, and the idea is to give yourself a pleasant sound to focus on, not just another sound that will keep you awake. You can create a bedtime playlist with relaxing songs, a playlist with classical music, a playlist with ambient sounds or a playlist with your favorite music.

For further investment, you can also buy noise-canceling headphones that will address and cancel any cacophonous and loud external noises. Getting used to them can be difficult, which is why it would be best to practice using them. You can try training yourself on sleeping with the headphones, and soon enough you won’t have any problems wearing them. Alternatively, you can try earplugs to keep those sounds away or add a defense from external noise to the bedroom. You can purchase a white noise machine that emits sounds that mask noises or disturbances from the surroundings. Additionally, you can try using a portable fan or an air purifier that is especially good for sleepers with allergies.

You can also try some of the many white noises and guided meditation applications that are made to help you sleep. If you are trying to block snoring from your partner or roommate, you should buy nasal strips and nasal spray. These products are the best way to cancel annoying snoring sounds. You can also try snoring mouthpieces or anti-snoring devices.

Visualization

Imagining and visualizing a peaceful and quiet environment will help distract your mind so that it won’t focus on the disruption. You need to visualize a place that makes you feel relaxed, focus on the smell, sight, and sound on that place, and transfer yourself there. It will help you avoid paying attention to anything that currently surrounds you.

Deep Breathing

Breathing exercises are also excellent as a distraction from the noise and a sleep technique that will help you go to sleep comfortably. These exercises give a simple and effective solution for those who have troubles sleeping at night. Because breathing is something that we can control and regulate, they are a useful tool for relaxing and clearing the mind. Deep breathing is best for individuals who are struggling with blocking clamor without external help, like earplugs or headphones. Doing these exercises helps oxygen circulate through the body and during the process helps calm the mind and body. It has also been shown that they are useful in lowering blood pressure. All you need to do is to inhale through the nose and exhale through the mouth in rhythmic cycles. It is best to start the exercises with counts of three for every inhale and exhale. After that, you can begin to increase the count up to five or even six slowly. Make sure to count each repetition.

Proper implementation of breathing exercises can help you defend yourself from all kinds of noises. They are one of the most effective meditation techniques to implement in your life. Once you master this, you will be able to strengthen your mind, improve your focus, and relax in situations that escalate your temper. You just need to take slow and deep breaths.

Meditation

Meditation is a great way to relax and shift your focus. This calming method has been proven to help slow down heart rate and lower blood pressure. Calming the mind with meditation leads to a more relaxed state that will reflect positively on your sleep, and you will be able to fall asleep even in noisy places.

Progressive Muscle Relaxation

This technique is often used in yoga to help reduce stress. The method of progressive muscle relaxation relaxes the body and relieves you of physical stress. You need to tense and relax each of your body’s areas. You start with your head, work your way down to the feet.

Keep Yourself Exhausted

A good way not to pay attention to any sounds is to keep yourself too tired. Exercise is an excellent way to increase the amount of deep sleep you get, and it also contributes to a restful and more sound sleep. Any physical activity can reduce stress and make you spend energy. At the end of the day, you will feel tired, and neither you nor your brain will pay attention to anything around you. The more physically tired you are, the more you won’t be able to stay awake during the night.

Follow A Bedtime Routine

Our bodies respond to any change in the environmental or in our habits. Because of that, you need to have a constant routine for all your daily activities and stick to it, as it will help your body know when to do certain things. Your body will get a signal when it is time to sleep, and the routine will shorten the time you need to fall asleep. You can add certain relaxing activities into your schedule before bed, such as reading a book, having a warm bath, exercising or any activity that calms you down. It is vital to create a stable routine that your body will get used to and maintain it.

Make Your Bedroom Comfortable

Apart from activities you can do, you also need to have a comfortable sleep environment that will suit your preferences. Adjust the temperature, put calming colors and decorations, minimize noise as much as possible, and try to take care of distractions. The same thing goes for your bed. You need to create a comfortable sleep surface by choosing the right mattress model, sheets, pillow, and any additional sleep products you need.

Channeling our inner Mythbusters, it’s time to dive in and uncover whether the concept of beauty sleep is a solid fact or merely a myth. The phrase “beauty sleep” might sound familiar, perhaps something your mother or grandmother mentioned. But here’s the kicker – the scientific community has entered the fray, transforming what might seem like idle chit-chat into a topic worthy of rigorous inquiry. Indeed, when the researchers in their lab coats get involved, you know it transitions from mere speculation to a matter of significance. So, who benefits from demystifying the concept of beauty sleep? Continue reading, and you may just discover that indulging in extra shut-eye could turn out to be the ultimate beauty tip you never knew you needed.

We all know how powerful the beauty industry is these days, but what if the key ingredient, the elixir of the fresh and young beauty, is available to all of us for free? Would it all collapse? Most likely it would not, but if you are into conspiracy theories, then this could be a good one.

So, what hides behind the veil of beauty sleep? It is so simple that you would barely believe it. Beauty sleep theory is based on getting enough sleep, approximately eight hours each night. That is it. No vampire treatments, no overhyped creams with weird ingredients, no goofy sheet face masks that can scare the hell out of your man (although that can be fun), nothing. It seems that the top beauty treatment is actually affordable to all of us, so why are not we all glowing and shining as soon as we step out of bed? Well, because we underestimate the power of sleep and do not look at it as a way of nourishing ourselves.

When it comes to beauty, women usually think about makeup products first. The market is overflooded with various products which are intended to cover each millimeter of our faces in tons of layers; it’s become ridiculous. So while we are getting lost among lipstick shades and face primers, we forget about the base, about that plain canvas which our skin represents. Yes, there are facial creams, nourishing treatments and so on, but none of that can help if we do not nurture our skin correctly from the inside. Skin is the largest organ of our body, so everything that we do to ourselves will eventually show off on it, skin remembers everything, and by everything, we mean every stress, every sleepless night, worries, anxiety, etc.

Studies have shown that sleep deprivation can have a negative impact on our facial appearance. Dark under-eye circles, sapless skin with a greyish undertone, wrinkles, skin aging, small imperfections, and pimples are all connected to our unhealthy sleep habits. So not only that we feel tired and drained after a night of poor sleep, but we also look like that.

During the day our skin is working and defending itself from external impacts, and sleep time is reserved for regeneration and intense repair, as skin cells tend to recover two times faster during the night. Once we reach the REM-deep sleep phase, the skin regeneration process is at its highest, so our beauty sleep is actually a phase of proper deep sleep. As a part of the repair process, while we are sleeping, our skin produces collagen which makes our skin more plump and less wrinkle-prone. While we are snoozing, our body is boosting blood flow to the skin which gives it that healthy glow and eliminates dullness of our face. When the facial skin is well-rested and regenerated, then it can work properly with additional beauty care products.

To make a conclusion, we can say that the beauty sleep myth is busted. There is an indisputable correlation between our sleep hygiene and our facial appearance, so here is an experiment: Try sleeping for at least seven hours per night and take a picture of your face every morning to notice and track the improvement. Once you become aware of the change, you will sleep more for sure, and that is not only beneficial for your appearance but your overall wellbeing as well. The next time you laugh at some beauty sleep meme, remember that it is not entirely a joke. Now let’s check out some useful tips that can enhance the effects of beauty sleep.

Tips For Enhanced Beauty Sleep Routine

Before we go to sleep, we need to prepare our skin and take the day off, so here are some useful tips to improve your routine, because sometimes we girls need those few extra steps in order to really look their best in the morning.

• Makeup – always make sure to remove all the makeup before you go to sleep. Sleeping with your makeup will undo all beauty sleep effects, it will clog your pores, and no matter how long you sleep, your skin would not be grateful at all.
• Skincare – depending on your skin type, after cleaning you should apply a proper moisturizer. A good moisturizer is lightweight, soothing and hydrating. If you already have wrinkles, applying some anti-age products before sleep to help with the fresh morning look. Eye-creams and serums will sink into the skin during the sleep, but you should practice applying them around 15 minutes before you go to bed, because once we lay down, it is easy to wipe off the products by accident with pillowcase or sheets.
• Sleep routine – our day has only 24 hours and if we sleep around 8 hours that means that we spent ⅓ of our day sleeping. That sounds like huge a waste of time because we are not much productive while we sleep, but by allowing ourselves to sleep for those recommended eight hours, we are doing more for ourselves. And beauty sleep does not really work with only 6 hours of sleep, so try finding more time for rest.
• Bedding – we have all woken up with bedding line imprints on our face many times, it usually occurs if the pillowcase is made from cotton or similar materials that tend to develop permanent lines and wrinkles. To avoid that try using silk bedding.
• Sleep position – when it comes to facial care, many dermatologists recommend back sleep position as the best one for several reasons. By sleeping on your back, you avoid putting additional pressure on one side of the face. For example, if you usually sleep on your right side, that side of your face is constantly being pressed into the pillow, which makes that one side more wrinkle-prone and it will probably age faster than the left side. Also, this position prevents all the oils and creams from our face to get in touch with the pillowcase, sheets, and our hair.
• Pillowcase – this part of the bedding is mostly in touch with our face, so it is essential to keep it clean. You should change it at least once a week and flip it every night. Pillowcases are like a playground for bacteria and all kinds of dirt that can plug your pores, so it is essential to keep them clean.

Bad Habits That Are Hindering Your Beauty Sleep

After some useful tips, we would like to point out a few things that are preventing you from experiencing a night of proper beauty sleep. We all do these things sometimes, but somehow we always need someone else to reminds us that they are wrong.

• Coffee – we are all aware that coffee can keep us awake when needed, but did you know that half of the caffeine will remain in your system even after four to six hours? Research has shown that it is best to avoid drinking coffee at least six hours before your desired bedtime; otherwise it will restrict your sleep. If you do not drink coffee often, or feel sensitive to it, we recommend drinking it only before your lunchtime. Coffee addicts should also try to reduce the intake of their favorite drink after 3 PM. In the afternoon hours try replacing coffee with green tea which contains less caffeine.
• Smartphone – we start our day on our phones, and we go to sleep with them. We all have the urge to scroll down through our feed just one more time before falling asleep, which can be attached to so-called FOMO syndrome. It is easy to get carried away because time flies on social networks, and your predicted 5 minutes can easily turn into one hour or more of Instagram stalking. Limit your time on social networks and always minimize the lighting of the screen if you are in a dark room.
• Netflix – with Netflix binge-watching your favorite shows has no limits, it is so easy to get addicted to it quickly and before you are aware, it is already morning. If you are a fan of horror movies, then we have some bad news for you. Watching scary movies or series before bed will cause the adrenaline rush and arouse the chemicals in your body that can keep you awake, so if you have plans to sleep tonight, you should watch some less thrilling movies.
• Nightcap – although many recommend a glass of wine per day, drinking alcohol during the evening hours also affects our sleep negatively. It will make you feel sleepy, but it can also lower the quality of your shut-eye, and considering that it also has diuretic features, you will probably have to wake up at some point to go to the bathroom.
• Overthinking – taking our daily stress and problems to bed is never a good idea, but we usually tend to analyze and overthink everything while we are in our bed. Negative thoughts and worries will keep you awake longer than you want, and it will also reduce your sleep quality. We recommend writing it all down in sleep journals before bed, that way you will express your thoughts and concerns, and you will feel more relaxed once you go to sleep.
• Exercise – there is no need to become a gym addict or run a marathon, but a small amount of physical activities did not harm anyone. When we exercise, our body produces endorphins which help us feel better about ourselves. It will also take some of our energy so we will feel more tired at the end of the day and sleep better.

Beauty Sleep Benefits

We gave you our tips and tricks which you need to follow if you want to see the beautifying effects of sleep. It is essential to be aware that beauty sleep is not some miraculous treatment that will magically beautify your appearance over the night. Beauty sleep works the best in cooperation with all the above-listed things which basically all suggest that you should nurture a healthy lifestyle in every possible aspect. In the end, we would like to point out the most important benefits that you can gain from beauty sleep.

• Morning glow – your complexion will be all glowy after a night of good sleep due to the enhanced blood circulation during the night. It works as a free spa rejuvenation treatment at home.
• Wrinkles – collagen production is another process that happens while we are sleeping and deals with our fine lines. Today collagen is the most popular ingredient of anti-age products because it gives skin youthful elasticity and plumpness.
• Eye-circles – our under-eye area tends to get darker and more prominent as we age, this can be connected with our genetics, but it is also associated with our sleep habits. The lack of sleep means less time for blood circulation which will show off as pronounced and dark circles under our eyes.
• Skincare – tired facial skin lacks hydration and circulation features which will prevent your skincare products to really show off what they can do. Only when the skin is well-rested, it can cooperate properly with other beautifying skin care products.
• Hair – our hair will also feel the benefits of healthy sleep routine. During the night hair follicles are receiving restorative nutrients that are in charge of growth and strength, so when there is not enough time for that process to occur, our hair tends to become dry, damaged, it breaks easier and falls off too.
• Wellbeing – beauty sleep would not only show off its benefits on your face, but you will also feel much better from the inside. Once you wake up well-rested, you will feel positive, more concentrated and in the right mood, and your body will be thankful.