Do you get your eight hours sleep a night? Probably not. I don’t either. Most people know the recommended amount of sleep every night but hardly any of us get it anymore, certainly not every single night. Lack of sleep and tiredness have just become a natural part of life for many people at this point. The problem is, not getting enough sleep has all sorts of effects on your health. It can affect your metabolism, increase your risk of mental health issues and increase your risk of getting diabetes to name just a few.
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The more sleep you lose, the more likely you are to be stressed out, and you’ll lose more sleep as a result. Once you get yourself into a cycle like that, it’s difficult to get out of. Before that happens, try some of these simple tricks to help you get more sleep.
Get A New Mattress
A mattress is something that you only buy once in awhile and it’s easy to forget about it. Your mattress will degrade gradually so you won’t notice as it gets worse over the years. A bad mattress makes it very difficult to sleep and even when you do drift off, you’ll be restless during the night. There are all sorts of different ones out there and most people think that memory foam is the best one. It was for a while but recently, newer foam technologies have been developed and some of them are better than memory foam. The Tuft & Needle mattress uses adaptive foam technology. The mattress is built using multiple foam layers that combine to give a great sleep experience, without using memory foam. They have been found to reduce back pain as well as promoting good sleep as well.
Wear Some Socks
Though you might not realize it, you could be struggling to sleep because you’re a bit too cold. Having cold hands or feet can make it way harder for you to drift off, but there’s a quick fix for that. Just put on a pair of socks when you go to sleep and you could soon notice a measurable difference in your ability to sleep.
Keep It Dark
You’re probably thinking that’s pretty obvious. You can’t sleep with the lights on. But turning off the lights doesn’t always make your room dark enough to sleep in. When you’ve got streetlights outside, cars going past, digital alarm clocks with a display on, and a phone next to your bed, it’s suddenly pretty bright in there. When your brain picks up this light, it thinks that it’s still daytime and doesn’t shutdown properly. If you’re struggling to get to sleep, try removing all of these unwanted light sources. Blackout curtains are great if you live on a busy street and if you can’t stop the light coming in, get an eye mask to block it all out.
Get Rid Of Pets
Having your dog or cat sleep at the end of your bed is nice but it’s probably affecting your sleep. Every time they wag their tail or start licking themselves in the night, that’s going to wake you up or disrupt your sleep. Even if you sleep right through, it won’t necessarily be good quality sleep and you’ll still run into a lot of the same health problems. You can still have them in the room with you but you should just put a bed down on the floor for them instead of letting them jump in with you.
Keep A Consistent Schedule
The body’s natural clock is very sensitive and it can easily be thrown out of whack, that’s how you get jetlag. When you keep a good sleep schedule and make sure you’re getting into bed at the same time every night, your body is ready to fall asleep naturally. But if you’re going to bed at different times of day, your body has no idea when to fall asleep. It’s important that you go to sleep and get up at the same time every day and you’ll find it much easier to get a good night’s rest. If you can, it’s a good idea to stick to the schedule at weekends as well, going to bed and getting up late will alter your body clock will shift and then you’ll spend the first few days of the week getting it back in line again.
People don’t realize just how much impact a lack of sleep is having on them, you’re likely to be the same so try out these techniques for getting a good night’s sleep and see how much difference it can make.
Disclosure: This is a contributed post.
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Donna L.
December 11, 2017 at 4:59 amHelpful advice, thanks.
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