Guide to Successful Sleep
Before we all became transfixed on the global pandemic, the topic of sleep had already begun to set in as something of a global obsession. From books to sleep-inducing drinks, the $65 billion sleep aid market seems to bring an ever-growing set of solutions to our sleep deficit. Whether these solutions work or not, one thing is true - we are tired AF.
You’ve probably heard the dire statistics before: More than 70% of Americans report they sleep poorly at least once a month and 1 in 10 Americans report insufficient sleep every night. More than a third of Americans report sleeping less than the recommended 7 hours per night on a regular basis.
With sleep as our core foundation to health, these facts are cause for deep concern. As individuals, we should be paying as much attention to our sleep - if not more - than we do to our diet, exercise and other health factors.
I have personally been on a lifelong journey to find successful sleep. After nearly three decades of poor sleep (since my teen years), I have finally begun to break through to finding my personal formula. Here are some PRO TIPS from a recovering sleep struggler.
#1: Rebrand Yourself As a Good Sleeper
The first tip is the simplest, but most profound, of changes - a mindset shift. It’s time for a new label! You are not a “crappy sleeper” or an “insomniac” - you are work in progress, a great sleeper with some hurdles to clear. I learned this tip from my favorite podcast host. One new years for his resolution, he stopped labeling himself as a bad sleeper and found that this one change in his mindset helped to improve his sleeping quality almost immediately. The truth is, every human needs sleep to neurologically process and cleanup as well as to detoxify our bodies and brains. Save for some extremely rare disabilities, we are all born with the innate ability and drive to sleep and we simply need to work to unstick whatever blockages are in our way. Starting with our belief in our sleep skills can do wonders! Positive self talk and labeling is key. I now say “I used to be a bad sleeper.” Put it in the past!
#2: Let in the Light
Our eyes are really an external piece of our brain, with light receptors dialed in to trigger both waking and sleeping hormones depending on the angle of the sun. To get your brain sleep and wake hormones in tip top performance, neurologists recommend a daily walk (often called a “circ walk”) of 5-10 minutes within the first hour of waking and again just before sundown. So, right when you get out of bed (or as soon as the sun is up), get outdoors, let the sunlight in your eyes and ditch the sunglasses. Do it again, just before the sun sets. This one simple change can get your natural sleep cycles and energy hormones back on track within a matter of days. The movement, even short and sweet, is also beneficial (more on that below).
#3: Dial In Your Bedtime
Becoming a parent and helping my children learn to sleep has given me so many lessons about my own approach to bedtime. One thing many parents will complain about is that when they put their children to bed later than usual, the kids will often wake earlier. This is true for adults too - and it’s most often driven by overactive adrenals. When we push through our natural sleepy start time, our body pumps out some extra adrenaline and cortisol to artificially boost our energy and keep us awake. What’s more, research has shown that sleep before midnight is often the most important of the night. (I once heard an adage that “every hour of sleep before midnight is worth two after.” While unscientific, the results are directionally accurate.) If you find going bed later and makes you wake earlier or find yourself feeling a boost of late night energy or a bit “wired” at bed time, it’s most likely that you need an earlier bedtime. Try an hour earlier and maybe even more and see how it goes for a few days.
When my doctor recommended an earlier bedtime a few years ago during a particularly bad flare up, I scoffed. I treasure my evening downtime and hated the idea of feeling robbed of what little precious time I had. On the other side of this change, I can report I have definitely regained time through overall boosted energy in my day and finding efficiencies in other areas (like wasting less time on my phone). I have found my personal ideal bedtime is about 9:30 and no matter how much my husband teases me about it, I make my way by then to be asleep by 10 nearly every night, if not earlier. When you feel yourself starting to yawn or get droopy eyes, that’s your cue!
(On a related note, if you are an afternoon or evening cardio workout person and find yourself having a hard time getting sleepy at a reasonable hour, this may also be your adrenals talking. Try shifting your workout earlier in the day and see how your body responds.)
#4: Ritualize the Wind-down
Another astonishingly simple sleep lesson I learned after having babies was the value of a routine sleep ritual. Starting at just a few weeks old, I would read a couple of books and sing a song before putting my babes to sleep in their crib. The repetition of behaviors cues their brains of what’s to come, setting the stage for restful sleep. As they have grown, the ritual has remained and works like a charm for calming them into bedtime mode.
As adults, we also have sleep rituals, but often lose some of the hygiene that can help unblock some sleep hurdles. While most of us are probably at least brushing and flossing, we have some other habits that are probably less helpful. For one, our phones are pretty much the enemy of good sleep. Putting them down (ideally on a charger in another room) at least 30-60 minutes before bedtime is ideal. It’s not just the “bluelight” you’ve heard about (which indeed does mess with your circadian hormones triggered by your eyes), but the content most of us are scrolling that is designed to light up our amygdala and create all sorts of emotions and desire to go back for more. Phones and apps draw us in, distract us and keep our fight or flight system activated in a very unhelpful way. Set an alarm on your phone and put it down (mine starts at 9pm).
Beyond setting the phones aside, creating pleasing rituals to set the stage for sleep can be both highly effective and enjoyable. Between dropping the alcohol a few years ago and working on my sleep, I’ve discovered I really love to drink Bedtime Tea and taking a hot bath or soak (which has been well researched to show that heating your body is not only good for fighting viral infections and moving lymph fluid, it’s also a wonderful natural sleep inducer when your body drops temperature quickly after getting out.) I usually wrap things up by watching a calming TV show in my pajamas, and then making my way toward bed by washing my face, brushing my teeth and settling in to read a few pages before I fall asleep. This is also a perfect time to weave in any other self-care goals you might have, including journaling or meditation. Whatever you choose, try to be as consistent as you can be and you’ll find your ability to fall asleep will improve with repetition. Including your partner in the rituals can be fun to - but I highly recommend sticking to your perfect pattern regardless of what your family members are up to.
#5: Create a Sleep Sanctuary
My entire family makes fun of me about my sleep needs. Look, some people might be able to sleep with six dogs in the bed, a snoring spouse, flashing lights and noises from the street and a couple of kids climbing in bed during the wee hours of the morning, but that’s NOT ME. I wake easily and rarely fall back asleep as easily, if at all. I spent years sleeping (or rather, lying awake) next to a snoring spouse before I finally realized I simply needed another bedroom.
I prefer to sleep alone in a really dark room with white noise and earplugs whenever possible. I remind my children that I need good sleep and they mostly respect this. I bought effective blackout shades that I can easily move during the day to let in maximum light. I invested in a nice bed and linens and treat the room like my personal sleep spa. While others may judge or tease, the fact is that many people sleep alone and don’t talk about it because it’s not a highly accepted part of our culture. I will share that this change, maybe more than any other, has drastically improved my health and quality of life.
If you sleep with a partner who wakes you, with lights or screens in the room, with noises or pets or children who disturb you, I highly encourage you to look at how you can remove some if not all of the disruptions to better your sleep health.
*Bonus: If you find yourself sleeping much better when camping, during a power outage or otherwise away from technology, you are likely highly sensitive to electromagnetic interference - another proven sleep disruptor. Our homes are full of interference, from our wifi to our remote controls, televisions to appliances. Removing as many devices and appliances from your sleeping space as possible will help. Unplug anything not in use and put the remotes, laptops and tablets in another room.
#6: Cut the Caffeine
I know. You’re tired AF and now I’m suggesting taking away the one tool we all rely on to get through those god-awful mornings when we can barely keep our eyes open. But it’s so worth it! I cut caffeine about 12 years ago and never looked back. I didn’t miss the late morning jitters and I certainly didn’t miss the garbage sleep I got as a result. I traded my latte for decaf and saw results within a week.
Physiologically caffeine takes about 10 hours to fully leave your system…but that doesn’t take into account the other hormone fluctuations that caffeine stimulates (such as adrenaline or cortisol). If you aren’t sleeping well, try to curb the caffeine as much as humanly possible, first cutting yourself off by noon, then perhaps 10am…then trimming back your total number of servings until you can reach zero. It’s hard, but if you wean off slowly, hopefully you can skip the headaches and withdrawals. And remember sneaky sources of caffeine such as the minor residuals in decaf coffee and the caffeine in chocolate and tea should be limited after noon too.
#7: Move Every Day
While we all know the many benefits of exercise by now, it can be really difficult to fit into busy schedules and even more difficult if our body is flaring or our energy is low. While in my twenties and thirties, I pushed myself hard to visit the gym and workout 5 or more days a week. While there’s nothing wrong with this, per se, pushing myself so hard not only felt like it was often doing more harm than good (especially when I was waking early to go work out), but it also left me feeling like a failure when I did anything less than the ideal goal I had set out for the week or month. I have since changed my mindset to be about any basic daily movement. On the hard days, this can look like a slow morning walk (even better if you combine this one with tip #2 and do a daily circ walk!). My go-to movement is yoga and when I feel more energetic, I step it up to do a Barre or Pilates class or a Peloton bike ride. No matter what kind of movement you enjoy, doing a little something every day will make a huge difference in your sleep. Just move.
#8: Unbusy Your Brain
Even with the best self-care efforts to set the stage for sleep, our brains sometimes have other ideas. Whether you have trouble falling asleep, waking early or falling back asleep during middle of the night wakings (my specialty), “busy brain” or anxious thought patterns can be a major factor in preventing the proper sleep duration or quality.
I have tinkered with many approaches to this over the years and will share that my personal journey has taught me many lessons that go far beyond sleep benefits. In terms of unblocking great sleep, it really comes down to repatterning our thought processes.
One of the most effective paths to creating new thought patterns is to work with a professional therapist. I found great relief, especially during quarantine, working with a therapist on how to create new thought habits that helped reduce unnecessary rumination (such as overthinking that email you sent at work earlier in the day) and reduce general anxiety (which for me was a general sense of overwhelm and never feeling like I could catch up on all the to-dos.)
Through the use of the some simple cognitive tricks and tips, I have continued to work on both accepting things that I can and cannot change (even if I dislike them) and to create new pathways to focus on the good in life. Some people might call the latter a gratitude practice (which always sounded hokey to me), some call it mindfulness…but a simple daily journal finally cracked the code for me. By spending less than five minutes each morning writing down my basic intentions for the day and things I’m grateful for, no matter now silly or small, my brain has become much more attuned to the good in the world. I notice this helps my overall mood and sense of joy in life and has also tremendously improved my sleep - a virtuous cycle indeed! I also use a personal “permission slip” when I’m worrying about something needlessly. I give myself a time when I will think it over (say, I’m nervous for an upcoming meeting and so I let myself worry about it the next morning instead of stewing all night). I thank my brain for trying to protect me and then let it go until the scheduled time. What a sanity saver! It’s hard at first, but keep practicing!
If this feels too difficult, a sleep meditation can really help you get started unwinding your brain. You can easily find these on Spotify, Peloton (Ross Rayburn’s voice is like audio melatonin) or any other streaming service. Tapping (check out the Tapping Solution app w/ free content) is another great meditation option with well researched benefits by stimulating energy medians in your body to calm your stress response (if you’ve never heard of this or seen it done - watch a little youtube tutorial for the technique). Ultimately for bedtime, try to lean on audio only and using wireless headphones if you can to keep the light away.
#9: Ditch the Trackers
Call me an old lady, but I’m starting to think we are just all on data overload! A few years ago, I got a fancy FitBit, then linked it to a bunch of apps, including my Peloton, and really loved watching all the data roll in. Look at that heart rate! Check out those steps! It felt really fun at first.
Then I started noticing some odd behaviors in some online fitness groups. People were going to great lengths to get “closed rings” every day on their Apple Watch (getting back out of bed at 11:50pm to finish a challenge) or were going to Herculean efforts to get a daily blue “completion” circle on their Peloton calendar. I saw one woman shared the story of true love from her husband when she had to have an emergency surgery and he took her watch and ran around the hospital until the rings closed so that she wouldn’t lose her streak. While this spouse is clearly an attentive and caring person, stories like these illuminate that we are all sort of losing the plot with the tracking, caring more about the data than the story behind it - our bodies and how we feel.
As time went on, I pulled back from my data-watching and simply wore my watch in a very passive way, rarely checking any information other than resting heart rate or other helpful health indicators. But sometimes, especially when I would sleep really poorly, I would check the watch - and sure enough…I slept like shit.
Then, a few months ago, my skin decided it didn’t like wearing a watch anymore. I had to set it aside and fully listen to my physical cues again…and you know what? I started sleeping better! I don’t know how much better or why, but I can hazard a guess that both the lack of infrared disruption on my skin (a proven sleep disruptor) and the lack of focus on the data is beneficial. It’s another “free” and easy change that’s certainly worth a shot!
#10: Support with Supplements
While the above tips are about letting go and changing habits, this is the one tip that’s really about adding to your routines to support your sleep. There’s no reason to suffer - if you need help to sleep and you’ve tried everything else, by all means work with your doctor to get the support you need. That said, usually they can only offer temporary solutions.
If you are anything like me and you struggle to process pharmaceuticals, medical sleep aids can feel like a twisted joke (in my case leaving me exhausted the entire next day, even on the mildest of medications.) I’ve spent the better part of two decades dailing in the best of the best natural supplements that don’t leave me with side effects and I’m sharing the best of the best here:
Magnesium: Research has shown that due to conventional farming practices, global soils are now shockingly lacking in magnesium, leaving our bodies depleted of this essential mineral, no matter how many fruits and veggies we eat. Even if you take a multi-vitamin, and especially if you have an autoimmune or digestive disorder, you are most likely deficient in magnesium. There are two main types to consider and both will help with sleep. Magnesium with Calcium (often called “Cal-Mag”) will help your muscles relax, including your digestive tract (i.e. this helps improve constipation without negative side effects - a healthy upside). Magnesium Glycinate is also called “nature’s Valium” - known to relax the nervous system (it’s a bit of an oversell, but it does chill you out a notch or two). I have found that a combination of both kinds of magnesium is helpful for me. Other kinds of magnesium may be useful for other health reasons, but not particularly useful for sleep. (Note: Magnesium is a key ingredient in the cult-famous Calm powder and other Instagram-worthy favorites).
Relaxing Sleep Drops: New on the scene, I was accidentally delivered this with my groceries several months ago and thought I would give it a shot after reading the ingredients. It’s essentially valerian root, chamomile and other sleep support herbs. I take 5-10 drops before bed and notice a huge improvement in my sleep quality. I only wish it were glycerine based rather than alcohol, but that’s my only complaint. It tastes pretty icky so get yourself a chaser or mix it with a glass of water.
Bedtime Tea: They are NOT all created equal. Don’t waste your time or money on anything other than Yogi Bedtime (regular flavor) or Sleepytime Extra. If you struggle getting up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night and getting back to sleep, skip the tea and do the drops above only.
Calms Forte: I first found this years ago when I was pregnant and looking for help with my horrible insomnia and midnight morning sickness. This isn’t a miracle drug, but it is a lovely homeopathic supplement that helps calm a nervous brain and body and help induce great sleep. I also like that you can take this again in the middle of the night if needed, and I don’t experience any side effects the next morning.
Other adaptogens and brain goodies: My doctor recommends Zen tablets for me (combining gabba and l-theanine to support sleep brain function). I have also had great success with ashwaganda, but have cycled off of it for a bit because these sorts of adaptogens are shown to lose efficacy if used over a long period of time.
Lastly, unless for very occasional use, such as travel - try to avoid Melatonin as a key sleep support tool. Unlike the remedies above, it essentially teaches your brain chemicals to produce less natural melatonin over time. Your best bet for inducing melatonin is the morning and evening circ walk in tip #2 above.
On that note, it’s time for a good night’s sleep. Nighty night.
