To get and stay healthy the typical recommended range for adults is to get six to eight hours of sleep each night. But what is more important than that, is how you feel when you wake up, after a night of rest?
If you do feel recharged and energized than you have certainly enjoyed a quality sleep, if not, there is something that is sabotaging you from achieving your restorative sleep patterns.
The quality of your sleep is influenced by a wide range of factors including your hormones and neurotransmitters. These are affected by daily stressors, your physical activity levels, the diet you eat, and your general health condition.
Sleep is a vital part of learning, memory, immunity and detoxifying your body. When you don’t get enough sleep, your risk of developing chronic health issues like hypertension, heart disease, depression, weigh gain etc.
Research has shown that if deepest stage of sleep, so called REM sleep is reduced, it can result in a decrease in a cognitive dysfunction, fatigue, daytime clumsiness, it can cause problems with your immune system, affect hormone balance, gut health and mood.
Our body’s circadian rhythm is the 24-hour cycle of sleeping and waking controlled by the brain. Darkness signals your brain to start producing melatonin in your pineal gland thus telling your body that it is time to go to bed.
However, there are many stressors that can affect sleep-wake cycles and melatonin production, and negatively impact your sleep.
Here are the four biggest culprits for not getting a good night sleep:
- Diet
It is very important what and when you eat at night. Overeating can negatively impact your sleep as well as consumption of refined sugar, caffeine, and alcohol. Consuming foods which are difficult to digest just before bed or too spicy or too acidic can cause acid reflux and destroy your night-time rest for sure. - Exposure to light
If you are exposed to bright lights and technology too many hours of the day it can delay your circadian rhythm in the evening. Also, it is recommended that you take time to pause from all the screens and electric devices late in the evening so that you can relax and your brain will not get false signals from the blue light that it is time to stay awake.
- Everyday stress
Everyday stress can lead to less time in deep sleep, decrease sleep quality, and even impair the processing of fact-based memories.
- Process of aging
Quality of your sleep can also be affected by the aging process, because most of us have a harder time falling asleep as we get older. Some experts suggest that those difficulties might be a result of magnesium deficiency, and supplementing with high quality magnesium supplement might help. But other have pointed out that you may also wake more during the night due to stress, pain, or even frequently needing to use the bathroom.
An irregular sleep schedule, like not going to bed and getting up at the same time each day, can all have a negative impact on your sleep, but once you have identified what may be causing your sleeping problems all you have to do is to find a way to help yourself fall asleep like a baby!