5 Secrets To A Better Night’s Sleep

Sleep is a basic necessity of life, as important to our health and well-being as air, food and water. When we sleep well, we wake up feeling refreshed, alert and ready to face our daily challenges. When we don’t get enough, continuous, quality sleep, every part of our lives can suffer. Our jobs, relationships, productivity, health and safety are all put at risk.

So here are 5 easy ways to have a better night’s sleep:

 

• Create a sleep conducive environment that is dark, quite, clean, preferably cool and comfortable. This is necessary to reap the restorative, energizing and revitalising benefits of sleep.

 

• Avoid sugar, chocolate, dessert and anything sweet at night—Sugar will make you hyper and keep you awake. Also it will cause your blood sugar levels to drop during the night and it will wake you up and disturb the quality of your sleep. So the best thing to eat before bed is good quality protein like an egg or a piece of fish, chicken and meat with vegetables to balance your blood sugar levels and sleep quality.

 

• Relax your mind before going to bed—Have a notebook and a pen on your bed side table and just before you go to bed do a mind dump on paper. Right down all the thigns you need to do the next day, the things are worrying you, your shopping and to do list for the next day. It should all go down on paper so you don’t have to remember it and have a disturbed night’s sleep as a result.

 

• Reduce or avoid as many drugs as possible—Many medications, both prescription and over-the-counter may have effects on sleep. Even multi-vitamins and B complex vitamins for some people taken after midday can cause sleepless nights. In most cases, the condition, which caused the drugs to be taken in the first place, can be addressed naturally and this can be discussed with your naturopath or health care practitioner.

 

• Check your bedroom for electro-magnetic fields (EMFs)—These can disrupt the pineal gland and the production of melatonin and seratonin, and may have other negative effects as well. Often getting all electrical appliances away from the bedroom fixes this problem. If this is not practical be sure to unplug your appliances from the wall before bed. This includes waterbeds and electric blankets.

 

Start tonight today for a better night’s sleep!

 

Gabriela Rosa is an author, researcher, natural fertility specialist and founder of Natural Fertility & Health Solutions—a multi modality, integrative medicine practice based in Sydney. Gabriela and her company are devoted to creating healthy and happy families by helping bring healthy babies into the world and empowering individuals through better health. Gabriela is a regular expert contributor in the media, she also publishes the ‘Natural Fertility Booster’ an online publication for prospective parents and has her own weekly spot on one of Sydney’s popular radio stations.

Keywords: Sleep > Sleep hygiene > Sleep quality