Sleeping isn’t what it once was. When I was little, my mom read me books like Good Night by Natalia Padilla before I went to bed, and somehow I would just fall asleep without thought. Now, I can hardly go to sleep when I hit the bed. So many thoughts rushed through my brain the moment I hit the bed. What do I need to do tomorrow? Did I remember to lock the door? Why is my neighbor so loud at night? Did I complete all my tasks today? And so much more, which often prevents me from sleeping and prevents others from doing the same.
Insomnia is a prominent issue that affects around 70 million Americans. If you have insomnia, here are some changes you could make to your lifestyle for you to help get some sleep. However, for more severe and lasting insomnia, you may want to get it checked with a psychiatrist as well.
1. End worrying before you hit the bed.
If you’re a worrywart, this may be difficult to do. You may want to finish everything you need to do before you go to sleep so that your mind won’t wander once you hit the bed. However, if this option is not possible, listing down all your thoughts and things you need to do for the following day and planning how to accomplish them will help appease your head before you go to sleep.
2. Avoid caffeine
It is recommended to avoid caffeine at least 3 hours before bedtime. However, it is better to avoid caffeine past 3 pm. When talking about caffeine, it does not refer to coffee alone, but make sure to avoid other sources of caffeine like energy drinks, tea, soft drinks, and many more.
3. Exercise
Regular exercise often improves sleep quality and duration. However, exercising right before you sleep may give the reverse effect and may act as a stimulant to the body, so morning exercises are the best way to go.
An exercise doesn’t necessarily mean a full-body workout – a simple walk and stretches outside when you wake up would be enough to condition your mind early in the day, so you feel tired at night.
4. Only use the bed to sleep
Avoid using the bed to read, lounge, work, or study since this often sends mixed signals to your brain when you go to sleep. Using the bed only for sleeping will condition your brain to send signals to sleep once you hit the bed. Using it for other activities often dampens and confuses the brain since other activities need you to concentrate more and wake up.
5. Same sleeping and waking uptime
Sleeping and waking up at the same time often helps your body develop a “body clock” which sleeps and wakes up regularly at the same time. Ideally, this pattern should have been practiced starting in childhood. However, this can be developed later on in life if you could not practice this when you were young.
This system of sleeping and waking up at a fixed schedule should be uniform for all days – not only during weekdays. If you only practice this during selected times of the week, you are less likely to develop a body clock. This helps insomnia since you will often feel sleepy during bedtime.
6. Limit napping time
If you’re someone who likes to take naps during the day, you want to limit your napping time, especially if this means that you cannot sleep later at night. Doing this does not mean to cut off the nap suddenly, but you say slowly shorten your nap time until you reach a comfortable nap time where you can sleep at night.
For example, if you are the type of person who sleeps 2 hours after lunch, you may want to cut it down to 1 hour and 30 minutes or 1 hour only so that you feel more sleepy when the night comes. It is also advised to avoid naps later in the afternoon, so schedule your naps earlier in the day and avoid sleeping past two in the afternoon.
7. Eliminate alcohol and recreational drugs
Though there is a belief that alcohol and some drugs can help people fall asleep, this does not fix insomnia. First of all, this isn’t a permanent solution since it only works for a few nights, and you would become dependent on more and more alcohol or dosage every night for you to be able to fall asleep.
Secondly, alcohol and drugs may help you pass out, but they will not allow you to go deeper into sleep. It messes with the normal REM patterns you need to sleep deeply and wake up feeling well-rested. This means that using alcohol or drugs to sleep will still result in the same sleepy, irritable feeling when you wake up.