10 Ways To Wake Up Beautiful
1. Get an Early Start
Make a habit of washing your face a couple of hours before bedtime. If you wait until you’re tired, you are more likely to blow – used to “toxins and impurities to stay there all night,” says Laurie Polis dermatologist in New York Another consequence? You miss the best time to treat your skin. “At night, there is no blood flow to the surface of the skin, and there’s nothing else on your face to interfere with absorption,” said Polis.
2. Sleeping on your back
Note to fans of Audrey Hepburn: Lying on your stomach is bad for the “beauty sleep”. The head weighs an average of 8.7 pounds – a lot of pressure being applied on the face every night. In fact, many dermatologists say they can not tell which side of the people face to sleep in the number of wrinkles here.
3. How to Raise
Sleeping with your head elevated on two pillows, or the headrest of his bed area of 2 – to 4-inch pieces of wood. Gravity helps the circulation of lymph and blood so that the liquid does not accumulate, said Polis.
4. Save money, without wrinkles
At night, you do not have to worry about eye treatments, make-up stains, then rub the richest in the formula, you can. Polis Aquaphor swears: “And ‘conditions of the eye and hydrates the delicate skin eye really well.”
5. Sneak Glow
Mix a drop of self-tanner on your night cream or use a cream that contains some Tan-production of DHA.
6. Avoid Carb Face
Waking up with defined cheekbones, eating a high protein, low sugar meal (try the salmon and asparagus, a natural diuretic). Place rice, pasta and potatoes. “When we eat high glycemic carbohydrates is that our functions take a soft and pasty,” says dermatologist Nicholas Perricone Connecticut.
7. Wrap It Up
AM minimize frizz, sleep in silk satin pillow case or put a hair. “These fabrics are much softer than cotton, so there is less friction,” says Harry Josh and John Frieda stylist.
8. Find your inner dancer
Pile the hair twisted on top of your head (use a pet to prevent shrinkage.) “Tomorrow, you will have a large volume and good waves,” Josh said.
Turn on the ninth hair conditioning
Sleeping with a moisturizer to damp hair all night. We like Philip B. Hair Masque Katira, but no rich conditioner will. Rinse in the morning.
10. Pop a Rooster Pill
Trust us, we were skeptical. But after swallowing two pills on the Wake Up Time to 23 hours, we found lot easier to get out of bed seven hours later. Created by a lack of sleep single mother, the pill contains an energizing blend of thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6 and B12 and guarana-seed extract. It is formulated with a coating which releases the ingredients into your bloodstream towards the end of your sleep cycle lasts if you wake up clear-headed, not fuzzy.
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- Users of Gene-Eden, a Natural Antiviral, Report less Sleeping Problems in a Recent Study (prweb.com)
- Teaching Your Teen About Skin Care (webmd.com)
- Good sleep equates to good productivity (ukcredit.com)
Ten Food That Will Help You in Sleep
For some people, sleep comes as naturally as breathing. The moment their heads hit the pillow, they are in beddy-bye land. For others, sleeping can be a problem. There are people who would stay in bed for hours on end just trying to fall asleep. Some will fall asleep but wake up intermittently all throughout the night.
If you belong to the second group – the sleepless ones – you ought to know that there are certain kinds of food that can aid in sleeping. While there are a lot of myths associated with sleep, the truth is that certain elements/ingredients in food can contribute to sleep.
Take a look at this list of top 10 food that will allow you to snooze off before you know it.
MILK : Warm milk, that is. Do not discount what your mom has been telling you all these years. Some people think that the idea of drinking warm milk before going to bed helps in making your drowsy is a mere myth. Well, here’s one supposed myth that is actually true and is backed up by scientific data! Milk has tryptophan, which is an amino acid with sedative properties. While milk doesn’t contain that much tryptophan, it does have enough to help you feel drowsy. Another thing that helps is the fact that milk contains calcium, which not only strengthens your bones, but also assists the brain in processing tryptophan. So the next time you need help in falling asleep, warm some milk up before bedtime and down it!
CHAMOMILE TEA : Take note of the kind of tea – black tea or other kinds of tea with caffeine content will not work! There are different kinds of chamomile flower that are used to make the tea. However, it does not matter which kind is used for your tea as all varieties contain relaxants and have anti-spasmodic properties. These things contribute to getting your body relaxed enough to fall asleep. As an added plus, chamomile has a lot of healing properties!
WINE : Nope, I am not encouraging you down the alcoholic path. It does make sense, however. Remember the last time you had one drink too many? You probably fell flat on your face even before you reached your bed. Obviously, that’s not what I am trying to get at. According to researchers, a glass of wine can help you feel drowsy. The scientific explanation is that wine helps you relax by lowering your heart rate and blood pressure. Just make sure you stick to one glass before bedtime as more than that may only wake you up in the middle of the night or worse, give you a slamming hangover the next day.
BANANA : Not a fruit lover? Well, perhaps you ought to start with bananas if you are having trouble sleeping. Bananas taste really good and are filling. More than that, though, bananas contain melatonin – lots of it. Bananas also have serotonin and magnesium, both of which contribute to reaching “sleepy state.”
RED BELL PEPPERS : Aren’t peppers supposed to wake you up due to their spiciness? Sure, but red bell peppers are not spicy at all, and even better, they contain lots of Vitamin C. In fact, studies have shown that red bell peppers contain the highest amount of Vitamin C – more than any other fruit or vegetable! What this vitamin does is to inhibit the secretion of cortisol, which is the hormone released when you’re stressed (hence, you can’t sleep). While Vitamin C might not knock you out, having enough in your body will help you get quality sleep; and we all know that sometimes, quality is more important than quantity! (If you can’t make yourself eat red bell peppers, go get some supplements.)
OATMEAL : Oatmeal is another kind of food that is healthy, filling, and sleep-inducing. The reason behind this is that oatmeal contains melatonin. Again, this hormone helps you relax and ready for dream land. For better results, combine milk with your oatmeal. That should get you asleep in no time at all.
TURKEY : Of course, turkey made it to this list. After all, it is not the most popular sleep-inducing food for nothing! And, no, it is not a myth. Turkey is actually full of tryptophan, the same amino acid found in milk. And, while milk may contain only traces of tryptophan, turkey has loads of it. Better yet, turkey is not at all that fattening!
ALMONDS : Almonds and other nuts like peanuts and hazelnuts are good sleep aids. They all contain tryptophan, which we’ve already established as something that makes you fall asleep.
POPCORN : Popcorn? Yes, popcorn. Believe it or not, this favorite movie-time snack can actually aid you in getting some much needed sleep. Popcorn has lots of carbs, which produces serotonin, which in turn helps you relax. Word of caution: do not eat popcorn with butter before going to bed. Otherwise, you’ll negate all that work in the gym!
TOFU : Who likes tofu? I do! If you’re one of us, then tofu just might be what you need to help you get some rest at night. If you have a tofu dinner, you’ll get the carbs that you need without the fat, so eat up!
Of course, you have to remember that merely eating these items without addressing other issues will not totally solve your sleep problem. Combine these food items with proper exercise and a healthy lifestyle and you should cure your sleep issues in no time at all.
other top posts you should read here…!
Regular Health Mistakes
some of the most common mistakes made by many of us.
- Crossing our legs
: Do you cross your legs at your knees when sitting? Although we may believe that this is the lady-like elegant way to sit, sitting this way cuts down circulation to your legs. If you don’t want varicose veins to mar the beauty of your legs and compromise your health, uncross your legs every time you realize you have one knee on top of the other. The best way to sit is to simply place both legs together on the floor, balancing your weight equally. If you feel like changing position, instead of crossing your legs, simply move both legs together to one side. As an alternative, you could also consider crossing your legs loosely at the ankles. This is a classically elegant way to sit, and is far better for your legs and your health than sitting with your legs crossed at your knees.
- Not changing our toothbrush
: How often do you change your toothbrush? Most of us wait until most of the bristles have either fallen off, or are in such bad shape that we’d be embarrassed to pull out our brush in public. However, since not many of us need to pull out our brush in public, we carry on with our frayed one until we lose it. Replace your toothbrush often. Damaged bristles can harm the enamel, and don’t massage your gums well..If you find brushing your teeth a pain like I do, but know you must do it, you might as well be doing it right. Imagine going through the annoyance of brushing your teeth twice a day only to find out that you’re damaging your enamel every time you clean your teeth. Also, use a brush with soft bristles unless your dentist has advised otherwise.
- Eating out often
: There are oils that are high in cholesterol, and oils that cause little harm and are better for your heart. However, no matter how light the oil is, it is never a good idea to eat too much of it. Avoid fried foods. Remember that in all probability your favourite Indian food restaurant throws a huge, HUGE chunk of butter in a tiny bowl of dal. Rita, who worked in the kitchen of a 5 star hotel, was shocked when she saw the cook chop a 500gmbutter slab in half, and throw half into a Paneer Makhani dish. No wonder the customers left licking their fingers. And no wonder they felt so stuffed and heavy afterwards. Limit outdoor eating unless you know that you’re getting served light and healthy food.
- Skipping breakfast
: Never, ever skip breakfast. Remember, when you wake up in the morning it’s been around 10-12 hours since your last meal. Your body needs food now, more than at any other time. Eat a heavy breakfast. You will then be busy through the day, and the calories will get expended quickly. If you are trying to diet, eat a light dinner. Here are some more common health mistakes we make. Being informed and making a few changes can help make us feel a whole lot better.
- High heels
: High heels sure look great, but they’re murder for your back. This however doesn’t mean you should steer clear of stilettos. Wear them, but not when you know you will be walking around a lot. Wear them when going out for lunch or dinner -when the only walking you will be doing is to your car, to the table, and back.. Avoid high heels when you are going somewhere on foot. If you are constantly tempted to wear your heels, take a good look at your flats. Is there something about them you dislike? Invest in a new pair of beautiful flats or shoes with a low heel. Buy something you love, that you will enjoy wearing. If possible, get a matching bag. You will then enjoy your flats as much as you do your heels.
- Sleeping on a soft bed
: You don’t have to sleep on the floor be kind to your back, but do make sure you have a firm mattress. Although a mattress on springs is soft and lovely to sink into, it’s bad for your back. If you already have an old bed with springs, you don’t need to invest in a new one – simply get a thick wooden plank put over the springs, and place the mattress on the plank. Similarly, if your mattress is old and lumpy, throw it out and get a new one. Your neck and your back will thank you. The same rule applies to sofas. If you will be spending hours on a sofa, get a firm yet comfortable one. Sofas you completely sink into are not the best idea.
- Pillows
- Not exercising
- : So all of us know we should exercise more, but many of us don’t. This is a health mistake we consciously make! And why is that? Simply because we refuse to admit the damage we are causing to our bodies by not working out.. A number of people only start working out once they’ve experienced a warning signal. Don’t wait for a heart attack to strike before you decide to opt for a lifestyle change. Make the change now. You don’t need to train for the marathon to be in top shape. Half an hour of brisk walking three to four times a week will make a world of difference to your health. You could then increase this to forty minutes, four times a week – and you’re all set. If you haven’t exercised for a week, you’re making a mistake.
: No matter how comfortable sleeping with ten cushions is, have pity on your neck and resist. Sleep with one pillow, and make sure it is not too thick. If your pillow gets lumpy, discard it and go for a new one. Get a thin pillow if you sleep on your stomach and something a little thicker if you sleep on your back, to give your neck adequate support
Assess Your Sleep Needs
The Takeaway
- Although there is some genetic variation, most adults need between 7.5 to 8.5 hours of sleep per 24-hour period to function optimally.
- You can find your optimal sleep time if you set aside several days (perhaps during a vacation) to allow yourself to sleep as long as possible.
- Once you know how much sleep you need, it’s important to allot that amount of time in your daily schedule for sleep.
How Much Is Enough?
The amount of sleep that a healthy individual needs is largely determined by two factors: genetics and age. Genetics plays a role in both the amount of sleep a person needs, as well as his or her preference for waking up early (these are the so-called “larks,” or morning-type individuals) or staying up late (these are the “owls,” or evening-type people). Our internal biological clock, which regulates the cycling of many functions including the sleep/wake cycle, can vary slightly from individual to individual. Although our internal clock is set to approximately 24 hours, if your clock runs faster than 24 hours, you tend to be a “lark” and wake up early; if your clock runs more slowly, you tend to be an “owl” and go to bed later.
The majority of healthy adults require between 7.5 to 8.5 hours per 24-hour period. This is true from young adulthood through late in life, though many older people have difficulty sleeping in a single block of time each night. Generally, sleep needs during a 24-hour period follow this pattern:
- Newborns (1 to 2 months) – 10.5 to 18 hours
- Infants (3 to 11 months) – 10 to 14 hours
- Toddlers (1 to 3 years) – 12 to 14 hours
- Preschoolers (3 to 5 years) – 11 to 13 hours
- School-aged children (5 to 12 years) – 10 to 11 hours
- Adolescents (12 to 18 years) – 8.5 to 9.5 hours
- Adults (18 years to the end of life) – 7.5 to 8.5 hours
Even without considering genetics and age, the National Sleep Foundation‘s 2008 Sleep in America poll found that many adults are apparently not meeting their sleep needs, sleeping an average of only 6 hours and 40 minutes during the week, and about 7.5 hours on the weekends. How can you tell if your sleep is adequate and meets your needs? Sleep scientists and physicians have a variety of methods to help determine if you are getting enough sleep.
How Much Sleep We Need(1:04)
Dr. Lawrence J. Epstein discusses ways to determine individual sleep needs.
Pay Attention to Your Sleepiness
Sleep needs and patterns of sleep and wakefulness are not the same for everyone. The first step in determining your need for sleep is through self-evaluation. Ask yourself: “How tired do I feel during the daytime? When do I feel most alert? When does fatigue set in?” Even moments of sleepiness that you may think of as routine, for instance, falling asleep on the subway on the way to work, or during a lecture, are likely a sign that you are not getting enough sleep.
Paying attention to your body’s cues for sleep is the first step toward figuring out if you are meeting your sleep needs, or if you are sleep deprived or suffering from a sleep disorder (or possibly both).
Keep a Sleep Diary
A very helpful tool to track your sleep time and patterns is a sleep diary. Used in sleep research and clinical settings, a sleep diary is a handy reference to help people become familiar with their own natural patterns of sleep and wakefulness. The information that you will record in the sleep diary is simple and straightforward. It includes the time you go to bed, the time you wake up, your total hours of sleep, and whether you had any nighttime awakenings (and if so, how long you were awake) and any daytime naps. In addition, noting how you feel upon awakening (refreshed or tired), and how you feel at different times of the day will enable you to become more aware of your patterns, and help you determine if you are getting adequate sleep. Just keeping track of your sleep in this way may help improve your situation. If you need more help to improve your sleep, refer to Adopt Good Sleep Habits andAddress Your Sleep Issues.
Follow this link to print out a Sleep Diary [PDF].
Take a Sleep Vacation
Another method for determining your sleep need is to take a “sleep vacation.” During a two-week period, when you have a flexible schedule or perhaps are on vacation, pick a consistent bedtime and do not use an alarm clock to wake up. Chances are that for the first few days or week you will sleep longer because you’ll be paying off your “sleep debt“—the amount of sleep deprivation that you’ve accumulated over a period of time. If you continue going to bed at the same time and allowing your body to wake up naturally, you will eventually establish a pattern of sleeping essentially the same amount of time each night, probably in the range of 7 to 9 hours. Congratulations! You’ve identified the amount of sleep that you need.
Make Sleep a Priority
Now that you know how much sleep you need—and if you’ve allowed your body to pay back your sleep debt and “find” its natural sleep patterns and duration—you are probably also feeling a lot better, sharper, happier, and healthier. This is how it feels to be well rested. The next step is to make sure that you continue to make sleep a priority and find ways to protect your sleep time.
If You’re Having Problems with Sleep
You may be doing all the right things—respecting your sleep needs and patterns, setting aside an ample amount of time to sleep, keeping a sleep diary—but still experiencing daytime sleepiness, fatigue, or insomnia. If that’s the case, you should consider consulting a sleep specialist who can help you set up a better sleep environment, provide support for making behavioral changes that may be interfering with sleep, or possibly diagnose a sleep disorder. You have a right to feel well rested—and there are many resources available to help you get the sleep you need.
Resources and References
- National Sleep Foundation, Children and Sleep, 2008.
- National Sleep Foundation, 2008 Sleep in America Poll.
Related Content
Related Articles
- Could You Be A Super Sleeper? (psychologytoday.com)
- Good sleep with a good mattress (time4sleep.co.uk)
The Healthiest Sleeping Position for You
At one point or another you’ve fallen asleep in a less-than-comfortable position and suffered the consequences the next day: the aches, the pains, the fatigue. Those symptoms, however, are just the short-term results of one bad night. What you might not know is that your sleeping position — even in the most comfortable of settings — could have lasting health implications that affect your health. What is the healthiest sleeping position? It mostly depends on what’s right for you.
You probably belong to one of three categories: back sleeper, side sleeper or stomach sleeper. Those distinctions might not seem that important, but there’s an entire subset of the medical community devoted to analyzing those specific positions and determining which is healthiest. Jonathan Sherrill, a registered polysomnographic technologist and general manager of the Los Angeles-based Advanced Sleep Medicine Services Inc., is a member of that community.
According to Sherrill, a person’s primary concern when settling into a sleeping position should be comfort.
“Overall, we recommend the position that is most comfortable,” Sherrill says. “The body will naturally acclimate and adjust to whatever position it functions best in.”
However, the sleeping position a person finds most comfortable isn’t always the healthiest.
“In order to sleep and recover, your body has to enter a zone where it’s unaware,” Sherrill says. “It needs to shut off from the external cues of the environment and it needs to go into that recover mode. So while it’s in that zone, it’s not really conscious of what it’s doing. The body could be malfunctioning in several ways.”
Those malfunctions are related primarily to breathing. Chronic obstructions in a person’s air intake can lead to sleep apnea, a disorder characterized by excessively low blood oxygen levels, which over time can result in stroke, heart failure and sexual dysfunction among other negative health effects.
The Back Sleeper
Of the three basic sleeping positions, the back sleeper is the one most commonly associated with sleep apnea.
“For posture reasons we do like people to sleep on their backs, but we also see that people tend to malfunction more in that position,” Sherrill says. “Gravity allows your tongue to relax and during a certain phase of REM sleep your body goes through muscle atonia when your body relaxes so much that you essentially become paralyzed. So when you’re sleeping on your back and your tongue falls back and your muscles are paralyzed, it leads to a higher incidence of sleep apnea in that position.”
The Stomach Sleeper
Sleeping on one’s stomach also can prove detrimental.
“We usually like to rule out the stomach,” Sherrill says. “It’s a position that many obese people will go into naturally. However, in that position you often end up with more backaches. Your stomach is pressing back and your spine enters an awkward posture, which can lead to pain.”
The Side Sleeper
That leaves the side position, which, according to a 2003 study conducted by the London Sleep Assessment Service, is the most popular position among the general population. Over 50 percent of people favor some variation of the side sleeper position during sleep. According to Sherrill and his colleagues, the majority has it right: Sleeping on your side, and specifically on your right side, is perhaps the healthiest position a person can adopt.
“Right is preferred over left,” Sherrill says. “The left position can increase your blood pressure, increase your heart rate and we recommend that people who suffer heart attacks should not sleep on their left side.”
That conclusion was partially echoed in a recent New York Times article exploring the various health effects of right-side versus left-side sleeping. When asked which side was generally healthier to sleep on,Times health expert Claiborne Ray pointed to a 2003 study that found that some people did indeed benefit from sleeping on the right side of their bodies, but that they tended to be individuals with pre-existing heart conditions.
Ray said, “The findings were in keeping with the concept that a left-hand position ‘may exert deleterious effects’ on heart pressure, cardiac output or the functioning of cardiac nerves and thus ‘may be a protective strategy.’”
In other words, there’s research that suggests sleeping on your right side can help prevent circulatory problems and there’s research that indicates sleeping on your right side helps mitigate the effects of pre-existing circulatory conditions. It’s a chicken-egg situation, but in any case the evidence points to a common conclusion: Sleep on your right side, especially if you’ve got a bum ticker.
How to Hack Your Brain
My body is incompatible with Earth.
It has a daily sleep-wake cycle that lasts about 28 hours instead of 24 hours, which means each day I stay awake about four hours longer than most people. In the middle of the week, I sometimes find myself waking up at 11PM and going to bed in the early afternoon the next day. When I was younger, people thought I was insane. The only thing I remember of elementary school is being tired.
Eventually, I discovered that if I stuck to a 28-hour schedule, my body was happy; I woke up rested, went to sleep tired, and everything worked great. Except, well, that my life was incompatible with the rest of the world. Living with a normal schedule was going to be tough, so I had to find a solution.
After some research, I discovered that what I probably have is called non-24-hour sleep-wake syndrome. There’s a way to fix it using a hack called polyphasic sleep, which is really fascinating and can be used by anyone. It can shave 6 hours off your normal sleeping time (with a catch, of course).
But first, about sleep…
A lot of people believe sleep has been proven to repair or rehabilitate the brain and body, but this is not necessarily true. We don’t really know much about sleep. There’s no clearly. defined biological reason for it, and it is intuitively an evolutionary disadvantage.
In the late 1930’s, a wealthy amateur scientist named Alfred Lee Loomis and his colleagues watched an EEG monitor for brain electrical activity during sleep, and they made a pretty remarkable discovery: there are actually five main parts to each of several phases of sleep that occur during a normal night. One of these stages is called REM (rapid eye movement), and it is where most of the benefit of sleep comes from. Ironically, it is in REM sleep that the brain looks the least asleep. In fact, it looks awake. This is the phase where dreams occur.
It seems that all you really need to survive and feel rested is the REM phase, which is only a tiny portion of your actual sleep phases at night. You only spend 1-2 hours in REM sleep during any given night, and the rest is wasted on the other seemingly useless phases. This is where the opportunity to hack the brain presents itself. What if you could find a way to cut out the other phases and gain 4-5 more hours of productive wakeful time?
Hello, polyphasic sleep
One of the ways to force your brain into REM sleep and skip the other phases is to make it feel exhausted. If you’ve gone 24 hours without sleep, you might notice that you drift away into dreams straight from being awake. This because your body goes instantly into REM sleep as a protection mechanism. The way to hack yourself into entering REM sleep without being exhausted is to trick your body into thinking you’re going to get a tiny amount of sleep. You can train it to enter REM for short periods of time throughout the day in 20-minute naps rather than in one lump at night. This is how polyphasic sleep works.
There are actually six good methods to choose from; the first one, monophasic sleep, is the way you’ve probably slept your whole life. The five others are quite a bit more interesting.
MONOPHASIC SLEEP
POLYPHASIC SLEEP
The catch
How awesome would it be to sleep a total of two hours a day and feel rested? Very awesome, of course, but there is a catch. The more naps you have (and thus the less sleep you have total) the more rigorous you have to be regarding your nap times. You can’t miss a nap by more than a couple hours in the 2 and 3 “Everyman” methods, and you must have your naps within 30 minutes of their scheduled times for the Uberman method. If you miss a nap, the whole schedule is thrown off and you’ll feel tired for days.
Thankfully, when I can keep to one of these schedules, I’m able to ignore my body’s abnormal internal clock and just stay awake all day and all night with minor 20-minute interruptions.
The rigor of keeping the schedule makes most of these methods unrealistic for most people. But if you have a flexible schedule and can manage to pick a method and stick with it for several months, you’ll find that you feel amazing and you have a seemingly unlimited amount of time during the day to get things done. It’s the ultimate brain hack. •
Further reading
I haven’t included all of the material required to start these alternative sleeping methods in this article. If you really are interested in trying them, there are tons of resources online. Here are a couple places to get you started.
• The Wikipedia article is a concise and excellent introduction: Wiki on Polphasic Sleep
• And this is a good article about Everyman and Uberman: The History of Everyman
5 Keys to Enhanced Sleep
Insomnia - a condition that causes problems both with falling asleep and staying asleep – affects millions of people.
Since sleep medical professionals point to sleep as a primary contributing factor to many common diseases, it’s obvious that it’s not just important but crucial to sleep well.
Fortunately, those same sleep medical professionals have also discovered the conditions that determine our quality of sleep.
Simple lifestyle changes can have you sleeping like a baby in no time.
Here are five tips to explore before you even think about asking your doctor for a sleeping aid or buying one over the counter.
1. Invest in a quality mattress. Getting a enjoyable night’s rest may be as easy as getting a new sleeping surface. Many people report that memory foam mattresses allowed them to completely relax and sleep deeply for the first time in their lives. Indulge in the very best bed linens you can afford, too. Sheets with at least a 300 thread count are smooth and luxurious, and your blankets and comforters should also give you a feeling of being pampered. Some mattress retailers offer free sheets or comforters when you buy a new mattress, but these are characteristically of a cheaper quality as they are a free add-on for buying the mattress. When it comes to bedding, the best things in life are not free.
2. Put your body on a schedule. Going to bed at the same time every night and getting up at the same time every morning (yup, weekends too) puts your body on a regimented resting pattern. After a while, it will “expect” to sleeping at a set time, and you might not even need an alarm clock to get up for work. (You’ll find that your day starts out much better when you wake naturally rather than being jarred awake by an alarm.)
3. Create a relaxed sleeping environment. Your bedroom should be quiet and dark. Even the smallest amount bit of sound or luminosity-such as the ticking of a clock or a light left on outside-can interfere with your sleep, even though the person sleeping may not be aware of it. Do what you have to: A sleep mask androom darkening blinds will screen out the brightness; earplugs and “white noise” like a rotating fan can help with interfering noises. The best temperature for sleeping is 68-72 degrees Fahrenheit. Most bodies begin to overheat over 75 degrees, and any temperature below 60 degrees is too cold for the body to relax.
4. Calm down. Stress is a real sleep killer. Look for ways to distress prior to going to sleep. Do a bit of light reading, meditate, try various mellow stretches, or enjoy an herbal bath.
5. Protect your sleep from the great caffine caper. Caffeine stays in your system longer than you might realize-up to 8 hours. For better sleep, you should prohibit caffeine intake at least six hours before you go to sleep. Remember that pop drinks, most teas, and chocolate all contain enough caffine to interfere with your sleep.
Many of people who have followed these suggestions greatly enhanced their sleep quality and therefore their quality of life.
Give them a month’s trial and you too will reap the rewards of a peaceful night’s sleep.
Hit the Snooze Button To Live Longer
Brunch at 10?
Make it 11.
As if not having circles under your eyes wasn’t a compelling enough reason to get enough sleep, here’s another biggie: You’ll be less likely to age from diabetes, the makes-you-sick- and-tired disease that affects more than 24 million Americans and 2 million Canadians.
While more than 80 million of us in North America have the genes for type 2 diabetes, very few of us have to express them, if we do the right things.
When researchers let people sleep just 5.5 hours a night for two weeks, they saw that the sleep-deprived folks had started to develop diabetes; they had increasedinsulin resistance and reduced glucose tolerance.
What does that mean?
Basically, your body has mailmen that take energy from food and place it inside the mailbox in your cells.
But with diabetes or insulin resistance, those mailmen can’t get the mail inside.
So glucose, like a posse of bored teenagers, hangs out in your bloodstream and causes all kinds of trouble.
That’s dangerous to your arteries, your brain, your immune system and your kidneys.
Previous research saw the risk for developing diabetes go up with far less sleep, but these scientists decided to test a more realistic scenario of just 5.5 hours (sound familiar?).
Too busy to get to bed earlier?
No, you’re not; especially since your life depends on it!
Try inching up your bedtime by 10 little minutes a night.
By this time next week, you may have dropped your risk of aging from diabetes.
