Sleep: The Under-rated Foundation of Health
Foundations of Health:
Sleep
Digestion
Nutrient Dense Diet
Blood Sugar Regulation
Stress
When working with clients sleep is one thing I often see that gets overlooked. Our society is all about hustle culture. We hustle all day and into the night or we are so tired from hustling all day that we need to wind down with Netflix or social media scrolling for some "Me Time" before bed. This might make you feel better in the moment, but it will greatly impact your ability to fall asleep, the amount of sleep you get, and your sleep quality.
This might not sound so bad because you can make up for it on the weekend by sleeping in or you will get more sleep tomorrow night to make up for it, yet this theory has been debunked. Sleep can't actually be replenished another night. Sleep is such a powerful tool and when we get the recommended 7-9 hours per night it's amazing how much better we feel.
Sleep is part of a 24 hour rhythm that our body follows, this is called the circadian rhythm. This powerful rhythm is influenced by so many factors. For it to work properly we need exposure to sunlight in the morning and sunset in the evening. Both of these exposures help release the proper hormones to keep us awake (cortisol) or to help us get to sleep (melatonin). There are many other hormones and neurotransmitters that affect this 24 hour rhythm:
adenosine
serotonin
dopamine
oxytocin
My favorite example to talk about in relation to hormones and sleep is adenosine. Adenosine is directly impacted by caffeine intake. Adenosine is a hormone that makes us drowsy as the day progresses but, when we drink caffeine it blocks the adenosine receptor sites. This causes us not to feel drowsy, until the caffeine wears off....enter the afternoon slump around 2/3pm that most people experience. Then we reach for either more caffeine or sugary foods to wake us up again. Both of these cause vicious cycles of either poor blood sugar regulation or dependence on caffeine to stay awake, both of which will negatively impact our ability to fall asleep and stay asleep. Fascinating right??
So what are the risks if we aren't routinely getting enough sleep (less than 6 hours):
Impaired memory
Reduced alertness
Contributes to mental health disorders: anxiety, depression, etc
Metabolic disorders: pre diabetes/diabetes
Increased risk of coronary artery disease
So how do we fix this??
For the specific example above, I commonly recommend that clients stop consuming caffeine by 12pm at the latest, ideally even earlier. Caffeine has a half life of 5-7 hours so if you stop it earlier in the day you give your body time to build up that adenosine and get tired for a more supportive bedtime.
My top tips for improving sleep:
No screen time (TV/phone/iPad/kindle) for one hour before bed
Wear blue light blockers once the sun goes down (especially important if avoiding screens before bed isn't going to work well for you)
Go to bed and wake up at the same time each day
Get early morning sunlight after waking up
Watch the sunset outside before bed
Keep your house temperature around 65F overnight
Avoid carb/sugar heavy meals right before bed
Stop caffeine consumption by 12pm
We saw how our sleep can be impacted by our daily habits, but what does getting a good nights sleep actually do for us?
Benefits of getting enough sleep:
Improved mental clarity
Regulated hunger & satiety cues: regulated metabolism
Improved emotional regulation
Improved memory
Improves immune function
Healthy microbiome --> improved digestion (more on this next week)
Improved cardiovascular health & lowers blood pressure
So one of the answers to your health goals might be something as simple as going to bed an hour earlier, finishing your coffee earlier in the morning, or taking a walk after dinner while the sun is setting.
Our daily routines have so much influence on our sleep and we rarely understand or relate certain habits to being the cause of our sleep difficulty. By tracking our sleep, food, activities, and digestive habits/complaints we can start to correlate what could be contributing to our insomnia, waking in the middle of the night, or not feeling rested when we wake up. This is something that I do with every client I work with, so we can work together on making diet and lifestyle shifts to support the sleep your body desires.
If this topic really interests you I highly recommend reading the book Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker, PhD.
I hope you enjoyed this little dive into sleep and what it does for our body. Next week I will be tackling the huge topic of Digestion and if you deal with brain fog, bloating/gas, constipation/diarrhea, sugar cravings, depression, etc you will get some helpful tidbits out of that email!
If you know of anyone who you think would benefit from the deep dive into sleep or the digestion email coming next week, please forward this email on to them.
If this information really resonated with you please feel free to book a free 30 minutes Discovery call with me and we can discuss it in more detail. I'd love to hear more about your health journey.