More tips to get a good nights sleep

Here are more tips to get a good nights sleep:

  1. Read a book or a magazine – I appreicate this is very old school.  The reason is studies have shown that brain activity during sleep is better regulated after reading a physical book compared with reading a screen.
  2. Have a hot shower or bath at night.  When you get in all your blood comes to the surface of your body, so when you step out, your core temperature starts to drop.  This stimulates sleep.
  3. Go to bed at the same time every nights – it’s possible to “programme” the body to get used to falling asleep at a certain time every night.
  4. Yoga or light exercise can help relax muscles and release any tension.
  5. Complementary therapies –  these promote relaxing, reduce stress and anxiety and are therefore ideal for a good night’s sleep.
  6. Breathing exercises or medication – taking deep breaths helps the body switch off from the flight or fight more to rest-and-digest mode.

References

https://www.pnas.org/content/112/4/1232

Related Posts

  • Does abstinence improve sporting performance?

    I know lots of my readers take part in sporting competitions and they always want to perform at their peak and win.  So is it best to abstain the night before a competition?  Certainly here is a myth that abstinence before sporting activities improves performance? But does it? Researchers at the University of Florence reviewed hundreds of studies to determine if there was any truth in the myth that abstinence helps performance.  They found no evidence to support the myth that abstinence before a sporting competition improves performance.  In addition they found no evidence that having sex the night before impairs performance the next day.  They came across one study that found marathon runners did better the next day after having sex the night before. All sporting competitions are as much about the mind as the physical activity.  So the impact of sex the night before on marathon runners may be psychological.  Maybe that is why the organisers of the Rio Olympics distributed more than 450,000 condoms in the athletes' village during the 2016 Olympics. Reference Stefani Laura, Galanti Giorgio, Padulo Johnny, Bragazzi Nicola L., Maffulli Nicola, 2016, Sexual Activity before Sports Competition: A Systematic Review,  Frontiers in Physiology, Vol 7, pg 246 http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fphys.2016.00246

  • Migraine – Part 3

    In part 1, I explore what a migraine was and how it differed from headaches  and they shared a herbal remedy, last week in part 2 I looked at potential nutrional diffciences.  This week, I want to explore some growing evidence about the impact of exercise. When you are having a migraine it is natural to want to rest and for some people exercise can trigger a migraine.  So I was slightly surprise about the growing evidence that suggest exercise can help migraine sufferers.  Firstly, the evidence all relates to a certain type of exercise known as High Intentsity Interval Training (HIIT).  This is where you alternative periods of intense exercise with periods of less intense recovery. Recently scientists compared the effects of twice weekly HIIT sessions with moderate continous exercise and a control intevention and found that HIIT had most beneficial results.  They found HIIT significantly reduced the munber of migraine days amoung sufferers. Reference Hanssen H, Minghetti A, Magon S, et al. Effects of different endurance exercise modalities on migraine days and cerebrovascular health in episodic migraineurs: A randomized controlled trial. Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2018;28:1103–1112. https://doi.org/10.1111/sms.13023

  • What can help depression during pregnancy?

    Post natal depression is very well known, what is talked about less often is depression during pregnancy. A team of scientists in the Uk and Singapore conducted a systematic review of six clinical studies, involving 450 pregnant women that examined the effects in yoga on depression during pregnancy. All six studies showed reductions in depression scores, indicating that yoga is a promosing non-medicine approach for improving psychological health of pregnant women. Participants recruited for the trails reported mild depressive states and therefore larger studies are required to examine the impact of yoga on pregnant women with severe prenatal depression. Reference https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S174438811830608X?via%253Dihub=