It is hard to stick to a plan for healthy eating if you are
constantly sleep-deprived.
It is hard to put in your best effort with physical or
mental activity if you are drained and have not recovered from your previous
effort, or even the previous day.
If you make a habit of chronically getting insufficient
sleep, your body will break down, and more importantly, your mental health will
too.
Sleep is the foundation for everything else. You will need
to pay attention to your food intake and activity levels, but efforts you make
in these areas will be undermined if you have not gotten your sleeping habits
in order first. When you’re recovering from a period of stress, your best
priority is to focus on your sleep habits, before working on your food intake
or exercise habits. Without good sleep, it’s hard to hold yourself to
discipline in many other areas of your life over a consistent, long-term basis.
The goal here is 7 to 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep every
night. To do this, you need to be aware of things that disrupt your sleep, and
methodically address them.
Here is a list of sleep disruptions that are readily
managed, and some strategies for managing them. I have prioritized these in my
opinion of the order of ease of management. You can work through to the harder
stuff until you get your sleeping working sufficiently well.
- Lights. Our circadian rhythms are linked to blue light, and this can disrupt our sleep and waking cycle. Try to block out sources of light in your bedroom, whether from night lights, windows, alarm clocks or whatever else.
- Noise. Whether it’s noise from your partner snoring, or random noise from outside, this has a tendency to disrupt restful sleep. The starting point to address this would be to wear ear plugs.
- Temperature. If you are too hot, it may be hard to sleep. During hot summer months I’ve found that air conditioning makes a huge difference on the quality of sleep that I get.
- Allergies. You’ll have to find your own strategies for managing medical issues such as allergies, but unmanaged, they may interrupt your rest.
- Sleep/wake cycles. Developing a routine and a consistent wakeup time may help your body be sleepy at appropriate times, and awake at appropriate times.
- Stimulation. You may need to reduce chemical stimulants (caffeine etc.) and information stimulants (TV, computer, etc.) in order to create a better routine.
- Mattress and sleepwear. What you sleep on, and the fabric in contact with your skin when you sleep, may be affecting your sleep. It may make sense for you to find a better mattress. You may need to experiment with sleeping on something softer or firmer, or finding more comfortable sheets or sleepwear.
- Apnea. In this medical condition, your breathing may temporarily cease during your sleep, causing your blood oxygen level to plummet, which in turn causes your brain to awake in an “emergency mode”. If this happens many times a night, you may not be developing sufficient durations of good quality sleep. Weight and high elevation can contribute to this. You have to work with your physician to diagnose and treat this. While an overnight oxygen study is not too hard to do (wear a monitor on your finger while you sleep) in order to identify the potential for a problem, a full sleep study may be needed for diagnosis and can be expensive and difficult to arrange if you don’t have a sleep medicine practitioner locally.
- Stress and anxiety. These are reduced by getting enough sleep, but they also exist in a feedback loop with sleep, and too much stress can prevent you from getting good sleep. To walk out of such a feedback loop, you need to take measures elsewhere in your life to lower your overall stress levels. My favorite strategy to start with is establishment of regular circadian (sleep/wake) cycles and regular exercise.
There are other sleep disruptions that are less easily
managed. You’re going to have to figure these out for yourself, but I’ll update
here as I accumulate suggestions.
- Kids. Most new parents I know have to come up with strategies to care for infants throughout the night. It gets better as time goes on, but it seems like kids can disrupt sleep at any age.
- Pets. If your pets are waking you up in the middle of the night, they shouldn’t be in your bedroom, no matter how snuggly they are, and you may need to train them more.
From a larger standpoint, sleep is a manifestation of a
general physiological need for recovery. After each day of stimulation, both
physical and mental, your body and your brain need to prepare themselves for
the next pulse of activity. Sleep is a critical part of consolidating the day’s
gains to get ready for the next day.
Note: As with all content on this site, I expect to return
to update this over time to add more details and original sources to studies
behind some of my assertions. I’m building this site as a part-time project
while I keep up with other work.
