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7. Soothing Bedtime Routines
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If you have children, your own rituals will be even more precious as a method of easing into slumber once you have said goodnight to them.
This is your own time to enjoy peace and privacy.
Once you have decided to turn in for the night, unwelcome intrusions from other housemates or family members can be deterred by hanging a “do not disturb” sign on the door.
If friends often telephone late, don’t bother taking the call – let the answering machine take them.
Listening to music or your favorite late-night radio program can ease and help to “clear” your mind of daily clutter before sleep.
If you like to read in bed, allow yourself time for it and go to bed earlier so you get as much sleep as you need.
It can be comforting to keep favorite images or objects near your bed and glance at them before you sleep, to remind you of people you love and happy times.
Maybe have a relaxing picture of nature to help you calm your mind and meditate or visualize yourself into sleepiness.
Recommended Better Sleep Routines:
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These tips are intended for “typical” adults, but not necessarily for children or persons experiencing medical problems.
A Healthy Daily Schedule & Sleep Routine:
Morning:
Wake up at the same time each morning refreshed and without help.
Have a cup of coffee, tea or hot chocolate if you like it and it doesn't bother you. Eat a nutritious breakfast.
Begin work alert with lots of energy and in a good mood.
Afternoon:
Have a nutritious lunch.
Exercise by late afternoon.
Avoid alcohol, nicotine and caffeinated products.
Evening:
Have a nutritious dinner.
Stop working and begin to relax before bedtime.
Eat a light, healthy snack.
Before bed, listen to music, read a novel, take a bath and think about your day, appreciating what you accomplished and whom you touched.
Make sure your sleeping environment is cool, quiet, dark and comfortable.
Go to bed at your regular time.
Night:
Get a good night of 7 to 9 hours in bed with lots of deep sleep without disruptions.
1. Maintain a regular bed and wake time schedule including weekends.
Our sleep-wake cycle is regulated by a "circadian clock" in our brain and the body's need to balance both sleep time and wake time.
A regular waking time in the morning strengthens the circadian function and can help with sleep onset at night.
That is also why it is important to keep a regular bedtime and wake-time, even on the weekends when there is the temptation to sleep-in.
2. Establish a regular, relaxing bedtime routine such as soaking in a hot bath or hot tub and then reading a book or listening to soothing music.
A relaxing, routine activity right before bedtime conducted away from bright lights helps separate your sleep time from activities that can cause excitement, stress or anxiety which can make it more difficult to fall asleep, get sound and deep sleep or remain asleep.
Avoid arousing activities before bedtime like working, paying bills, engaging in competitive games or family problem-solving.
Some studies suggest that soaking in hot water (such as a hot tub or bath) before retiring to bed can ease the transition into deeper sleep, but it should be done early enough that you are no longer sweating or over-heated.
If you are unable to avoid tension and stress, it may be helpful to learn relaxation therapy from a trained professional.
Finally, avoid exposure to bright before bedtime because it signals the neurons that help control the sleep-wake cycle that it is time to awaken, not to sleep.
3. Create a sleep-conducive environment that is dark, quiet, comfortable and cool.
Design your sleep environment to establish the conditions you need for sleep – cool, quiet, dark, comfortable and free of interruptions.
Also make your bedroom reflective of the value you place on sleep.
Check your room for noise or other distractions, including a bed partner's sleep disruptions such as snoring, light, and a dry or hot environment.
Consider using blackout curtains, eye shades, ear plugs, "white noise," humidifiers, fans and other devices.
4. Sleep on a comfortable mattress and pillows.
Make sure your mattress is comfortable and supportive. The one you have been using for years may have exceeded its life expectancy – about 9 or 10 years for most good quality mattresses.
Have comfortable pillows and make the room attractive and inviting for sleep but also free of allergens that might affect you and objects that might cause you to slip or fall if you have to get up during the night.
5. Use your bedroom only for sleep.
It is best to take work materials, computers and televisions out of the sleeping environment. Use your bed only for sleep to strengthen the association between bed and sleep.
If you associate a particular activity or item with anxiety about sleeping, omit it from your bedtime routine.
For example, if looking at a bedroom clock makes you anxious about how much time you have before you must get up, move the clock out of sight.
Do not engage in activities that cause you anxiety and prevent you from sleeping.
6. Finish eating at least 2-3 hours before your regular bedtime.
Eating or drinking too much may make you less comfortable when settling down for bed. It is best to avoid a heavy meal too close to bedtime.
Also, spicy foods may cause heartburn, which leads to difficulty falling asleep and discomfort during the night.
Try to restrict fluids close to bedtime to prevent nighttime awakenings to go to the bathroom, though some people find milk or herbal, non-caffeinated teas to be soothing and a helpful part of a bedtime routine.
7. Exercise regularly. It is best to complete your workout at least a few hours before bedtime.
In general, exercising regularly makes it easier to fall asleep and contributes to sounder sleep. However, exercising sporadically or right before going to bed will make falling asleep more difficult.
In addition to making us more alert, our body temperature rises during exercise, and takes as much as 6 hours to begin to drop.
A cooler body temperature is associated with sleep onset. Finish your exercise at least 3 hours before bedtime. Late afternoon exercise is the perfect way to help you fall asleep at night.
8. Avoid caffeine (e.g. coffee, tea, soft drinks, chocolate) close to bedtime. It can keep you awake.
Caffeine is a stimulant, which means it can produce an alerting effect.
Caffeine products, such as coffee, tea, colas and chocolate, remain in the body on average from 3 to 5 hours, but they can affect some people up to 12 hours later.
Even if you do not think caffeine affects you, it may be disrupting and changing the quality of your sleep.
Avoiding caffeine within 6-8 hours of going to bed can help improve sleep quality.
9. Avoid nicotine (e.g. cigarettes, tobacco products). Used close to bedtime, it can lead to poor sleep.
Nicotine is also a stimulant. Smoking before bed makes it more difficult to fall asleep.
When smokers go to sleep, they experience withdrawal symptoms from nicotine, which also cause sleep problems.
Nicotine can cause difficulty falling asleep, problems waking in the morning, and may also cause nightmares.
Difficulty sleeping is just one more reason to quit smoking. And never smoke in bed or when sleepy!
10. Avoid alcohol close to bedtime.
Although many people think of alcohol as a sedative, it actually disrupts sleep, causing nighttime awakenings.
Consuming alcohol leads to a night of less restful sleep.
Take an Inventory of your Sleep Habits to see if there is a simple natural insomnia cure you can apply
One of the things that we've learned in recent years has been that the longer a sleep problem continues, the more ingrained it becomes and the more people become conditioned to that sleep problem.
Just like a snowball building up, it gets bigger and bigger as time goes on.
A good first step is to keep a sleep diary to identify specific problem areas.
In the diary, you should note the time you go to bed; when you wake up; how long it takes you to fall asleep; if you wake early; and the time you spend napping during the day.
If you plot out this information in a sleep diary for a couple of weeks, you may discover patterns.
It's important to see what the best nights and what the worst nights look like to raise awareness that your sleep is not the same every night, because we tend to overvalue the poor nights and undervalue the good nights.
It also gives you an opportunity to try and figure out what happened on the poor nights that made them poor.
Or alternatively, what happened on the good nights that worked well and that helped you sleep well.
You need to break the learned association between being awake and being in bed.
If you are not asleep in 15 to 20 minutes, get up out of bed, go into another room and engage in some sedentary activity until you begin to feel sleepy.
Then at that point, return back to bed.
Take a closer look at any existing medical conditions
Underlying medical conditions can also contribute to sleeping problems.
Virtually every chronic medical illness—conditions that cause pain, impair our ability to move at night, cause difficulty breathing—can be associated with insomnia.
Psychiatric conditions, such as clinical depression and serious anxiety disorders, can also be associated with long-term insomnia.
And many medications can lead to insomnia, including some antidepressants, blood pressure medications and certain over-the-counter medications.
Simple adjustments in medical care can often help minimize problems stemming from medical sources.
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8. Relaxation with Aromatherapy
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