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Struggling to Sleep? Top Tips to Help

by Jessica Amey

Not getting enough sleep is a common problem. While struggling to nod off on an occasional evening shouldn’t do you too much harm, if it starts to become a regular occurrence, it could lead to health problems. Sleep is critical to all of your bodies functions. It keeps your skin bright and youthful, helps your organs to do their jobs, keeps you alert and happy and can even help you to maintain a healthy weight. While you are asleep, your body recovers from the day just gone, repairs and heals itself, letting you start each day at its best. Failure to get enough sleep can over time affect your physical and mental health, lead to anxiety and affect your mood and relationships.

If you find you are having difficulty falling asleep or that your sleep in interrupted and fitful, here are some things that could help.

Change Your Bed

An uncomfortable bed, with an old mattress, can make it impossible to get a good night’s sleep. You can find it takes you hours to get comfortable and that even if you do manage to get some sleep, you wake up with aches and pains. Long-term this can lead to severe back problems so if you’ve had your mattress for a while and it’s no longer as comfortable and supportive as it should be, check out MattressNextDay for some better options.

Paint the Room

Believe it or not, your choice of bedroom décor can have a huge effect on your quality of sleep. Light colours, like creams and pale blues on the walls, can help you to relax and sleep better. If you do want to add some bolder colours, do it with your accessories and soft furnishings.

Declutter

A cluttered bedroom can lead to stress, keep you awake and even cause a dangerous tripping hazard. Spend some time going through the room decluttering. Get rid of anything that you don’t need or want and then make sure that anything that is left has a home.

Avoid Caffeine

You probably know that cutting caffeine will help you sleep. But, do you realise that caffeine isn’t just in coffee? It’s also in tea, hot chocolate, and chocolate snacks. Caffeine also affects us all in different ways. So, some people may sleep fine after a late-night cup of tea, whereas others need to go decaf after 4 pm.

Get Some Exercise

Not getting enough exercise is a common cause of struggling to sleep. Even going for a 15-minute brisk walk can help so try to fit at least some activity into your daily routine.

Turn Your Devices Off

One of the leading causes of poor sleep today is spending too much time in the evening looking at screens. We watch TV until late, then spend time in bed checking our phones or looking at our tablets. The content we see can stimulate our minds, and the blue light from the screen can make it harder to switch off. Leave your devices in another room when you go to bed for a better night’s sleep.

Even if you think that you sleep well, you may find that making these changes improves your wake-up routine, helping you to feel alert and well rested all day long.

‘This post has been contributed to help my readers’

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