How to Improve Sleep for Weight Loss and Mental Health
I’ll admit, for most of my life, my sleep habits have been terrible. But until this past year, they seemed completely acceptable. In fact, they’re probably not much different than yours.
High school and college were commonly marked by late nights followed by groggy mornings. I was forced to adapt early in my adult life. I began waking up earlier thanks to my long-distance relationship with Kara. I was a night owl trying to be a morning lark. It worked about as well as sticking those two birds in the same cage. But I figured if I could function throughout the day (i.e. keep my body moving) then I was doing okay.
Besides, the weekends were always there to play a little catch-up, right?
But I had it all wrong. In the following paragraphs, I’ll explain why your health – both short-term and long-term – depends on your sleep quality, why sleep must be a priority, and why you average night of six hours could be killing you. Once you understand the science of sleep, I’ll provide everything you need to improve your sleep tonight.
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The importance of sleep: why it should be a top priority
How does sleep change with age?
How important is sleep?
I think we would all agree that sleep is important. But how important is the question.
Let me give you a simple exercise to get you thinking. Take a moment and prioritize the following items when it comes to your health:
Exercise
Nutrition
Hydration
Sleep
It may seem like an impossible list to sort. But we’ll come back it in a moment.
After learning the purpose and function of sleep – beyond helping you not feel groggy in the morning – I’ve completely changed my view. Let me explain why.
Before writing this article, I began tracking my sleep. According to the reports I was given each morning, I slept better than 92% of people on average. But according to actual sleep research, I wasn’t sleeping well at all. I routinely slept less than 7 hours and my deep sleep (the restorative kind) was usually 10-12% below what it should be.
Back to that exercise I gave you a moment ago. Sleep is often thought of as one of the pillars of health right along with nutrition and exercise. But as Matthew Walker, neuroscientist, and author of Why We Sleep, explains, sleep is not just a pillar of health, it’s the foundation. It’s the bedrock that your nutrition, hydration, and exercise are built upon.
Sleep is non-negotiable. And people who don’t prioritize it face immediate repercussions (whether they realize it or not) and long-term side effects.
What is sleep?
It seems like an obvious answer, right? Sleep is the opposite of being awake. But as anyone who has studied sleep will tell you, sleep is much more than a non-waking state. We now know that sleep is not an offline brain state. In fact, EEG reports show brain activity during certain stages that mirror awake states.
Sleep is a time of healing, restoration, glucose regulation, brain detoxification, it’s when your brain transfers data from short-term storage to long-term memory consolidation. Sleep scientists have called sleep the restorative process in response to the damage done during waking hours. The list of functions and processes taking place while you’re asleep could go on. As you’ll discover shortly, some functions of the brain and body are even more active during sleep than when we're awake. It’s for this reason the National Sleep Association calls sleep a “dynamic activity.”
Sleep is a five-stage mental and physical state. It involves neurons in the brainstem that produce neurotransmitters (such as serotonin and norepinephrine) that keep some parts of the brain active while we are awake. Other neurons at the base of the brain begin signaling when we fall asleep. These neurons appear to “switch off” the signals that keep us awake. A chemical called adenosine (also referred to as “sleep pressure”) builds up in your blood while awake and causes you to become sleepy.
The importance of sleep: why it should be a top priority
Let me start making a simple statement you’ll agree with now, but even more so by the end of this article: Sleep is important. Its value goes so much further than your mood regulation and energy levels.
In fact, sleep is so important, that the World Health Organization (WHO) has classified shift work as a known carcinogen because of the way it impairs someone’s sleep. They’ve even implemented legislation in certain countries that provides compensation for government employees required to work late-night or early morning hours.
Sleep is valuable. But unlike taking a multivitamin or quitting smoking, it’s not often we change our behaviors because of it. Over-booked schedules make it difficult to adopt a regular sleep schedule. And when given the chance, we sacrifice the hours we could be sleeping in exchange for a few more hours of TV. Burning the candle at both ends, the twenty-first-century corporate hustler is celebrated for his or her willingness to forgo sleep in order to produce more.
We overestimate our ability to get by without sleep and underestimate its importance.
But what if instead of taking this thing we’ve been doing all our lives for granted, it was pitched as a miracle drug? Let’s step into a hypothetical doctor viait for a moment. He tells you he has a new life-sustaining prescription for you, one that will provide strength, energy, and mental prowess; one that will ward off disease, fight infection, lower stress levels, and improve your metabolism. It will even decrease your chance of cancer and cognitive disease such as Alzheimer’s.
Undoubtedly, you respond with an emphatic, “yes!” You want the prescription, but you have to imagine the cost must be significant for such a miracle pill. But to it even better – your doctor tells you it’s completely free!
Now here comes the question with an obvious answer: Would you ever imagine depriving yourself of such a medication? Yea, I wouldn’t either.
So instead of seeing how my body manages little sleep, I’ve changed my tune to see how my body responds when I do everything I can to nurture it. How could I improve the efficacy of such a prescription?
You’ve heard it said you “can’t outwork a poor diet.” Well, knowing what I now know, I’d say you can’t outwork – or out diet – poor sleep!
No matter how hard you try, you can’t outrun the effects of sleep loss. In fact, each year during daylight savings there’s a 24% increase in heart attacks across the nation.
Your brain is the control center of your body. And it demands sleep to operate. I’m sure you can appreciate the effects alcohol has on cognitive function. But what about a loss of sleep?
After 19 hours of being awake (i.e. sleeping only 6 hours/night), your brain reaches a cognitive impairment equal to legal intoxication (.08 blood alcohol level).
Sleep stages
Sleep scientists have divided sleep into two distinct stages: rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and non-rapid eye movement (Non-REM) sleep which is broken down into three individual stages.
(Stage 3 NREM is sometimes separated into 2 separate stages: Stage 3 NREM and Stage 4 NREM.)
Rather than being one long drawn-out sleep sequence, you actually cycle through all sleep stages several times during the night.
Stage 1 non-REM sleep
Other names: N1
Length: 1-5 minutes
Light sleep comprises 45-55% of nightly sleep
This is the initial stage of sleep when you transition from being awake to sleeping. It’s characterized by light sleep lasting only a few minutes and it’s during this stage you’re most easily awoken. In it, your heartbeat, breathing, and eye movements slow, and your muscles relax with occasional twitches. Brain waves slow from wakefulness patterns. You may have noticed someone experience quick jolts after dosing off. These are sudden muscle contractions are called hypnic myoclonia or hypnic jerks, and are common after falling asleep.
Stage 2 non-REM sleep
Other names: N2
Length: 10-60 minutes
Light sleep comprises 45-55% of nightly sleep
This is the next stage of light sleep before entering deeper sleep. Your heartbeat and breathing continue to slow, and muscles relax even further. During this stage eye movements stop and brain waves (fluctuations of electrical activity that can be measured by electrodes) become slower, with occasional bursts of rapid waves called sleep spindles. Your body temperature drops and eye movements stop. You will spend more time in repeated sleep cycles of Stage 2 non-REM sleep than any other stage.
Stage 3 – Stage 4 non-REM sleep
Other names: N3, Slow-Wave Sleep (SWS), Delta Sleep, Deep Sleep
Length: 20-40 minutes
13-23% of sleep
Stages 3 – 4 are often grouped together. These are your deep stages of sleep, responsible for helping you feel refreshed in the morning. Understandably it’s the stage medications and alcohol are notorious for robbing sleepers of. They occur during longer periods during the first half of the night. The hallmark sign is the slowest heartbeat and breathing you’ll experience during the night. Muscles are relaxed, brain waves become even slower, and it can be difficult to awaken someone in this stage.
If you’ve ever been woken up and felt groggy for several minutes afterwards, you were most likely in Stage 3 sleep at the time.This the deepest sleep and the most difficult to wake someone during this stage. Children experience bedwetting, night terrors, or sleepwalking during deep sleep.
REM sleep
Other names: REM Sleep
Length: 10-60 minutes
20-25% of nightly sleep
The stages all derive their name from the rapid, side-to-side eye movement that takes place in this stage. It first happens about 90 minutes after you fall asleep.
Adults spend about 20% in REM sleep, in contrast, infants spend about half of their time in REM sleep. Your brain wave activity actually resembles that of wakefulness. Your breathing becomes faster and irregular, and your heart rate and blood pressure increase, again, almost similar to your waking levels. Although you can dream during any of the sleep stages, dreams are most common and most vivid during REM sleep, which is explained by the significant uptick in brain activity. Your arm and leg muscles become temporarily paralyzed to prevent you from acting out your dreams. As you age, you sleep less of your time in REM sleep.
REM sleep is believed to be essential to cognitive functions like memory consolidation, learning, and creativity.
REM Sleep and dreams
Ideally, you’ll spend over 2 hours dreaming each night. The purpose of dreams remains elusive to sleep scientists. Most mammals and birds dream, humans dream, but we still don’t understand their purpose or what benefit they provide.
*Reptiles and other cold-blooded animals don’t show signs of dreaming.
Sigmund Freud thought they were a sort of a “safety valve” for unconscious desires. But then, in 1953, we discovered infants also dream. Freud’s theory was abandoned and we realized there must be more to dreaming than unfulfilled fantasies.
Dreams can occur during any stage, but most often during REM sleep. And during this sleep stage, your body is paralyzed to prevent it from acting out or responding to your dreams.
Some people can suffer from a rare disorder called REM sleep behavior disorder. It’s a condition that interferes with the body’s self-induced state of paralysis causing the dreamer to potentially respond to the dream’s stimulus.
On average, an adult will only spend about two hours dreaming assuming they’re getting 7-9 hours. But infants and unborn babies experience a great deal more. Yes, a baby will dream even while he or she is still in the womb. They will spend 85-90% of their time dreaming in the last couple of weeks leading up to birth. Infants will spend 50% or more of their sleep in REM. And for good reason: REM sleep stimulates the brain regions used in learning.
How does sleep change with age?
But sleep structure, habits, and duration change with age.
If you ever spent any time with an infant and the elderly you know there’s a vast difference between their sleep patterns. Many people assume the reason older people sleep so little is that their bodies no longer need as much sleep.
Sleep requirements will decrease after the first 12 months of age. Sure, adults are no longer growing a brain like an infant. But when it comes to sleep we all need it no matter the stage of life.
Let’s take a look at the changes in sleep with age. This will help you understand the sleep requirements for each stage of life.
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Amount of sleep needed: 90+% of the day
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Amount of sleep needed: 14-17 hours of sleep
A mother’s alcohol consumption during pregnancy or breastfeeding will harm her baby’s brain development by suppressing the child’s REM sleep. This has been linked to brain disorders, learning disorders, mood disorders, and even teenage suicidal tendencies. It’s not a matter of ‘IF’ – suppressing a baby’s REM sleep will disrupt and distort the brain’s development.
While most mothers understand the importance of abstaining from alcohol during pregnancy and breastfeeding, not as many have thought about the potential effects caffeine can have on their children. There is little research on effect of moderate caffeine consumption on breast milk. But as one research paper suggested, “Caffeine appears in breastmilk rapidly after maternal ingestion [...] Preterm and younger newborn infants metabolize caffeine very slowly and may have serum levels of caffeine and other active caffeine metabolites similar to their mothers' levels, so a lower intake level preferable in the mothers of these infants.”
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Amount of sleep needed: 12-15 hours of sleep
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Amount of sleep needed: 10-13 hours of sleep
Parents should always air on the side of caution. You are setting your child up for success or failure depending on their quality and quantity of sleep. One study found that 3-year-olds who sleep 10.5 hours or less had a 45% chance of being obese by the age of 7 when compared to children who slept 12 hours per night.
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Amount of sleep needed: 9-11 hours of sleep
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Amount of sleep needed: 8-10 hours of sleep
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Amount of sleep needed: 7-9 hours of sleep.
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Amount of sleep needed: 7-9 hours of sleep.
*See below for specific sleep tips for adults.
My personal sleep tracking
For over a month and a half I’ve been tracking my sleep and last night was the first night I’ve had a normal amount of deep sleep. Sure, I’ve had plenty of nights with 7 hours of sleep, 8 hours, and even more. But last night was the first time I got anywhere close.
Your sleep should be comprised of 20-25% REM, 45-55% light sleep, and 13-23% deep sleep.
Throughout college, I was (foolishly) the kid joking that I would sleep when I died. But during my first job after college, I saw how it was a statement that didn’t age well. My boss was the guy who personified that foolish statement. And each year it nearly killed him.
During an overseas business trip, my coworker and I were unable to find him for over 24 hours. We called him – no answer. We emailed him – no reply. We even checked with the hotel to see if he had left a message. No one had any idea where he was.
In the middle of the night, his lack of sleep had apparently caught up to him. He checked himself in for what he explained as the “strangest thing.” Apparently once or twice a year his body would stall out like a broken down car on the side of the highway.
Although he would never admit it, his body was craving sleep. But he was unwilling to get the adequate rest his body needed. His 3.5-4 hours of sleep each night were his badge of honor – the epitome of hustle! So much so that his own body couldn’t keep up.
And come to find out, this wasn’t the first time he had checked himself into a hospital during a business trip unannounced.
I knew sleep was important. But I still never gave it the priority it deserved. Exercising and eating right required action – I could get behind that. But sleep… sleep isn’t exciting. It’s literally not doing anything.
But I decided it was time to invest in my rest. To give sleep the priority it deserved (or so I was told). So, I dove into the research, planned out a sleep routine, invested in some sleep tech, and started tracking my sleep each night.
First month of tracking sleep
I didn’t make any changes to my sleep when I first started tracking. I maintained my current dietary and sleep routine habits.
SIDE NOTE: You could have above-average nutrition, but still be negatively affecting your sleep. As we'll discuss later in this article, when it comes to what you eat and your sleep, it’s not just about WHAT you eat, but also WHEN you eat it.
Sleep was less than optimal… I knew I should be sleeping more. But I discovered I needed to improve the quality of my sleep for the sake of my health and well-being. I began to understand what sleep doctors meant when they said most people have become used to suboptimal sleep.
Second month of tracking sleep
I became aware of the things that were affecting my sleep. I became more consistent with the fundamental things that I knew affected my sleep (i.e. limiting screen time in the evening, reading paper books instead of books on a screen).
As a result, the quality of my sleep slowly began to improve during the second month, but my deep sleep (Stage 3 non-REM sleep) was still less than optimal. I averaged less than 10% deep sleep. Some nights it was as low as 3 or 4%. Only twice during my first two months of tracking my sleep did I land in the “healthy” amount of deep sleep range (13% one night and 16% another). Deep sleep should account for 13-23% of your sleep each night.
Third month of tracking sleep
During my third month of tracking my sleep things finally started to improve. Not only was I aware of what habits and tactics would improve my sleep, I proactively began implementing as many of the needed changes as I possibly could. But I want you to understand I didn’t do anything drastic to improve my sleep. I simply focussed on improving the quality of my sleep and my actions reflected that.
Here are a few of the things I did to improve my sleep:
Maintained a consistent sleep schedule waking up the same time each night (no exceptions on the weekend)
Stopped consuming liquids after 7:30 PM
Stopped eating at 7:30/8:30 PM
Stopped eating salty foods after dinner
Dimmed lights within 60 minutes of going to bed
Stopped screen use 30-60 minutes before bed
Stopped consuming caffeine after 11:00 AM
Washed my face/splashed warm water on my face 30 minutes before bed
More than 75% of the nights I got at least seven hours of sleep. And my deep sleep was consistently in the healthy range of 13-23%. The difference between a night of getting enough deep sleep and not is noticeable.
On the nights I achieve a healthy amount of deep sleep I wake up easier feeling refreshed. I’m able to think more clearly and I’m able to push myself further during my workouts. But one of the things I notice most about achieving a healthy amount of deep sleep is how much more cardio output I have. I’m much more easily winded when I don’t get enough deep sleep.
What happens when you don’t get enough sleep?
As I can attest, sleep affects every function of our health. It impacts both mental and physical function. In fact, studies have associated Daylight Savings time with a 24% increase in heart attacks.
Sleep loss and sleep disorders are among the most common yet frequently overlooked and readily treatable health problems. According to research, it’s estimated that 50 to 70 million Americans chronically suffer from a disorder of sleep and wakefulness.
The result of poor sleep can lead to cataclysmic consequences such as the space shuttle Challenger. The less-publicized effects are more common such as a sleepy driver causing a car accident or a sleep-deprived doctor making surgical or diagnostic errors.
A poor night’s rest here or there might be one thing. The acute effects of sleep deprivation can be seen within hours such as a car accident. But the cumulative effects of sleep loss are less frequently associated. Sleep loss and sleep disorders have been associated with a wide range of deleterious health consequences including an increased risk of common health problems such as obesity, strokes, heart disease, infection, cancer, and age-related brain disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.
Sleep loss affects overall health
Thanks, in large part to ongoing sleep research, we’ve realized the effect sleep loss has on our health during the past decade. Sleep loss – identified as less than 7 hours per night – has been associated with many health disorders including:
Obesity in adults and children
Diabetes and impaired glucose tolerance
Cardiovascular disease and hypertension
Immune deficiency
Anxiety symptoms
Depressed mood
Alcohol use
Sleep loss and immune health
If you feel sleepy when you’re sick, it’s not in your head. Your body produces cytokines to fight infections and they’re known for promoting sleep. It also makes sense that your body would try to limit the use of certain functions in order to prioritize energy for fighting infection.
Sleep loss and mental health
Sleeping problems occur in almost everyone with mental disorders, including those with depression and schizophrenia. The amount of sleep a person gets also strongly influences the symptoms of mental disorders. And disrupted sleep can trigger episodes of mania (agitation and hyperactivity) in people with manic depression.
But extreme sleep deprivation can even lead to psychotic paranoia and hallucinations in otherwise healthy people.
One of the most famous examples of sleep deprivation-induced hysteria happened in 1959 to a New York City radio DJ, Peter Tripp. Tripp set out to break the record for staying awake the longest to benefit the March of Dimes. He stayed awake for 8 days and 8 nights straight (a total of 201 consecutive hours).
After the first four days, he was hallucinating spiders and mice crawling over his body. His mental state continued to deteriorate so badly during the following four days that he was unable to differentiate between reality and delusion. He was convinced his doctors and those around him were conspiring against him.
His short-term side effects wore off within the following days. But according to those around him, his life was never the same. He was fired from his job, divorced, and rarely heard from again. Going for more than a week without sleep is a long time. But the official world record is held by Randy Garder who stayed awake for 264.4 hours (11 whole days). Gardner set the record in 1963 for a high school science project. This was the last time The Guinness Book of World records acknowledged a sleep deprivation record sitting the health risk of attempting such a record.
Gardner, like Tripp, quickly overcame the short-term side effects in the following 24-48 hours. But the long-term results eventually caught up with him. During an interview with NPR, he mentioned he came to a point in his life where he stopped being able to sleep. “I was awful to be around. Everything upset me. It was like a continuation of what I did 50 years ago,” explained Gardner. After years of dealing with life-altering insomnia, he regained his ability to fall asleep. But only for a maximum of six hours.
Your quality and quantity of sleep affect your mental health in both the short term and long term. Sleeping problems are common in many other disorders, including Alzheimer’s and dementia. And besides hysteria, paranoia, and manic episodes, sleep affects your brain in much more subtle ways. Your quality and quantity of sleep also affects your ability to focus and retain information.
Sleep loss and heart health
Yes, a lack of sleep goes straight to your head. But it also goes to your heart.
A loss of 1-2 hours of sleep (sleeping less than seven hours in a night) increases systolic blood pressure and heart rate, putting stress on your cardiovascular system. The most frightening example of this occurs each year across the nation during daylight savings. Researchers have found that heart attacks increase by 20% during the following week after Daylight Savings.
An hour of increased or decreased sleep has been directly correlated to the level of heart attacks.
Sleep loss and weight management
There isn’t a system or function in your body that doesn’t feel the effect of your sleep. Your body’s weight is no exception. Most people would probably assume weight management is somehow controlled by sleep. But most are left asking HOW?
Let’s take a look at a couple of the ways to sleep directly affects your weight management.
Sleep affects what we eat
Considering what we’ve already learned, it seems foolish to consider sleep loss as a weight-loss tool. But that is exactly what some have attempted to use it for. Where’s the logic in this? It goes along this line of thinking, “If your body is burning calories all day while your awake, you’d probably benefit from powering through the night.”
As silly as this logic may sound, the little calorie deficit created by not sleeping is even worse. Research shows you only burn an additional 143 calories staying up for 24 hours relative compared to someone who gets 8 hours of sleep at night. That’s less than 1/4 cup of guacamole. I think most of us would rather have our sleep.
So, we can safely rule out the idea of depriving ourselves of sleep to lose weight. The reality – and more accurate thought – is that your body needs sleep in order to maintain and/or develop healthy weight management.
Think about this…
Do you remember the last time you stayed up late and began craving a kale salad? You probably don’t because sleep deprivation changes our food preferences – and not for the better.
When your body is sleep-deprived, it releases endocannabinoids into your system which is similar to having the munchies.
A study conducted by Dr. Matthew Walker and his team of researchers published in 2013, showed that sleep-deprived subjects were much more likely to make unhealthy food choices and consume higher amounts of calories. Compared to the choices made while rested, the sleep-deprived subjects chose food that added up to 600 calories more than their usual choices. “There’s something that changes in our brain when we’re sleepy that’s irrespective of how much energy we need,” says Dr. Kenneth P. Wright, director of the sleep and chronobiology lab at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “The brain wants more even when the energy need has been fulfilled.”
Less than 7 hours of sleep increases the risk of weight gain, obesity, and type 2 diabetes.
Researchers found that under-slept individuals ate 300 extra calories compared to their rested selves. That is 10-15 pounds a year— every year.
Dr. Wright suspects the reason our brain’s response to food changes with sleep can be attributed to adenosine. Adenosine is a metabolic byproduct that disrupts neural function and promotes sleepiness as it accumulates in the brain. One of the ways that caffeine stimulates wakefulness is by blocking adenosine. Adenosine is also cleared from the system during sleep.
According to Dr. Walker, adenosine builds up and could start to degrade communication between networks in the brain without enough sleep. Getting sleep may be the equivalent of rebooting the brain.
Sleep affects your hormones
In addition to adenosine, cortisol levels are dramatically affected by our amount of sleep. Cortisol is the stress hormone responsible for increasing your appetite. The brain’s cortisol levels increase with less sleep.
Measuring two appetite-related hormones, research found that sleep loss increases appetite. They associated sleep insufficiency with lower levels of leptin, a hormone produced by an adipose tissue hormone that suppresses appetite, and higher levels of ghrelin, a peptide that stimulates appetite.
This correlation between sleep loss and weight gain is seen in both adults and children. One study saw a 45% increase in obesity in 3-year-olds by age of 7 who slept 10.5 hours or less when compared to children who slept 12 hours per night.
Sleep affects your physical performance
Sleep deprivation negatively impacts your brain’s mental performance which directly affects your body’s physical performance. That means slower reaction time, a loss of strength, and decreased stamina.
Sleep is a time for your body to repair and restore. Each night’s rest allows your body to rejuvenate for the next day. It repairs itself from the previous day’s stress and prepares for the next day. “Sleep is important for pretty much every one of your physical systems,” says Janet Kennedy, PhD, the founder of NYC Sleep Doctor.
In addition to repair, sleep provides the necessary energy and motivation to maintain an active, healthy lifestyle. After a short night’s rest, the last thing you typically want to do is work out. Research supports this – a single night of poor sleep can decrease strength, lower cardio fitness, and decrease time to exhaustion.
Frequently asked sleep-related questions
There are countless sleep-related questions. But I want to tackle a few of the most common ones.
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“I’ll just sleep in this weekend.” It’s a thought we’ve all had: playing “catch up” over the weekend for the sleep we’ve missed during the week. It may not be this simple or straight forward though. Depending on how sleep-deprived you are, sleeping longer on the weekends may not be adequate.
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Yes and no. It depends on who uses it and when. It’s good for when you’re traveling through timezones and need to get your body’s circadian rhythm to recalibrate to the new time zone faster. It can also be helpful for the elderly who experience chronic sleep disruption (often due to age and medications).
For everyone else, taking melatonin can disrupt your sleep pattern. Although most melatonin supplements say they are non-addictive, you can still develop a dependence on them.
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No. Alcohol suppresses melatonin creation, interferes with REM sleep, and prevents your body from entering deep sleep stages. This is often the reason you wake up feeling groggy after a night of drinking.
Alcoholics can develop such a severe REM sleep deficit that they literally begin hallucinating – their body is trying to dream even while they’re awake.
This can lead to vivid even disturbing dreams when their body is given the opportunity to “catch up” on REM sleep.
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It’s not necessarily a question – but a commonly made statement that I thought should be addressed. Many people seem almost impervious to the effect of caffeine. Is that actually the case?
Well, even though you may be able to fall asleep quickly, you won’t experience as much deep sleep. Caffeine interferes with your brain’s ability to enter the deep, restful stages of sleep.
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According to Dr. Walker, you can ask yourself two simple questions to determine if you’re getting enough sleep:
After waking up in the morning, could you fall back to sleep at 10:00 or 11:00?
Can function optimally without caffeine before noon?
But if you want an even better idea of whether you’re getting enough sleep, answer the five-question SATED questionnaire.
Click here to download it.
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Freud was convinced they were unrealized fantasies. But dreams are much more than that. But how much more – with all the research that’s been compiled they still don’t know. Even sleep scientists still aren’t entirely sure what purpose dreams serve. Some suggest dreaming may help process emotions. Events from the previous day often affect your dreams, and people suffering from stress or anxiety are more likely to have frightening dreams.
On average, you spend about 2 hours each night dreaming but most of those dreams are forgotten. Dreams can be experienced in all stages of sleep but usually are most vivid in REM sleep. Some people dream in color, while others only recall dreams in black and white.
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When it comes to sleep, the question shouldn’t be “How little can I get by with?” Study after study has confirmed we don’t do well on little sleep. After 17 to 19 hours (i.e. sleeping less than seven hours per night) without sleep, research shows that performance is impaired as much or worse than that of a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) level of 0.05 percent.
It’s been said that the number of people who can get by on five hours of sleep per night if rounded to a whole percent would be zero… the number of people who can thrive on less than seven hours of sleep is rare. And for those who say they can, research would suggest you would be pleasantly surprised by the results of sleeping seven or more hours each night for multiple consecutive nights. The fact of the matter is that most adults need 7-9 hours of sleep a night.
I previously hinted at the select few who can get by on little sleep. A rare condition called short sleep syndrome (SSS) allows a select group of people to sleep only 4-6 hours without any effects of sleep deprivation. So far, these people have one of two genes. And before you assume you have one of these genes, short sleep syndrome (SSS) affects fewer than 1% of the world’s population.
Most people underestimate their need for sleep and overestimate their ability to get by without it. Sleeping for six hours or less can have many short-term and long-term detrimental effects on your body. One sleep deprivation study published in the journal Sleep took 48 adults and restricted their sleep to a maximum of four, six, or eight hours a night for two weeks. One subset was deprived of sleep for three days straight.
The subjects who got six hours of sleep a night for two weeks straight functioned as poorly as those who were forced to stay awake for two days straight.
Many people feel they can "catch up" on missed sleep during the weekend but, depending on how sleep-deprived they are, sleeping longer on the weekends may not be adequate.
Research has shown that even moderate sleep deprivation produces impairments equivalent to those of alcohol intoxication.
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Yes. The blue light from a TV screen interferes with your melatonin production.
How to get better sleep
When it comes to improving your sleep there are many things to account for. A routine is important, but so is your environment. The choices you make when you wake up can even affect the quality of sleep you’ll get later on that night.
The reality is that more people achieve poor sleep. So, why are so many people so bad at something they’ve been doing their entire life? It comes down to habits, routines, and environment.
In order to help you get the best night’s rest, I am going to provide you with a recipe for the best night’s rest.
Routines + habits + environment = restful sleep
To make sense of this formula, I’m going to break it down into three ingredients and explain the factors or elements of each one.
In his book, Why We Sleep, neuroscientist Matthew Walker provides 11 tips for improving your sleep quality. I’m going to discuss many of those tips, but I’m going to categorize them, expand upon them in more depth, and add a few practical tips as well.
Sleep routines
Find a sleep routine
Your alarm clock isn’t the only clock in your bedroom. Your body is equipped with an internal clock that follows a specific sleep-wake cycle. Maintaining an erratic sleep schedule throws off your circadian rhythm.
People often assume they can deprive themselves of sleep during the week and then catch up over the weekend. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear to be a safe solution. “Attempting to catch up on missed sleep (sleep deficit) over the weekend may not always be effective and can result in physical and mental fatigue,” explains Walker. Following a regular sleep schedule is beneficial for overall health and well-being.
Sleep habits
Most people think of the things they do right before bed when they hear “sleep habits.” But the truth is, your sleep can be affected by the things you do throughout the day.
Cut the late-night exercise
Late-night workouts can make it more difficult for your brain and body to calm down before bed. A rise in core body temperature from exercise can also make it more difficult for your body to wind down and enter sleep. As Dr. Walker suggests, “Aim to finish heavy exercise two to three hours before hitting the sack.” You can learn more about the way exercise impacts sleep quality.
Reduce caffeine and nicotine consumption
Caffeine and nicotine temporarily block the signal from adenosine, a crucial sleep chemical in your brain, which builds throughout the day. The build-up of adenosine eventually breaks through, causing a dramatic crash. Both stimulants are stimulants can lead to light sleep.
Reduce salt intake
Did you know sodium can also affect your sleep? “Eating a meal that's high in sodium at dinnertime can contribute to sleep disturbances, in part due to an increase in blood pressure and fluid retention,” explains Dr. Sandra Darling of the Cleveland Clinic. “The result may be restless sleep, frequent awakenings, and not feeling rested in the morning.
Limit beverages before bed
Hydration is important, but drinking fluids before bed can lead to a full blatter waking you up throughout the night. This occurs even more frequently with age due to a weakening bladder. Try to avoid drinking fluids a two hours before bedtime
Limit alcohol
Alcohol before bed may help you relax and even fall asleep, but too much of it can contribute to a lack of sleep and the ability to stay asleep. Alcohol robs you of REM sleep — the deep slumber your brain requires for restoration. Heavy alcohol consumption can also impair your breathing at night.
Eat light at night & stop earlier
If you’re going to eat before bed, opt for a light snack instead of heavy foods or large meals. Eating before bed forces your body to prioritize food metabolization rather than sleep.
Your body’s metabolism naturally increases your core temperature while processing food. But your body is trying to lower your core temperature when going to sleep (your body temperature must drop 1-2 degrees for sleep). Similar to liquids, try to avoid consuming food two hours before bedtime.
Talk to your doctor about your medication schedule
Certain medications such as heart, lung, and allergy medications (even some over-the-counter medications) can interfere with sleep. If you’re struggling to sleep well, speak with your healthcare provider to see if you can take them earlier in the day.
Have time to relax & unwind
Going straight from the business of the day to climbing into bed to sleep can lead to troubled sleep. Whether it’s reading, meditating, light stretching, or journaling, you want to be able to have some downtime before bed. Dr. Matthew Walker suggests keeping a worry journal to write down any troubling thoughts you might end up ruminating on throughout the night.
Take a bath
It might sound counterintuitive, but taking a hot bath before bed can help drop your body temperature. It causes the blood to rise to the surface of your skin creating a rabid cooling effect once you step out of the tub. Not only does this help your body drop its core temperature as required for sleep, it helps you feel sleepier and more relaxed. But not everyone has time to bathe before bed. A quick, simple substitute is to splash warm water on your face or wash your face before bed.
Get some sun
Expose yourself to natural sunlight for at least thirty minutes each day to help regulate your sleep patterns. The best time is early in the morning to help your body wake up and begin building sleep pressure throughout the day.
Avoid lying in bed for too long
Lying in bed counting sheep isn’t the best remedy to fall asleep. It will only lead to more anxiety and frustration. Psychologically your brain will also begin to associate your bed with non-sleep-related activities. If you’re unable to fall asleep within 25-30 minutes, get out of bed and read a book or meditate until you begin feeling drowsy.
Sleep environment
Keep devices out of the bedroom
As Dr. Walker suggests, the ideal bedroom should be similar to a cool prehistoric cave: cool, dark, and gadget-free. Charge your phone in another room, get rid of electronics that cause noise, and if you cab, eliminate any clock that makes you aware of the minutes passing by.
Consider the temperature of your room
Sleep specialists suggest 65 degrees as the optimal sleep temperature. That may be a little chillier than some would prefer. But either way, you want to make sure it’s not too warm. You want the room to be cool enough that you’re comfortable: not too cold, but not too warm either.
Consider the darkness of your room
Your bedroom should be dark. Melatonin is called the darkness hormone for a reason. Darkness signals the brain to go to sleep. Block out as much light as possible. But make sure you’re able to find your way safely to the bathroom for middle-of-the-night trips.
Consider your sleep attire
You want your pajamas to be loose, unrestrictive, and comfortable. You don’t want to sleep in something that will restrict your movement or cause you to get too warm in the middle of the night. Try to avoid going to bed in something that will cause you to wake up feeling too hot and need to remove a layer.
Consider your pillow and mattress
Your mattress and pillow should be swapped every eight years. This ensures neither become too worn down. It’s also a good idea for sanitary purposes. You spend one-third of your life sleeping. You sweat and also lose skin cells that get embedded into these surfaces.
Add some noise
Noise, especially loud infrequent noises, can be one of the most disruptive things for sleep. When it comes to noise and your sleep, you want to reduce – better yet, eliminate altogether – disruptive noise. But certain noises can prove to be helpful. White noise, such as the hum of a fan or the static of a radio, can promote sleep.
More recently, sleep specialists have encouraged the use of pink noise – random noises with a lower frequency than white noise – as they say, it improves your deep sleep state. Pink noise may even lead to better memory retention upon achieving wakefulness.
Optimizing sleep
How to optimize sleep for memory
Sleep is an essential part of memory and learning. Sleep transfers memories from short-term to long-term storage. This process of memory consolidation takes the information you’ve learned during the day that’s sitting in your hippocampus and transfers it to your nyocortex for long-term storage. If you do not sleep the night after learning something your chances to maintain those memories are gone. It is an all-or-nothing process – if you want to remember something, sleep on it.
How to optimize sleep for creativity
Thomas Edison’s aversion to sleep was well-known. It was a waste of time he thought. Edison claimed he never slept more than four hours a night.
But sleep wasn’t completely useless to the inventor – stories suggest he may have relied on slumber to fuel his creativity.
Edison is said to have taken midday naps while holding a ball bearing in hand. As soon as dosed off, the ball would drop into a steel bowl and wake him. The point was to harness the pre-slumber creativity without forgetting it.
The practical implications of such a practice may be a little difficult to apply. If you don’t feel like having your midday naps interrupted by the clang of a steel ball, you could just keep a notepad next to your bed for when inspiration strikes. Avoid using the note app on your phone through – the blue light from your phone will interfere with melatonin levels making it harder to fall back to sleep.
How to optimize sleep for weight loss and weight management
Do you remember the last time you stayed up late and began craving a kale salad? You probably don’t because sleep deprivation changes our food preferences – and not for the better.
Sleep deprivation directly wreaks havoc on your weight management for multiple reasons.
Sleep affects your hormones
You only burn an additional 143 calories staying up for 24 hours relative compared to someone who gets 8 hours of sleep at night.
When your body is sleep-deprived, it releases endocannabinoids into your system which is similar to having the munchies.
A study conducted by Dr. Matthew Walker and his team of researchers published in 2013, showed that sleep-deprived subjects were much more likely to make unhealthy food choices and consume higher amounts of calories. Compared to the choices made while rested, the sleep-deprived subjects chose food that added up to 600 calories more than their usual choices. “There’s something that changes in our brain when we’re sleepy that’s irrespective of how much energy we need,” says Dr. Kenneth P. Wright, director of the sleep and chronobiology lab at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “The brain wants more even when the energy need has been fulfilled.”
Dr. Wright suspects the reason our brain’s response to food changes with sleep can be attributed to adenosine. Adenosine is a metabolic byproduct that disrupts neural function and promotes sleepiness as it accumulates in the brain. One of the ways that caffeine stimulates wakefulness is by blocking adenosine. Adenosine is also cleared from the system during sleep.
According to Dr. Walker, adenosine builds up and could start to degrade communication between networks in the brain without enough sleep. Getting sleep may be the equivalent of rebooting the brain.
In addition to adenosine, cortisol levels are dramatically affected by our amount of sleep. Cortisol is the stress hormone that is responsible for increasing your appetite. The brain’s cortisol levels increase with less amount of sleep. A large majority of adults respond to stress with overconsumption. Hormones that stimulate appetite increase, while hormones that blunt it drop. People become less sensitive to insulin, raising their risk of Type 2 diabetes.
Sleep affects your physical performance
Sleep deprivation negatively impacts your brain’s cognitive function. This manifests itself in slower reaction time, poor decision-making, and poor memory capability.
Sleep is a time for your body to repair and restore. Each night’s rest allows your body to rejuvenate for the next day. It repairs itself from the previous day’s stress and prepares for the next day. “Sleep is important for pretty much every one of your physical systems,” says Janet Kennedy, Ph.D., the founder of NYC Sleep Doctor.
In addition to repair, sleep provides the necessary energy and motivation to maintain an active, healthy lifestyle. After a short night’s rest, the last thing you typically want to do is work out. And the effects of that lack of sleep compound itself when you try to make healthier food choices. Not only do our preferences change with a lack of sleep, but also the willpower to make healthier choices seems to decrease.
Conclusion: you need to sleep
Sleep should be a matter of how much not, “How little can I get away with and still function tomorrow?” Sleep is the foundation of health. Rather than robbing yourself of it, work toward developing habits and a schedule that allows you to get as much quality sleep as possible. Seven hours of sleep should be the minimal dose.
Right alongside your diet and exercise, your sleep routine should be given considerable thought.
Additional sleep resources not directly quoted:
http://slumberwise.com/science/can-you-thrive-with-only-five-hours-of-sleep-a-night/
http://www.livestrong.com/article/115829-effects-sleeping-hours-night/
https://www.ninds.nih.gov/Disorders/patient-caregiver-education/understanding-sleep
https://www.masterclass.com/articles/matthew-walker-on-improving-sleep-quality
https://www.memosmine.com/the-mine/book-summary-why-we-sleep-by-matthew-walker-phd/
