How much sleep is enough? While sleep requirements vary slightly from person to person, most healthy adults need at least 8 hours of sleep each night to function at their best. A restless night and a cranky morning can be blamed on your daily routine, such as your lifestyle choices, sleep schedule and of course your mattress.
Here are a few tips which will help you optimize your nightly rest so you can be balanced, productive, mentally sharp, and full of energy throughout the day.
- Set a regular bedtime. Try to go to bed at the same time every night. Choose a time when you normally feel tired, so that you don’t toss and turn.
- Make sure your bed is comfortable. You should have enough room to stretch and turn comfortably. If you often wake up with a sore back or an aching neck, you may need to invest in a new mattress or a try a different pillow.
- Keep noise down. If you can’t avoid or eliminate noise from barking dogs, loud neighbors, city traffic, or other people in your household, try masking it with a fan, or recordings of soothing sounds. You can buy a special sound machine or generate your own white noise by setting your radio between stations.
- Take naps to make up for lost sleep, try to limit it to 30 minutes to and hour. Avoid napping too close to bedtime, which may make it a bit difficult to get back to sleep. Throwing off your entire day.
- Wake up at the same time every day. If you’re getting enough sleep, you should wake up naturally without an alarm. If you need an alarm clock to wake up on time, you may need to set an earlier bedtime.
- Limit caffeine intake and stay away from big meals at night. You might be surprised to know that caffeine can cause sleep problems up to 10 to 12 hours after drinking it! Consider eliminating caffeine after lunch or cutting back your overall intake. Make dinnertime earlier in the evening, and avoid heavy foods within two hours of bedtime.
- Fight drowsiness. If you find yourself getting sleepy way before your bedtime, get up and do something stimulating to avoid falling asleep, such as washing the dishes, phoning a friend, or preparing for the next day. If you give in to the drowsiness, you may wake up later in the night and have trouble getting back to sleep.
- Make your bedroom sleep friendly. A bedroom that is too hot or too cold can interfere with quality sleep. Most people sleep better in a slightly cool room with adequate ventilation.
- Finally, reserve your bed for sleeping and relaxation only. If you associate your bed with events like work or errands, it will be harder to wind down at night. Use your bed only for rest. That way, when you go to bed, your body gets a powerful cue, it’s time to nod off.
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