Disclosure: “I participated in an Ambassador program on behalf of Influence Central for Pernix Therapeutics. I received a promotional item to thank me for my participation.”
One of my biggest problems over the past eight years has been insomnia. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I began suffering from insomnia during my second pregnancy. From very early on, I had a hard time falling asleep. I think part of it can be attributed to the fact that not only was I stressed out over health and housing issues, my unborn child was a nightowl, and when I wanted to sleep, he was awake and doing acrobats inside me.
After his birth, the insomnia didn’t go away. In fact, it got worse. I attribute part of that to the job I do. As most bloggers will attest to, our work is never-ending. We always have something that needs to be worked on, whether it’s a blog post, picture editing, social media marketing, brainstorming, etc. And since most of us are parents, a lot of our work hours are at night. Speaking from my own experience, I’ve found myself answering emails at midnight, which I realize isn’t helping me any.
While social media and emails are a wonderful way to build relationships with customers and clients, as well as family members, there are times when none of that is so great. I’m not always the best at ignoring my phone when it goes off, alerting me of a new message.
And when I can’t fall asleep at night, the first thing I reach for is my phone to play a game. Not good.
I know I’m not the only one. I have more than a few friends that struggle just like I do and turn to their electronic devices to help them wile away their sleepless nights. In fact, insomnia is a huge problem in our country with almost 4 million Americans currently suffer from insomnia.
For those like me, here are some shut-eye strategies that I’m going to implement into my every day routine to see if they make a difference in my sleep habits. At this point, I will try anything to get a good night’s sleep. And you should to. What do you have to lose?
- Get up and get moving! One of the ways that you can help yourself sleep better at night is by getting up and exercising first thing in the morning because it helps strengthen your circadian rhythm.
- Relax. In order to help your body wind down, you should do something relaxing, like taking a warm bath. It can help your body transition from daytime to nighttime.
- Turn the electronic devices off! An hour before you plan on going to bed at night, turn your electronic devices off. Not only does this eliminate any temptation to pick up the phone, tablet, etc., and check your email, check your social media accounts, play games, etc, the LED lights from the devices can actually wake your brain up. To help keep myself in check, I’m going to turn off social media an hour before I go to bed. It won’t be easy for me because part of what I’ve been doing for awhile now, is work on social media stuff at night when I’m chilling in bed.
- Keep your room dark! A light on in your room can actually keep you awake because it tells you brain it’s time to wake up, whereas darkness helps you fall to asleep.
Keep an eye out for a future post from me on the shut-eye strategies worked for me. And I would love to hear how they worked for you and any other suggestions you may have.
To learn more about healthy sleep habits, please visit Wanttosleepmore.com.
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