Reduced quality of sleep
Besides nutrition, exercise and a healthy mindset, the quality of sleep plays a huge role in the quality of your health, recovery and rejuvenation of the body as a whole. Sleep is incredibly important for so many bodily functions, and for recovery in general.
Your whole body is resetting and healing as you sleep. Do you sleep badly or could the quality of your sleep be better? You have a lot more control over the quality of sleep than you might think. There are specific environmental measures that can be taken to significantly improve sleep quality. If the quality of sleep is poor, the body does not recover as it should. So, how can you improve your sleep? First, recognise your sleep quality.
How do you recognise a poor sleep quality?
You are unable to fall asleep within 30 minutes
If you lie down at night and do not fall asleep within 30 minutes, the quality of your sleep may be affected. Your nervous system may have been put into the sympathetic state (the fight or flight, or stressed state) and your body will not be able to get a deeper sleep in a non-relaxed state.
Waking up several times during the night
Your body has a very well established circadian rhythm (internal biological clock) together with a sleep cycle that runs through a sort of programme from light sleep, deep sleep to REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. When you wake up at night, you disrupt this important sleep cycle that restores your battery to 100% for the next day. You then have to subtract the 10, 20 or 30 minutes you spent tossing and turning that night to get back to sleep. It is important to note that waking up at certain times is also a reflection of specific organs that have challenges in the body, as there are recovery times for the liver, colon, adrenal glands, etc. The clock graph below gives a perfect example of the health of organs and the sleep time associated with them. For example, if you constantly wake up at 4am, there is a physical or emotional blockage in the lungs.
Waking up achy, groggy with a lack of energy
If you wake up in the morning with a lack of energy with a groggy, achy feeling then your sleep quality is affected somewhere. If your body is physically sore and it doesn’t recover and feel less painful in the morning, your sleep quality is simply too low. The best sign of good sleep quality is waking up feeling rejuvenated, clear-headed and ready to start the day.
Sleep is an important part
of our health!
The quality of our sleep influences the quality of our energy, health and life.
What factors impair our sleep?
Negative electrical energy in any form
Whether natural or technical EMFs (Electromagnetic Frequencies), radiation or dirty electricity. These are all forms of energy (wired or wireless) that have an effect on our nervous system, the electrical wiring in our body, which can affect the quality of your sleep. Do you ever feel restless? Maybe there are too many wires around! Remove as much electricity as possible in the bedroom, cables, gaming consoles, TV, digital alarm clock, wifi modems etc.
Radiation of blue and green light
When the sun goes down, the amber glow is the last natural form of light we see in the sky, next to the moon and the stars. This natural form of lighting is warm, calming and lets the body know that it is time to rest. Light photons enter the eyes and let the brain know whether it is day, night, high sun or low sun. Specific wavelengths of blue and green light let the body know that it is day. This causes the sleep hormone melatonin to be produced later, making you less tired and less likely to fall asleep. Lamps such as LED, CFL and the like that have a bright white colour contain many blue and green wavelengths. Screens, TV and other lights also contain this light. You should avoid these 2 hours before sleeping.
The gut is awake, while it should be asleep!
Another common mistake is to eat or drink something before sleeping that stimulates the body. It is better to eat earlier in the evening, preferably before 5 o’clock in the afternoon and not to eat anything after 8 o’clock. The aim is to relax your body and not to put your metabolism into a digestive state. Other common mistakes are drinking chocolate milk, coffee or tea late at night. Chocolate contains theobromine, which is a stimulant. Coffee has caffeine, and certain teas are also stimulants. The best way to end the day is just a glass of water.
Physical factors
Certain physical factors may also play a role. Perhaps your biochemistry is unbalanced and you lack certain nutrients. Perhaps you are going through menopause, which may also involve various complaints. One of these complaints may be poor sleep. At this stage, there is so much going on in the body, it goes through many changes in the hormone balance that it can affect your sleep.
Ways to achieve better sleep quality
Reduce radiation (negative energy)
Wifi
Turn off your Wifi router at night. Wifi radiation can disrupt your energy so you wake up tired and unrested. Tip: Buy a timer to turn off your wifi at night (say 12 hours to 7 hours) that way it will automatically turn off every night. This one-off expense will improve your sleep quality forever!
Smartphone
Try not to look at your phone two hours before sleeping. If you must use your phone’s alarm, put it on aeroplane mode. However, if you don’t need to set an alarm, better still turn your mobile phone completely OFF. The phone still emits radiation when in aeroplane mode. Don’t let aeroplane mode tell you that there is no radiation because you can’t make calls any more. It is still there.
Electricity power sockets
Ideally, you want your bed to be the furthest away from the wall sockets in your room. These can negatively affect your sleep cycle. When sleeping, stay as far away as possible from wall sockets (which give off dirty electricity). You can also place sockets with flaps that block the radiation to some extent.
Introduce calming lights and elements
Change your light bulbs
Instead of bright white lamps that emit blue and green wavelengths of light, switch to simple salt lamps! Many people already have a salt lamp. Use them only at night. Or switch to biorhythm-friendly light bulbs. Or just use candles more often. The disadvantage of candles is that the wax can get everywhere and many emit toxic chemicals.
Buy anti-blue light glasses
Another solution that takes protection from light (which is ultimately protection from the melatonin hormone) to another level is to buy anti-blue light glasses. These block the blue light coming from your laptop, ipad or smartphone. Some glasses can block both blue and green wavelengths of light. Ask an optician for more information. Both wavelengths contribute to the body’s inability to produce melatonin at night.
Calm your nervous system
The hormonal system needs to adjust and switch to sleep with the production of melatonin around 9pm. If the body does not produce melatonin at this time, it may have several causes, but lighting is the most obvious reason that melatonin is not produced in the body at the right time. In addition to melatonin, the nervous system needs to calm down and relax. You can calm the nervous system by taking a warm bath with some magnesium and essential oils, or a warm shower. By making a cup of non-stimulating, calming tea, such as chamomile, rose or lavender tea. Magnesium is also the most valuable mineral to take later in the evening. Magnesium will quickly calm and relax the nervous system. Put a diffuser in your room with calming lavender oil and put on some soft piano music or yoga music which will surely relax you.
Find a relaxation and sleep routine that works for you
Each of us is a unique individual and some of the things that help one person relax may make another person restless. We are all unique in our bio-individuality.
Tonight, try putting on some soothing music, having a nice conversation with a friend or family member, having a relaxing tea (chamomile, lemon balm), and dim the lights in an orange/red hue. Breathe calmly and avoid the news for once today. Who knows, it might take your sleep to a new dimension.
See a health practitioner
To check your health and to see if you are lacking any substances or nutrients, you can visit an orthomolecular therapist. Various tests can be done to check the imbalances. They can also help with stress and menopause related problems.
Read our other article on sleep here with even more tips to improve your sleep.
Here’s to a good and healthy sleep!
Health Check
Do you want to know how your health is doing, so that you can take steps to improve your sleep? By doing an EMB blood test or a Vitalfeld Bodyscan, imbalances can be found, after which Nutriswitch, practice for orthomolecular therapy, can advise you on the right nutrition and supplementation and help to repair imbalances or nutritional deficiencies.
Read the reviews of Nutriswitch to see what others have experienced.
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