Did you know there is an annual World Sleep Day that celebrates sleep and highlights issues related to sleep?
World Sleep Day for 2021 was the 19th March.
When we look at Self-Care, sleep is one of the important fundamentals that should be addressed. If you don’t get sufficient sleep a number of things can happen:
- you become stressed very easily
- it’s hard to concentrate on tasks at hand
- it’s easier to lose your temper
- you eat more
Continue reading for more details on each of these points:
1. You Become Stressed Very easily
Have you noticed then when you don’t get enough sleep that you are more likely to become stressed? The little obstacles in life start to become bigger and therefore harder to deal with.
Maybe you have a tight deadline at work but because you haven’t slept well you’re working slower or making mistakes. This adds stress to the deadline because it’s making it more difficult to reach.
When you don’t get enough sleep the body produces excess cortisol from the adrenal glands, possibly to make up for the lack of energy. Cortisol is the stress hormone. This can lead to weight gain (when prolonged), high blood pressure and it can affect your sleep during the following night.
2. It’s Hard to Concentrate
Lack of sleep makes it harder to concentrate on tasks you have to accomplish during the day. This can affect your work, your studies, your home life.
When I don’t get enough sleep it’s as if I’m having to work through this fog. There’s a lot of yawning, attention wandering and a strong desire to close my eyes!
Have you ever felt like that? And in comparison – how about a day after a good night’s sleep? Concentration levels are so much better, you get things done quickly and without the “fog”.
3. It’s Easier to Lose Your Temper
This one is a biggie for me, especially when my children were young!
When you’re tired the slightest irritation can set you off and you lose your temper.
Or maybe you don’t outwardly express it but you definitely feel niggled by people. Someone sends you an email asking a question and on a normal day you would just calmly answer the question but on a day after a bad sleep, you answer with a tone of impatience in your reply.
Have you been in a supermarket and felt everyone was getting in your way on purpose and just wanted to ram your trolley at them? Yep, that can happen when you are sleep-deprived!
This is one for children too – ever noticed how angry a child can get when they don’t get enough sleep?
4. You Eat More
When you’re asleep the body is engaged in various tasks to detox, repair and generally restore energy to the body. If you don’t sleep well this process is interrupted and you don’t have the energy you need.
This leads to eating more because the body is trying to compensate for that lack of energy and it keeps saying “I’m hungry”. It especially drives you to eat carbohydrates for quick energy. This in turn affects your bloody sugar levels by giving it a false high, followed by a crash, followed by a strong desire to eat more!
It’s a vicious circle.
Long-term sleep deprivation can actually cause you to put on weight just from this one factor alone. You’re eating more calories than you actually need and so inevitably put on weight.
Add to that the extra cortisol in your system, as mentioned above, your body stores fat. Cortisol takes any extra unused energy and stores it as fat.
So, if you’re putting on weight or finding it hard to lose weight, sleep is definitely a good place to start.
Self Care Activities To Improve Sleep
Taking care of yourself is important. It’s not selfish. If you don’t take care of yourself then you can’t operate at 100%. This affects every aspect of your life.
Here are 6 Self-Care activities you can do to improve sleep:
- Get some exercise during the day and/or go for a walk. The body is supposed to move during the day. By using the muscles and getting the blood flowing, oxygen circulating you will be more likely to sleep deeply
- Turn off all screens at least an hour before bed. Don’t go to bed with your phone, iPad, tablet, laptop. Screens can affect how you feel and cause you to stay awake. If you absolutely have to have a phone in your room then put it on flight-mode to cut the wifi connection.
- Have a relaxing warm bath about an hour before bedtime. Add some Epsom Salts and lavender oil to help you relax
- Consider taking a magnesium supplement. Magnesium helps the muscles to relax which may help you sleep better
- De-stress! There are many ways to de-stress. The 10 Day Stress Cleanse sums it up the best with 1 new practical tool to apply to your life every day for 10 days.
- Try sleep affirmations, a great way to put the power of intentions to use. These will help you fall asleep more easily and sleep more deeply.
Sleep well!
