Sleep is an essential part of our daily life, but many people do not have a night of quality sleep. With the arrival of spring, the daytime will be longer, which means that the time we sleep at night will be reduced to a certain extent.
The change of seasons, temperature, humidity, and precipitation will all impact our sleep. How to adjust the schedule of work and rest when spring arrives to ensure a good sleep?
1. Stick to a sleep schedule
Even though adults generally quit going through a standard routine during the night, it can help you sleep better if establish one. Start the transition from wakefulness to sleep about an hour or two before bedtime. Concentrate on relaxing pursuits and avoid doing or considering things that are stimulating or stressful.
2. Practice a relaxing bedtime ritual
Here are fantastic examples of relaxing night activities comprise:
Listening to light music — some soft music before bed will help you relieve compressed nerves, thereby improving sleep quality, but listening to music all night is not a good idea.
Stretching and relaxation exercises — Exercise before going to bed is best to be soothing. For example, you can walk for half an hour to digest the food in your stomach as soon as possible. You can do yoga stretching exercises on the floor or the bed, which can soothe the nerves and relax the muscles; you can also do head massages, such as temples. Do abdominal massage and foot soles before going to bed, and you will feel very relaxed.
Taking a bath — Taking a bath, especially a warm bath, because of the warming effect and the stimulation of water, the capillaries of the whole body and even the internal organs are dilated, and the surrounding blood vessels dilate. The blood supply increases, the brain is in a relatively frail state and drowsy, and it can relax the whole body at the same time.
Reading a book — Reading before bed is also an effective way to enhance sleep quality. If you find it hard to fall asleep, try to read a book before going to bed. Concentration in the process of reading can easily cause fatigue and improve sleep quality.
3. Power off electronic devices
Electronic products before going to bed are common in modern society, especially for young people, whose dependence on electronic products is more serious. Some people even feel unable to sleep without holding a mobile phone before bedtime. Too much blue light will delay the body’s best sleep time affect vision and cause more severe effects.
4. Change your bedroom environment
Try to redecorate your bedroom environment and make it more comfortable for sleep.
Light
Light affects the activity of our brains and the production of melatonin. The brightness of the bedroom light will affect our emotions, thereby affecting the quality of sleep. The lighting in the bedroom should be soft, while yellow can create a comfortable atmosphere.
Color
The color of the bedroom background wall also has a significant effect on sleep. Statistics show that the yellow-tone background wall is relatively suitable for rest, the purple-tone background wall is not conducive to sleep, and the blue-tone background wall can best satisfy you with enough sleep time. Therefore, it is recommended that people with sleep problems try to change the background wall to blue to help them fall asleep.
Temperature
Keeping the bedroom cool and fresh will help you fall asleep quickly. Research shows that the room temperature around 68 ˚ F is the most comfortable and easy to fall asleep. Open the window in the daytime and feel the spring wind. Changing the thick blankets and quilts into some slight silk bedding set will help you cool down and feel calm before sleep.
Scent
The smell in the bedroom will also affect us to fall asleep. The faint fragrance can have a hypnotic effect. Therefore, it is an excellent choice to put aromatherapy in the bedroom to help sleep so that the room is full of refreshing smells, and it can also soothe the nerves.
5. Sleep on a comfortable mattress and pillows
Using the right pillow and mattress collectively can offer comfortable support for your spine and alleviate stress. The bed must also be big enough to stretch and roll.
People sleeping on the side require the right mattress to guarantee natural backbone stretch and equilibrium of forces.
People who sleep likely need a mattress which may provide additional support.
People who sleep on their backs need mattresses that may help the throat and lower back.
A medium-height pillow functions nicely and can stop your mind from going ahead. The decreased pillow might offer excellent support for your head without even straining your neck.
6. Control Fluid Intake
It is not recommended to drink a lot of water before going to bed at night. After drinking water at night, people are in a relatively static state during sleep. Blood circulation and metabolism in the body are relatively slow, and water staying in the body for a long time will quickly increase the internal organs’ functional burden. And it will increase the frequency of nocturia, which is not conducive to the stability of sleep. If the water can not be discharged from the body in time, there will be facial swelling and other phenomena.
7. Watch What You Eat
Under normal circumstances, try not to eat within 2 hours before going to bed. Because the calories produced by food before bed cannot be consumed, it will generally lead to obesity (it is not absolute).
At night, the function of the digestive system will weaken. Overeating at dinner, eating some spicy food, high-fat and a high-protein diet will increase the gastrointestinal tract burden. It makes the endocrine system more active and stimulates adrenaline secretion, which excites the brain and affects sleep quality.
Consider not intake caffeine when you’re tired because it can lead to fragmented sleep later at night, and that’s harmful to your cognition and productivity.
8. Reduce irregular or long daytime naps
There is lots of evidence demonstrating the worth of brief, 10-minute naps. However, longer naps can be problematic–particularly if you’re currently getting six to eight hours of sleep each night. The sleep that you get in the middle of the day is not the sleep you get during the night since it is not a part of a 90- to 120-minute sleep cycle. Thus, either restrict your naps to ten minutes or electricity via your midday slump before your predesignated bedtime.
9. Put the alarm clocks out of your sight
When you sleep, you must keep the alarm clock at least 1 meter away from your head to minimize the alarm clock noise’s adverse effects.
Remember not to use high-volume, stimulating music, and you can replace it with soothing light music as the alarm clock’s alert tone. It is better to use crescendo music so that the damage can be minimized.
Avoid setting multiple alarm clocks. Generally speaking, it is best to set one or two alarm clocks, as long as you can gently wake yourself up.
10. If you wake up and can’t fall back to sleep within 20 minutes or so, get out of bed
We all have had the experience of getting up at night, and we don’t have to think that getting up at night affects the quality of sleep. If you can fall asleep again within 20 minutes after getting up at night, it will not affect the quality of sleep. If you can’t fall asleep again, try to do some relaxing or reading to make you calm down and help you to sleep again.
Conclusion
The change of seasons will affect people’s sleep time and sleep conditions, especially for patients suffering from sleep apnea and insomnia. It is best to pay attention to some problems in your life and develop a good living habit. Try the above methods to adjust your schedule in time to better adapt to the new season. If you find it hard to fall asleep and always could not have a night of quality sleep, try to contact your doctors for help if needed.