The Medicine of Sleep 

Sleep Better Naturally

Sleep and rest are areas of self-care we often push aside.  “If I stay up just one more hour I can get this accomplished or that finished.”  Doing so may just get these things accomplished; however, your body pays in the subsequent decline in health and wellness.  Chronic sleep deprivation ages us faster and sets us up for weight gain, anxiety, depression, adrenal gland and other hormonal issues, inflammatory diseases including cancer, and a whole host of other ill-health problems.  Yikes!

Sleep is imperative for energetic days, efficient body cell function & replication, detoxing, healing, vibrant longevity, and just good all-around health.  When we are in good sleep cycles our body is healing our DNA. Sleep is nature’s power healing mode.

Creating a personal atmosphere that encourages good sleep is simple and easy.

When we get plenty of sleep we wake up energized and ready to meet the day’s challenges.  Not enough sleep?  We then stagger out of bed feeling foggy in the head; looking for that pot of coffee, cup of tea, chunk of dark chocolate, or sugary breakfast foods.  Using these food items to rev ourselves up does seem to work in the short term but actually exacerbates the ‘lack of sleep’ health issues over the long haul.

Sleep enhances body cell function.  Your cell’s internal organelles, the tiny machinery inside each cell, work more efficiently when you are well rested.  Your body metabolism functions at a normal level because of adequate sleep.  Good metabolism also means you digest and process food and calories efficiently.  This means less fat is deposited into fat cells because your body is instead using the calories for on the spot energy.

Add an hour of sleep per night, and you could drop 10 to 20 pounds this year.  Adding extra seep time can assist appetite control among many other things.   Getting to sleep before 10 PM and getting a solid 8 hours of good sleep stabilizes endocrine function (stress response), glucose control, insulin levels, and glucose tolerance and reduces your risk for digestive tract distress & disease, obesity, diabetes, coronary heart disease, cancer.....  Our body cells function best when we care for them with the flow of nature, not against it.  

When the sun comes up our body’s adrenal hormones are kicking in to create energy to get up and go. Over the course of the day our adrenal hormones naturally wane, like the sun, so we can sleep at night. As it gets darker out, we release other hormones that help us to go to sleep and stay sleeping. When we live in harmony with the waking up (moon set & sunrise) and sleep cycles (sunset & moon rise) our body’s hormones, biology, & chemistry works as nature intended. The rhythm of the Earth slows down at night and so should we.

Evaluate what in your life is interfering with living in rhythm with the cycles of the day, interfering with your sleep and then heal, repair, those lifestyle medicine areas of your life.

Ways to Enhance the Sleep Experience:

1.      Eat whole foods.  Your body cells function better with real food.  You will sleep better!  

2.      Decrease or eliminate caffeine intake.  Keep coffee to 1-2 cups per day in the AM.  Know your body and how you are impacted by caffeine. Monitor how your sleep is affected by 1-2 cups per day: are you having trouble falling asleep or are you waking up and feeling nerve irritation and can’t get back to sleep??  You might want to cut to 1 cup per AM, drink ¼ to ½ caf or decaf coffee only, or maybe your body would function better with no coffee at all. Be mindful of your body’s needs. You can buy both regular and decaf beans and then grind to the proportions of caffeine you sleep best at.  

3.      Decrease or eliminate sugar intake.  Skip sugary drinks and treats.  They stimulate your nerves and prevent good sleep. I truly recommend eliminating all refined sugars (white and brown) and using only sucanat, maple syrup, and local (raw) honey in extreme moderation. Sugar interferes with good sleep, depletes the body’s magnesium which further interferes with sleep, and disrupts healthy gut microbes contributing to more health problems that interfere with sleep.

4.      Eliminate artificial sweeteners.  They contribute to ill health in many ways and despite the ‘no calories’ they actually work against you in the weight loss and sugar detox arena. I also believe refined, packaged sweeteners such as stevia work against our cellular health, blood sugar health, sleep, etc. They may avoid the sugar / caloric issue but they set the body up for believing sugar is coming and the subsequent bio-chemical responses the body makes to deal with sugar. But, no sugar actually enters your body and blood and yet they are both waiting for it. I truly believe this makes the body craves more sweet/sugar. You are ar better off to use real, whole food sweeteners in serious moderation and only on occasions. Not the “eat sweets everyday” mentality our culture has adopted (yes, this keeps the sugar industry wealthy but keeps you not so healthy!).

5.      Exercise every day:  simply walk for ½ hour and do some push-ups and core body muscle work (crunches or yoga poses to strengthen the core muscles.  I have a handout with poses if you are interested… just tell me and I will zap it off to you.)  30-40 minute commitment to you.

If the work exercise makes you break out in hives… call it Your Healing Movement Magic.  

6.      Get outside every day.  Your body needs fresh air and natural sunlight to function at its best, including the ability to sleep. Your body and all its organs and organ systems work in rhythm with the circadian rhythm of Nature. When the Earth, Nature, sleeps… so should you.                 You ARE Nature.

7.      Play every day.  Play & joyfulness keeps our body, heart, & soul light, refreshed, and ready for sleep at night.

8.      Drink water, pure water (avoiding chlorine and fluoride).  Stop after 6 PM or so to prevent bathroom breaks at night disrupting your sleep.

9.      Avoid alcohol and drug intake. These substances interfere with your body’s ability to enter a healthy sleep cycle which leads to other health problems from sleep deprivation.

10.  Get to sleep before 10 PM.  Your circadian rhythm functions best this way as they are in rhythm with the Earth’s rhythm.  Start your pre-bedtime peace and relaxation ritual early so you can be in bed, lights out, and sleeping before 10 PM. Your body will thank you with energy and good moods. Your ritual need be no fancier than washing face and brushing teeth. This is far better than being on a computer screen until just before you shut the bedroom lights off. 

11.  Practice calming activities before bedtime.  Computer and TV screens stimulate the eyes, nervous system, and the hypothalamus and pineal glands making it harder to fall asleep and enjoy restful sleep.  Shut screens off 2 hours before bedtime. Turn off household wi-fi for sleep. Put your phone somewhere out of your room or at least far from your bed, head, & body.

12.  Find a good pillow that supports the curve of your neck.  I love my feather pillow I can mold to support my neck at a healthy angle. Find your happy pillow and sink in.

13.  Try progressive muscle relaxation and deep breathing, emptying the mind, for those nights you lie in bed with a racing mind and perhaps a racing body.  If you are a reiki person, do a reiki treatment (in your mind) on yourself OR on someone else who could use the healing energy and is open to you doing this.  Puts one to sleep with grace and peace.

14.  Magnesium deficiency is very common and contributes to poor sleep issues. If I have not given you handouts on magnesium, please ask.

A supplement that many people use and like is Natural Vitality brand Natural Calm. This is a powdered magnesium citrate supplement. Take 1 full tsp. in the AM and one in the PM before bed. Pay attention to bowel movements as magnesium citrate can loosen stools. If this happens, simply switching to another form of magnesium will prevent loose stools and give your body the benefits of the magnesium. I am not a big fan of this Natural Calm product for the loose stool reason.

Try magnesium glycinate, 400 mg at bedtime. Avoid supplements with the filler magnesium stearate. Magnesium is required for Vitamin D use in the body so you are doing double good duty here.

15.  Take a hot magnesium bath before bed: Use 2 full cups of magnesium salts (drug store purchase of Epsom salts) in a bath of hot water. Sink into the tub, relax and enjoy. Try candles, essential oils or all-natural incense, and calming music to create a peaceful home spa experience. 

16.  Try calming herbs at bedtime to enhance your body’s natural sleep patterns.  Chamomile, catnip, lavender, passionflower, hops are some good calming herbs to use in teas, capsules, and tinctures. 

• Skullcap is an herb that relieves monkey mind, the racing thoughts

• Valerian calms the mind, less input coming in, it’s like turning down the internal stereo

• Hops & California Poppy are herbs that put you to sleep

• Passion flower is an herb that helps keep you sleeping, avoid the “wake in the middle of the night and cannot return to sleep” issue

Most herbal tea blends for sleep support contain a blend of these herbs to help on all fronts of the sleep issue problem. Use a different tea blend each night to avoid becoming immune to the herbal combination.

17.  There are many relaxing essential oils for inducing peace, calm, and sleep: Lavender, chamomile, and blends such as Young Living's Peace & Calm. Use them in a diffuser, add to carrier oils and rub on your feet, on your temples, along either side of your spine, and on your shoulders for their relaxing effects. I rub a little under my nose, cover my nose with my hands, and breathe in the calming scents. Never ingest essential oils. Always buy organic Eos from a very reputable company. Many synthetic EO companies exist out there. Natural is what you want. EOs are very, very strong plant medicine. More is NOT better. Use with deep respect for the plant medicine you are inviting into your life.  

18.  Melatonin, taken at bedtime, can help you fall asleep. If you fall asleep without a hitch but wake up and can’t get back to sleep, try 5 HTP at bedtime instead.  I am not a big fan of melatonin as it makes me feel like I took a synthetic drug to sleep. I sleep but wake up feeling groggy not refreshed. This is my physiological response to melatonin. Many of my clients love it. Pay attention to your body’s needs and reactions. I have read information from sleep studies that melatonin is best used when you have jet lag or work midnight shift; using it to create a self-induced melatonin surge. Melatonin is a hormone so we are playing with hormones when we use it.

19.  CBD oil: CBD oil, cannabinoid oil, is a relaxing supplement to take to help fall asleep and stay asleep. CBD oil is made from hemp and does not contain the psychoactive component THC that is in marijuana buds.      

Sleep Inducing Teas: There are several wonderfully relaxing herb teas on the market and the Potsdam Food Coop, Nature’s Storehouse in Canton, even grocery stores sell them. Yogi and Traditional Medicinals are two of the herb tea blending company name brands.  Look for Bedtime Tea, Nighty Night Tea, and also Sleepy Time by Celestial Seasoning.  Other calming herb blend teas are Easy Now, Calm, and Cup of Calm.

If the tea bag is glued shut, not stapled, cut the bag open and steep the tea in a glass jar, covered.      If you steep “glued” tea bags, you are also steeping the toxic glue into your tea.

I make a quart of a sleep aid herbal tea if I feel I am going to have trouble sleeping. Make these teas in a quart canning jar: 2 tea bags and 3-4 cups of boiling water. Pour water over tea bags and screw lid onto jar. I allow the tea to steep, covered, for at least 1 hour before bedtime and keep the quart canning jar right next to my bed. I can drink a cup and turn out the light knowing I have tea reinforcement should I wake up to pee or whatever and cannot get back to sleep.

Valerian may be an herb in the sleep-inducing teas.  If you find the tea keeps you awake, stop using any blend with valerian.  Some people are sensitive to valerian and instead of it promoting sleep it actually stimulates you and keeps you awake.  Most people just have beautiful, Technicolor dreams from valerian!

Lavender is a wonderful relaxation herb. Too much lavender can exacerbate anxiety. This is a case of a little is wonderful but taking more, thinking more is better, is not better.

How to make medicinal strength herbal infusions: click here  Important to read & learn as most people do not make proper medicinal infusions but instead make weak herbal flavored hot water.

Looking for a quick sleep aid for nights you may have forgotten to make that sleepy time type tea?  Don’t feel like getting up at midnight to traipse down to the kitchen and sit while tea steeps on the countertop?  Try Deep Sleep gel caps from Herbs Etc, Herbs Etc. is a reputable herb company. I have used their products for many health concerns.

Teas, tinctures, and gel caps are wonderful sleep aids.  Keep in mind; if you use the same herb combination every night, they begin to be less effective.  I keep different tea blends (from different companies) on hand and use them in rotation.  I also do not recommend using a natural sleep aid every night.  Not that they are harmful, in any way, but discovering the underlying cause of the sleep issue will help to resolve the problem for more restful sleep without an aid.

Yoga Nidra for guiding you to sleep: https://www.doyogawithme.com/content/yoga-nidra-sleep

Have trouble sleeping after a glass of wine or two? Worse yet; do you fall asleep but wake up and can’t get back to sleep after a drink?  Try taurine (amino acid supplement) 1000 mg at bedtime after having a drink or two. I do not recommend this as a way to drink nightly and still sleep.

Will you be hitting the sheets before 10 PM tonight?  Every night?  Winter is a great time to re-establish healthy sleep routines with our shorter day and longer nights.  Indulge yourself in a mini DNA healing hibernation every night.

May you rest well and wake up refreshed with vibrant health and energy every day, all day long.

Sweet dreams, Paula