Today is World Sleep Day.
The 12th annual World Sleep Day is hosted by the World Sleep Society and this years slogan is ‘Healthy Sleep, Healthy Ageing’ and highlights the importance of sleep in overall health at any age and that quality of life can be improved by healthy sleep.
How awesome is it that there is a day celebrating Sleep. My love affair with sleep has been a long one and even though there have been periods when I haven’t got enough, I recognise how important it is to get a good nights sleep.
Now that the season of having newborns has passed in our house and the junior sleep lovers are at an age where they sleep all night, well most nights, as our littlest sleep lover still gets up occasionally to go to the toilet or wants to get into bed with Mr Sleep Lover and I, most nights I get the recommended 7-9 hours sleep at night.
As Arianna Huffington, founder and CEO of Thrive Global says, “Sleep is central to every aspect of our mental and physical health. And this is true at every age, from birth onward. The profound importance of sleep in having a healthy, happy and long life never wanes.”
Getting quality sleep has made a massive difference to my mental health and my physical health. Some days I still wake and feel like rubbish, like this morning my eyes feel so puffy I feel like I have been crying all night, but those mornings seem to getting few and further in between. My mental health can be poor at times but when I sleep well my mental health is better. I also deal with life so much better when I have had sleep and am not sleep deprived.
I have started making sleep a priority not just for me but for the whole family. The World Sleep Society have listed their commandments for sleep hygiene for adults and children on their website, but below I have listed the things that are currently working for the Sleep Lover family and the things we need to improve.
Having a regular bedtime and wake time. I am in bed between 9.30 pm and 10 pm every night unless it is the weekend and I watch a movie or I have something on. I am up at about 6 am every morning as our puppy Evie is ready for her morning walk.
Regular exercise. I look forward to my morning walk with Evie and find it a good time to listed to a podcast. When I get back home everyone is still in bed so I get a few minutes of quiet before the morning madness begins. I am also committed to going to Pilates twice a week, which I love!
No alcohol. My year of no wine has this covered. You can read about my decision to take a year off the booze in my previous post. Mr Sleep Lover still has the occasional drink and I find when he does his snoring goes to the next level. He usually finds himself being moved to the couch pretty quick. I find trying to sleep with the snoring gives me anxiety as I can’t get to sleep and then I get stressed as I know I won’t get enough sleep. This is something I need to work on.
Limit the use of electronics before bed. We have a no iPhone or iPad after dinner policy in our house. I find this important as it is quite easy to sit on the couch and get stuck in a scroll hole on Instagram and ignore everything going on around me. It is also important to set an example to the teenage Sleep Lover as he loves his phone!
Bedtime ritual. I have started my own little ritual at night. It is very basic and hopefully I will be able to add to it as time goes on. Once I get the teenager into bed I go and have a shower. This mainly to wash my face but I find it good to wash away the day and tell my brain it is nearly bed time. Then I will lay on the couch and watch a bit of TV, the only time I get to watch my shows and it is not for long. Then I get into bed and usually get to sleep straightaway. It is very rare for me to be lie awake. I have always had the ability to drop off to sleep anywhere. Sometimes I will read but I am usually pretty tired and only manage one or two pages.
We need to improve our bed time routine for the junior sleep lovers. At the moment Mr Sleep Lover or I have to sit in the bedroom with our youngest while she goes to sleep. We need to make her more independent in going to bed and getting to sleep. I would like also to read to the two youngest sleep lovers before bed.
I need to be more firm with bed times with the older two junior sleep lovers. At the moment they are going to bed later than they should be. They know what time they need to go to bed but always ‘forget’.
Make our bedroom a sleep sanctuary. Our mattress could be better but I have the issue that Mr Sleep Lover likes a firm mattress and I like a soft one. We need to look at upgrading our mattress to one that that will suit both of us. Our linen needs an upgrade. I can’t even remember that last time I brought a new doona cover. We also have things that don’t belong in a bedroom or does everyone have two guitars in their bedroom? We also need to get our puppy a bed as has taken to sleeping on our bed at night.
Lastly, I need to work on my eating habits as I know when I eat healthy I wake up with more energy but when I eat crap I have to drag myself out of bed.
Is anyone else working on their sleep habits and do you have any tips and tricks I should add?
Now to celebrate World Sleep Day I am off take a little nap!
Dx
