ARE YOU SLEEP STRESSING? LANA KNOWS SLEEP.

You probably know poor sleep makes you stressed and stress causes poor sleep.  Here’s why:

• A bad night of sleep doesn’t just make you feel bad the next day, it keeps cortisol levels high well into the following evening!
• Sleeping six hours or less per night can significantly increase stress hormones by as much as 80%.

Let’s look at the little things that promote sleep:

Avoid caffeine alcohol, and other stimulants.  What? There’s a good chance that’s not going to happen so here are some useful stimulating alternatives that actually help reduce stress.  And, you are more likely to do them than avoid all stimulants: 

• Black tea decreases cortisol in response to a stressful task, compared to a different caffeinated drink. Surprisingly, black tea contains more caffeine than green tea but substantially decreases cortisol.
• Green tea contains about one-quarter the caffeine of coffee and it also contains two unique relaxing compounds, l-theanine (an amino acid that counteracts the cortisol-increasing tendency of caffeine) and EGCG epigallocatechin gallate (a potent inhibitor that blocks the formation of cortisol and increases the relaxation neurotransmitter GABA). 

Doesn’t tea have caffeine?  Yes, but all teas contain the highest quantity of naturally occurring tannin of any plant.  Tannin blocks the absorption of caffeine in the colon. 

What about herbal teas?  Though chamomile, lemon balm, hops and passionflower are all touted for their sleep-promoting properties (and are often found in “sleep-formula” tea blends), their effectiveness hasn’t been proven in clinical studies, according to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

 Can I drink myself to sleep?  Although you may think it helps, NO.

• If you feel like you need to drink to sleep better, remember alcohol has a cumulative effect on the neurotransmitters GABA and Glutamate and, while you may fall asleep from alcohol, as little as two drinks will cause the quality of your sleep to be poor and you will wake up more frequently.  Unfortunately ladies, alcohol-related sleep disturbances are worse for women.
• You may find that one glass of wine two hours before bedtime promotes more restful sleep. Remember, one glass – two hours before.

Here’s some easy tips for better sleep:

• Make a few changes to your bedroom, getting blackout curtains and covering or unplugging electronics that emit light. Turn off wi-fi and cell phones.
• For the hour before bedtime avoid exposure to bright lights, especially from TV, computers, and cell phones because artificial light from these suppress production of melatonin, a sleep-inducing hormone triggered by darkness. Artificial light also shifts your circadian rhythms-a biological cycle that responds primarily to daylight and darkness and influences sleep. 
• Try taking melatonin for a brief period to reset your circadian rhythm. Melatonin supplementation has been shown to improve sleep quality and reduce inflammation but long-term (more than two weeks use is not advisable) so don’t be tempted to continue usage because you are sleeping better. Eventually, you will not be.
• Practice gentle weight training no more than three times a week.  This can reset the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis so that Cortisol balance improves and you’re better able to manage stress on a day-in, day-out basis.  Exercising less than 3 hours before bedtime won’t prevent you from falling asleep but it does hinder your sleep quality.
• Take a nap.  You may not get away with this at work but on your days off you it will help if you supplement sleep you missed at night by taking a power nap in the afternoon.  Taking a power nap in the afternoon offers one of the best returns on investment of your time.  A 20-minute nap not only blasts cortisol, it can keep your mood and energy high all day long. Taking a nap has been found to work even better than caffeine to keep productivity up the rest of the day.