‘Sleep hygiene’ refers to the behavioural and environmental factors that affect sleep.
If you suffer from insufficient sleep, it could be bad sleep hygiene which is to blame, either in the form of an unsuitable sleeping environment, bad sleep habits reinforced over many years, or a combination of the two.
Thankfully, it is easy to improve your sleep hygiene by making a few key adjustments to your nighttime routine. Good sleep hygiene may not solve all your sleep problems, but it is the essential foundation of a good night’s rest.
Why is sleep hygiene important?
Quality sleep is vital for both physical and mental wellbeing.
It is when your mind and body are at rest that they can heal from the stresses of the day, improving concentration and mood, lowering blood pressure, strengthening your immune system, and giving you a much-needed refresh. Good sleep hygiene therefore promotes good overall health.
Practising good sleep hygiene in the form of a healthy and sustainable nighttime routine creates a process of positive reinforcement. If bad behaviours can become ingrained, so can good ones.
The signs of poor sleep hygiene
Difficulty getting to sleep, frequent disturbances to sleep throughout the night, and tiredness during the day are the most common signs of poor sleep hygiene.
Other signs may include low mood and an inability to concentrate, as well as a lack of consistency in the quality and quantity of sleep you manage to achieve on a night-by-night basis.
How to achieve good sleep hygiene
Different people find that different things help them achieve restful sleep, but in general, to achieve good sleep hygiene you must create a pleasant bedroom environment to help you drift off, and stick to both a consistent sleep schedule and a healthy pre-bedtime routine.
Here are a few tips to help you achieve this:
- Have a set sleep and wake up time: Going to sleep and waking up at the same time every day will help to reset your circadian rhythm (otherwise known as your internal clock). The circadian rhythm determines when you will feel tired and when you will feel awake, so ensuring that it has a regular schedule to follow will be hugely beneficial.
- Watch what and when you eat: Your body needs to expend energy to digest food, so eating too late at night means you will likely be awake for longer. Caffeine is a stimulant, and can stay in your system for six hours or longer. And while alcohol may make it easier to fall asleep, the effects will wear off, causing you to wake in the night.
- Wind down before bed (without screens): Worrying about sleep is a self-fulfilling prophecy, so do whatever you can to reach a relaxed state of mind in the hour before bed. Read a book, journal, draw, knit, listen to music or an audiobook. Just try to avoid your phone, laptop, and tablet, which are designed to keep you stimulated, and which demote melatonin production (a hormone which facilitates sleep) by emitting a blue light.
- Keep your room cool, quiet, and dark: Bright light acts like sunlight, decreasing the amount of melatonin our brain produces to keep us alert. Noise also keeps us alert, so do what you can to make your room as quiet as possible. And while it is nice to be cosy in bed, our body naturally cools down in preparation for sleep, so keeping your bedroom cool will aid that process.
- Don’t lie awake: Learn to associate being in bed with feeling relaxed and content. If after 20 minutes you’re still tossing and turning, get up and do something else until you feel tired.
- Get sunlight and exercise during the day: Sun exposure and exercise wake your body and mind up. Getting plenty of both early in the day kicks your circadian rhythm into gear, so by the time you’re ready for bed, so is your internal clock.
These are just a few ways to drastically improve your sleep hygiene. Give yourself time to adjust to them and discover how easy falling asleep can be.
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