As a practitioner I hear it countless times a week from new clients that just can’t either get to sleep because they think too much in bed or wake up every few hours for no apparent reason.
However, there are several natural ways that people can fall asleep, and stay asleep. If they continue to have problems though they should see a naturopath or counsellor to assist them.
The Lighting Research Centre in New York has been studying the effects of light therapy and different coloured globes in lamps. It seems the intensity of the light and the colour (bright bluish white for day) affects the circadian rhythms of our internal body clock. Mariana Figueiro conducted the study to see if light therapy could alleviate sleep problems in elderly people with Alzheimer’s. Turns out people slept better than they had in years using her light therapy and to stay asleep during the night.
The rising of the sun has been the regulator of our clock for years but for many of us who burn the midnight oil so to speak, our rhythms have been messed up in some way and we find it increasingly harder to sleep. In older people changes in the eye also prevent enough blue wavelengths of light from reaching the retina so sometimes the messages don’t get through correctly.
“They don’t get enough light to maintain the synchronization between the solar day and their internal clock,” says Figueiro, which is why many have sleep problems. This is important because these rhythms regulate a lot of things in our bodies and disruption can lead to obesity, heart disease, diabetes, depression or maybe even cancer.
The purpose of the study is to try to find drugs to reset these rhythms so people are healthier. Paolo Sassone-Corsi, a molecular biologist at the University of California, recently found that a cellular protein called SIRT1, which slows ageing and improves the metabolism, can interact with another protein called CLOCK, and together these may regulate the circadian rhythm. This discovery also implies that factors such as diet can affect our daily rhythms and hints to the fact that our bodies are run by seemingly multiple clocks governed by the brain. The cycle of sleep during night and day registers in the retina to stimulate the release of melatonin, which helps us sleep.
In young people melatonin spikes higher than in older people so older people don’t sleep as soundly. As well as this, during the day enzymes and hormones go up and down affecting the rhythms. This is also affected by artificial lighting and the upshot of it is that it can and will affect your health. Sassone-Corsi says that women who regularly work night shifts like nurses “have something like three to four times more chance of getting breast cancer”.
Turns out we need a certain amount of daylight soon after sunrise to stay in sync and stimulate our circadian rhythms and this light needs to be more intense than the light to see, which is why it is important to go outside. Older people don’t go out as often so it is important to have higher levels of bluish-white lighting and lower, warmer light at night. This blue light at sunrise suppresses melatonin and tells the body it is daytime.
So if you are having problems sleeping you need to get out more in the mornings into the light and let it affect your circadian rhythms.
Insomnia can be very upsetting and serious and is often more common among women especially during menopause when hot flushes keep them awake. This is due to declining oestrogen and fortunately does pass. If you need help with them you need to consult a naturopath for the proper supplements.
Insomnia is also common among people who are obese or have high blood pressure, depression or anxiety and a new study in the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine suggests that adults should sleep eight to nine hours a night to remain at a healthy weight. It theorises that lack of sleep disrupts leptin and insulin which regulate appetite and body weight. It also leaves us sometimes feeling too tired to exercise and can make us moody so we look to food to feel better.
There are some natural remedies however that may work in the short term. One is a glass of milk, which is an old remedy from grandma’s day. Milk contains tryptophan, an amino acid which can induce sleep. Whilst this is not enough to get the brain to produce serotonin, which is a neurotransmitter that induces sleep, it is comforting and may help you relax enough to nod off. Alternatively, a cup of warm herbal tea such as passionflower, chamomile or lemon balm may help as it will relax you.
A late night snack of a high GI carbohydrate not long after dinner may also help. This causes the blood sugar and insulin to rise, inducing sleep much easier. Again this may be because it affects the tryptophan ratios in the body and you simply get tired. Valerian root is also a valuable supplement, but if you have a sensitive stomach you may find it upsets you.
Also remember that while wine may help you fall asleep it may wake you during the night as it can possibly suppress the REM (rapid eye movement) which is important to stay asleep. Reducing alcohol may prevent you from waking up at night as often as you do.
Similarly, to stay asleep, it is best to cut out the caffeine if you are sensitive. Don’t drink any after midday and remember that some soft drinks and sports drinks also contain caffeine and so does chocolate. As we get older we don’t eliminate the caffeine as quickly from the body so it stays there.
Alternatively there are sleep patches that Lifewave make that will last for 12 hours and are reusable if you only sleep 6 or 7 hours a night. Couple this with some Melatonin, Bach Flower Remedies, some Formula 5 Nerve Tonic by Dr Schuessler to calm you down, or some Metagenics Neurotone, and you may find you just drift off without any effort at all.
Long term you could learn to meditate and relax more, introduce a balance of exercise during your week and on the weekends take off for a well deserved break in our lesser smog countryside which will relax your nerves, whet your appetite and give you a bit of a new lease on the next week ahead.
Meditation and hypnotherapy are very close when it comes to technique, so if you need some outside help find someone to train you how to relax. It should only take a few lessons with you doing some ‘homework’ in between and before you know it you will be ‘zzzzing’ the night away.
Jenetta Haim runs ‘Stressfree Management (R)’ at 36 Gipps Road, Greystanes and specialises in developing health and lifestyle programs on either a corporate or personal level to suit your needs.
To contact Jenetta email info@stressfreemanagement.com.au or phone 9609 4881 or 0414 680 713. For more information check out the website at www.stressfreemanagement.com.au
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