The Perfect Sleep Schedule: Follow This Routine to Get the Best Sleep Ever

From parade.com

Bedtime may be after dark, but to be sure that you can fall asleep—and get sound shut-eye—you need to practise healthy sleeping habits all day long. This guide incorporates expert advice on how to fix your sleep schedule, including a sleep routine to follow from sunup to sundown, so you can spend less time counting sheep and more time getting the best possible night’s sleep.

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7 a.m.: Keep a consistent wake time seven days a week to fix your sleep schedule.

“The most important piece of advice is to pick a wake-up time and stick with it,” says Chris Winter, MD, medical director of the Sleep Medicine Centre at Sentara Martha Jefferson Hospital in Charlottesville, Virginia, and author of The Sleep Solution. This helps stabilize your circadian rhythm, your body’s internal clock for regulating feelings of sleepiness and wakefulness over a 24-hour period. As tempting as it may be to sleep later on the weekend, that can throw off your body clock during the week, disrupting your sleep routine.

7:05 a.m.: Make your bed.

According to a National Sleep Foundation (NSF) survey, bed-makers were nearly 20 percent more likely to report getting a good night’s sleep on most days than people who said they didn’t bother—that’s why it’s one of several crucial healthy sleeping habits. “Keeping your bedroom neat helps your sleep quality,” Winter says. To really help your sleep quality be the best it can be, an organic mattress is highly recommended to create an all-natural, cleaner sleep space.

7:15 a.m.: Get a good dose of sunshine.

Two more healthy sleeping habits to add into your sleep schedule: Throw open the shades as soon as you get up, and eat breakfast by the window. Exposing yourself to sunlight early in the morning helps set (or reset) your circadian clock correctly and keep it on track.

10 a.m.: Deliver a message to a co-worker in person.

People who sit for fewer than eight hours a day were significantly more likely to say they had “very good” sleep quality than those who are sedentary for eight hours or more in an NSF poll. Those who spent more time on the move were also more likely to be in excellent health, possibly because adequate rest is linked with everything from stronger immunity to reduced stress and obesity.

Noon: Eat a hearty lunch.

Try this to fix your sleep: Big dinners prolong digestion, which interferes with a good night’s sleep, so it’s better to eat your biggest meal before mid-afternoon and have a light evening meal of 500 calories or less. Pack every meal with foods like salmon, tuna, spinach, walnuts or tofu that are high in omega-3 fatty acids, which affect levels of melatonin, a hormone that signals the body to prepare for slumber.

2 p.m.: Cut off caffeine consumption.

“Caffeine has a long half-life, between six to eight hours,” reports Michael Breus, PhD, a clinical psychologist and sleep expert, “which means it can take up to eight hours for half of the caffeine to be metabolized by your body.” To fix your sleep, cut off your intake in time.

5 p.m.: Hit the gym (and prioritise other healthy sleeping habits).

People who worked out four times a week for at least 30 minutes fell asleep 12 minutes earlier and slept 42 minutes longer than those who didn’t exercise, according to a study published in JAMA. There’s no magic time to work out, but if it tends to keep you up, aim to finish vigorous exercise six hours before bedtime and moderate exercise four hours before.

9:30 p.m.: Write down your worries.

A great healthy sleeping habit to try: Doing a pre-sleep brain dump of what’s making you anxious, including what you have to do the next day, frees your mind so it can settle down. In one study, people who wrote to-do lists fell asleep nine minutes sooner—similar to the effects of some sleep meds—than people who wrote about the previous day’s accomplishments. The more specific the lists were, the sooner participants fell asleep.

10 p.m.: Turn out the lights.

Melatonin is dramatically affected by light, and while light of any kind can suppress its secretion, research shows exposure at night to blue light, the kind emitted by devices like tablets, smartphones and TVs, is particularly powerful at doing so. Melatonin kicks in at about 9 or 10 p.m., but if you or your partner, if you sleep as a couple, is reading on your Kindle or watching TV, you may be countering its sleep-inducing effects. If you can’t put down your tech at least an hour before bed, consider a pair of blue-blocker glasses to help fix your sleep.

11 p.m.: Listen to a lullaby.

Talk about sound advice! Listening to soft, slow (60 to 80 beats per minute) music before bedtime boosted sleep quality by 35 percent in a Case Western Reserve University study. Even better, soothing music can improve your quality of sleep once you drift off. Researchers don’t fully understand how, but music is known to affect the body’s natural stress relievers and help quell the anxiety that can keep you tossing and turning. Songs that hit the mark include Bach’s “Air on the G String,” Adele’s “Make You Feel My Love,” Carole King’s “Tapestry” and Ed Sheeran’s “Kiss Me.”

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