Don’t underestimate the importance of sleep

In my last article, I went through the many factors that lower the quality of your sleep and deprive you of sound restful sleep, leading to insomnia, possibly stress, depression, suppressed immunity and cancer. When sleep is less than optimal, you wake up groggy, unrefreshed, depleted of energy, irritable, grouchy and unwilling to get out of bed or start the day. You don’t even know that your slowed mental responses and physical reflexes could result in miscalculations and accidents while you drive, errors at work, declined mental performance and lowered efficiency. Sleep deprivation leads to bad mood, low productivity, failed relationships, isolation, depression and possibly fatal accidents. In earlier articles, I discussed several ways to prepare for bedtime in order to have a good night sleep. We spend one third of our lives sleeping; this should tell you enough about the importance of this vital lifestyle behavior. Unfortunately, humans are the only species which forgo sleep for working late hours and overtime, having night shifts or a late night of partying, or studying until the wee hours of the day. Studies have shown that animals in labs die after several consecutive nights of sleep deprivation. They just drop dead! I discussed that in an earlier article of this series. Today, I shall continue exploring some of the causes that disturb sleep and result in insomnia. I shall also recommend ways to fix bad sleeping habits in order to enjoy good mental and physical health, stabilize your mood, improve performance and productivity, and enjoy healthy long life. Problems and conflict at work and at home could keep you awake at night and disturb sound sleep, making your mind race and keep it busy with negative thoughts. To prevent that and calm your mind, do deep breathing by filling your lungs with air and stretching your abdominal muscles. Exhaling should be slow and through the mouth. Repeat several times before bedtime or even in bed. This method keeps the mind quiet and switches off worrying. Negative thoughts waste your energy and sleep, stressing your body and brain while keeping you awake and restless. Even though caffeine is a good energizer and wake-me-up in the morning, it chases sleep away when taken after six in the evening. Hence, it is best avoided several hours before bedtime. Too much caffeine during the day can disturb sleep and cause health issues like fast and irregular heartbeat. Caffeine is not only found in coffee, it is quite high in fermented black tea leaves and Maté leaves (grown in the Amazon area), much less in green tea, and very little in white tea (5 percent), and none in bancha tea (twigs of the tea tree). Cocoa beans and chocolate contain caffeine, too; they should not be consumed before bedtime. Naturally, dark chocolate contains more caffeine than milk chocolate; the former offers more pure cocoa and more antioxidants and magnesium. Too much caffeine keeps you awake, disturbs sleep, and causes stress. Avoid it in the evening as experts recommend “No coffee in the afternoon” in order to give the caffeine a chance to wear off your body before bedtime. Many are under the impression that Arabic coffee (with cardamom) does not have too much caffeine. Let me tell you it does. Heavily roasted or blackened coffee beans (Turkish coffee) lose quite a bit of their caffeine potency due to roasting. Cardamom, ginger, and cloves contain powerful antioxidants. When they are added to the coffee, it becomes very energizing to the body and brain, keeping you wide-awake in bed, counting sheep. By the way, men tolerate caffeine and alcohol better than women, who need to taper off their intake, especially during pregnancy. Alcohol is another substance to avoid. It may help in falling asleep, but it lowers the quality of sleep by delaying the rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, a cycle, which is important for brain repair and consolidation of learning and memory. People, who drink heavily, wake up with a headache and hangover the following morning, unrested. Anyway, we Muslims should not have this problem since we are not supposed to consume alcohol. Smoking cigarettes or shisha, argila and chewing tobacco prevent good sleeping. Like coffee, tobacco is another energizer that keeps the body awake and the brain alert, because of its nicotine content. Tobacco smokers and users enjoy it for this reason, but it is an addictive substance and a health-harming habit. Health issues like emphysema, lung disorders, cancer and poor sleep are related to the use of tobacco and smoking, even though the tobacco industry likes to convince you otherwise. You should become an independent thinker and make your own research about this harmful habit. Don’t underestimate second-hand smoke, too. It inflicts the same damage on your non-smoking children and close family members, especially pregnant women exposed to it. Keep in mind that the farming industry uses pesticides and weed-killers (Roundup) heavily, on tobacco plantation in particular. According to Professor Stephanie Seneff, Ph.D., senior scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, the toxic chemicals and glysophate in the weed-killer, Roundup, accumulate in the body, resulting in autism and cancer. Obesity is another factor that interferes with sound health-restoring sleep. Overweight individuals tend to snore loudly and develop sleep apnea, a risky condition that prevents oxygen from passing through the airways and to the brain, resulting in low oxygen intake, incidents of gasping for air, interrupted sleep (as often as every three minutes), and sometimes death. It should be addressed medically. There are devices that maintain free breathing and air flowing. However, weight loss, sometimes, could reduce the severity of the problem as well as throat exercises. Stick your tongue strongly against your palate in order to work your throat muscles, preventing them from becoming lax. Repeat several times while holding 30 seconds every repetition. Avoid sleeping flat on your back; the position results in parted lips and a gaping mouth, which encourage snoring. The sleeping position that could prevent snoring is sleeping on the side, making sure your mouth is firmly shut with your hand. Stress, fatigue, and overconsumption during the last meal could result in snoring even if you do not have the habit of doing so. Women are less likely to snore than men, but when they are overweight, they do snore loudly as well. These are some of the obvious causes of disturbed sleep and sleeplessness. Next week I shall suggest some foods, fruits, nutrients, and habits that help and improve the quality of your sleep, provided you make sure you do them regularly and all the previous recommendations in the previous parts. You need to work hard on your sleep to make it restful, repairing and revitalizing to your body and brain, and boosting to your immune system. References: • “Body clock alters immune system” by James Gallagher • “How Exhaustion Might Change the Way You Think,” by Amanda Woerner •“Emotions Run Amok in Sleep-deprived brains, ” by Charles Q. Choi • Ben Hirschler on sleep on Reuters • “Good Sleep, Sociability may keep Grandma Healthy,” by Megan Rauscher for Reuters. • The Science of Good Sleep: There is a reason You’re Always So Tired by James Clear in Wellness • “The Science of Good Sleep: There’s a Reason You’re Always So Tired” by James Clear, March 24, 2015 • “4 Ways to Sleep Better Tonight,” by Andrew Katz, July 17, 2012 • Interviews of correspondent Lesley Stahl of CBS with Matthew Walker, director of the Sleeping Neuroimaging Lab at the University of California, Berkeley. • “Six Senses” by Michael J. Breus, PhD ˂enquiries-spa@sixsenses.com> • “5 WORST FOODS to Eat Before Bed…and Best” by Jesse Cannone • www.higherperspectives.com • Sleep Positions N.B.: Individuals with medical conditions or on medication should consult their physicians when they decide to introduce anything new in their diet even if it is natural. Source: arabnews.com