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| What Does It Mean When You Can't Sleep? |
Staying up late all night can help you meet the work deadline but you haven't any idea how badly it can affect your body including your mental health and peace. Do you know why it is important to have quality sleep?
In today's hectic life, people are becoming lazy due to a lack of sleep at night. The problem of insomnia is more common in people. To overcome this problem people use to take sleeping pills and try other harmful ways which are obviously not recommended.
Having a good sleep not only keeps your mind active but also helps to improve digestion and maintains the immune system in the right way. But today we will know what are the 8 major reasons that are keeping you awake throughout the night and what changes you can make to have a quality sleep at night.
What Does It Mean When You Can't Sleep?
Do you know that our body has an internal clock called the Circadian Rhythm? This internal body clock (Circadian Rhythm) is our 24-hour body clock that takes care of our sleep. Circadian rhythm is affected by various factors such as hormones, lights, and darkness, which is why it also affects our sleep cycle.
This Circadian Rhythm helps our brain to be alert and active throughout the day, which helps us to stay active and more productive. While at night, our brain naturally starts feeling sleeping (indicating that it's the time to sleep).
But if you also have the same problem at night, Don't Worry!! Every problem has a solution. This article explains what factors are affecting your sleep and how can you fix it.
Top 8 Reasons You Can't Sleep Through The Night
1. Stress: Problems related to school, career, health, finances, relationship, families, etc can keep your brain active at night and make it hard for you to sleep. Stressful life events or mental distress, such as the death or illness of someone close to you, divorce, breakup, or toxic work culture at the office. According to researches, stress is considered to be the biggest cause for not getting quality sleep at night.
2. Sleep Apnea: It is a sleep disorder that either prevents sleep or makes you feel more tired and lazy even after having a full sleep. Frequent breathing difficulties while sleeping at night can lead to frequent sleeplessness, preventing you from getting quality sleep and feeling lazy the next day even after sleeping for a long time.
3. Using Mobile Phones: There is no doubt that we all are addicted to smartphones. It has become our daily need just like food or oxygen. I won't blame smartphones have changing the whole system and making our work easier and faster, but on the other way, they have taken control of our life affecting our health, mental peace, and sleep.
The artificial light emitting from our smartphone indicates to our brain that it has to stay awake as it looks like the light of the day. This deception spoils our natural rhythm (circadian rhythm) and we feel not sleepy at all.
Also, the algorithms of the apps we use these days such as TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, etc are designed so smartly and intentionally that you keep on scrolling and scrolling that you become addicted for the short term pleasure and can't get out of it easily.
4. Insomnia: Insomnia is a common sleep disorder in which a person has difficulty falling asleep or wakes up shortly after bedtime. At the same time, you feel tired when you wake up in the morning.
The problem of insomnia not only reduces the energy of the body but also keeps the person in a bad mood and leads to a variety of health problems such as diabetes, depression, anxiety, weight gain, high blood pressure, heart diseases, memory problems, etc.
5. Excessive Caffeine/Tea: People preferred coffee usually when they get tired while working. But too much coffee adversely affects our body in so many ways. A large amount of caffeine present in the coffee persists in our body for a long time.
This increases the adrenal hormone in our body which stimulates our brain making us active and energetic again. Consuming too much coffee or tea causes insomnia.
If you like to take coffee or tea after your dinner, it is likely to disturb your sleep. Caffeine being a stimulant will keep you awake even when it is bedtime. So avoid taking coffee/tea after 5 p.m.
6. Bad Sleeping Habits: Bad sleeping habits include irregular sleeping time, sleeping during the day, stimulating activities before going to bed (taking coffee or tea), playing video games, using computers or watching TV, using smartphones, etc can easily interfere with your sleep cycle before going to bed.
7) Taking Heavy Dinner: It is okay to eat light food before bedtime, but eating too much can make you feel physically uncomfortable while sleeping. Many people experience chest pain. The backflow of acid and food starts flowing from the stomach to the food tube (esophagus), which can keep you awake the whole night.
8) Consuming Nicotine: Products like tobacco or cigarettes can interfere with your sleep as the nicotine is present in tobacco and cigarettes which works like a stimulant keeping you awake for long.
Sleeping Problem Solutions
Here are some solutions and tips for you if you can't have quality sleep at night. We know it is hard to break a bad habit but slowing if you start following these given steps from today surely you will see the changes in your sleeping patterns and feel more energetic and healthy day by day. If you get a good sleep every night, it will directly impact your health including your mind and mental health as well.
- Set up your bedtime.
- Clean your bed every day and the environment where you sleep.
- Turn off the lights before you go to the bed.
- Take a bath before bedtime.
- Keep your room cool.
- Turn off your TV, laptop, or smartphone. And do not keep them near to your bed.
- Avoid taking caffeine, cigarettes, tobacco, and alcohol before going to bed.
- Do meditation and breathing exercises every day.
- Avoid overeating and beverages just before going to bed. (Eat light food in the evening).
- Listen to soft music or ASMR (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response) before bedtime.
- Use room freshener.
How Much Sleep Do We Really Need?
According to the sleephealthjournal.org article, healthy young adults need 7–9 hours of proper sleep is an appropriate amount.
| Newborns | 14–17 hours |
| Infants | 12–15 hours |
| Toddlers | 11–14 hours |
| Preschoolers | 10–13 hours |
| School-aged children | 9–11 hours |
| Teenagers | 8–10 hours |
| Adults | 7–9 hours |
| Older adults | 7–8 hours |
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