Healthy Hints

By: Bonnie Hester
Restful sleep provides the foundation for our mental and physical well-being. Millions of people suffer from some form of insomnia, resulting in fatigue, lack of mental alertness, and weakened physical and mental health. If you look at the millions of drugs on the counters for sleep-aid, you will know this is true. Lack of sleep also contributes to both minor and major injury accidents. Studies have shown that if you wake up at 3:00 in the morning and do not get back to sleep -- your immune cells do not work as well for the next 24 hours. Once you have a full night of sound sleep, they regain their disease-fighting abilities. A chronic lack of sleep may cause much more serious problems than a simple tendency to doze off the next day. People who do not get enough sleep on a regular basis may become less sensitive to insulin which, over time, can raise the risk for obesity, high blood pressure , diabetes. Dr. Eve Van Cauter at the University of Chicago found (1) that chronic sleep deprivation - 6.5 hours or less of sleep per night - had the same effect on insulin resistance as aging. Just like poor diet, a sedentary lifestyle, aging and chronic stress, lack of sleep is a risk factor for type 2 diabetes. Type 2 diabetes occurs when the body loses its ability to respond to insulin, the body's main blood sugar-regulating hormone. This insulin resistance causes blood-sugar levels to rise, which in turn increases the risk for a number of serious medical conditions including kidney damage, blindness, heart disease and lower limb amputations. Steps you can take to ensure you enjoy restful sleepinclude avoiding bed-time snacks, particularly grains and sugars. These will raise blood sugar levels and make sleep difficult. Later, when blood sugar levels drop too low (hypoglycemia), you might wake up and not be able to fall back asleep. Do not watch television or do any work in bed. Once in bed, close your eyes and simply "feel your body" - this means focus on your body and wherever you notice tension, consciously relax that area. Then, simply watch your slow easy breathing until you fall asleep. The neti pot is a beneficial practice which may help you improve your breathing for better health. Read spiritual or inspirational literature for a few minutes before bed. Avoid dramatic novels or distressing reading material. Go to bed as early as possible. Our body systems, particularly the adrenal glands, do a majority of their recovering during the hours of 11PM and 1AM. In addition, your gallbladder dumps toxins during this same time period. If you are awake, those toxins back up into the liver which then secondarily back up into your entire system and cause further disruption to your health. Prior to the invention of electricity, people would go to bed shortly after sundown, as most animals do, which is what nature intended for humans as well. Sleep when it is dark and in the daytime, get bright sunlight. So aim to be in your bed with the lights out between 9:30 P.M. and 10:30 P.M. If you are not used to getting to bed this early, move your bedtime up by 30 minutes every week until you are in bed by 10:30 P.M. For example, if you usually watch television until midnight, try turning off the TV by 11:30 for a week. Then aim for 30 minutes earlier, and finally 10:30 P.M. Stay away from alcohol and medications, if at all possible. Although alcohol makes people drowsy, its effect is short-lived and people will often wake up a few hours later, unable to fall back to sleep. Alcohol will also prevent you from falling into the deeper stages of sleep, where the body does most of its healing. Medications tend to be addictive and may even contribute to the cause of restless leg syndrome and other sleep problems. Avoid foods which you may be sensitive to. This is particularly true for dairy and wheat products, because they may have an effect on your sleep, such as causing apnea, gastrointestinal upset, excess congestion, and gas, among others.Reduce or avoid as many drugs as possible. Many medications, both prescription and over-the-counter, may affect sleep. Sleep in COMPLETE DARKNESS or as close to it as possible. When light hits the eyes, it disrupts the circadian rhythm of the pineal gland and the production of melatonin and serotonin. There have even been studies which show the effect a high level of melatonin (which sleeping in complete darkness produces) lowers your risk of cancer: The researchers found that totally blind women have a 36% lower risk of breast cancer compared with sighted women. Women who became blind relatively early in their life (before age 65), appeared to be especially protected against breast cancer, with cancer incidence rates 49% below those of sighted women. Only total blindness - not visual impairment - seemed to protect against breast cancer. According to the authors of the study, these findings support the theory that increased nighttime exposure to artificial light reduces melatonin levels, changing estrogen secretion rates and increasing risks for breast cancer. High blood levels of the hormone melatonin may explain why blind women have significantly lower risks of breast cancer compared with sighted women. Melatonin, an hormone which is secreted by the pineal gland in the brain and plays an important role in the body's sleep cycle, is thought to have an impact on the secretion of estrogen, which in turn influences breast cancer risks. Blind women are, by definition, unreceptive to light, and may maintain high melatonin production at night regardless of external light conditions. The authors of the study believe this may be the mechanism whereby blind women are protected from breast cancer. Ideally it is best to increase melatonin levels naturally with exposure to bright sunlight in the daytime and absolute complete darkness at night. Some sleep specialists recommend you get blackout drapes so no light is coming in from the outside.

The Effects of Sleep Deprivation: Sleep deprivation can have serious effects on your health in the form of physical and mental impairments. Inadequate rest impairs our ability to think, to handle stress, to maintain a healthy immune system and to moderate our emotions. In fact, sleep is so important to our overall health that total sleep deprivation has been proven to be fatal: lab rats denied the chance to rest die within two to three weeks. Find out more from this Free Guide to sleep disorders. Without adequate rest, the brain's ability to function quickly deteriorates. The brain works harder to counteract sleep deprivation effects, but operates less effectively: concentration levels drop, and memory becomes impaired. Similarly, the brain's ability to problem solve is greatly impaired. Decision-making abilities are compromised, and the brain falls into rigid thought patterns that make it difficult to generate new problem-solving ideas. Insufficient rest can also cause people to have hallucinations. Other typical effects of sleep deprivation include:depression • heart disease hypertension • irritability slower reaction times slurred speech • tremors. The older we get, the more likely it is that we will suffer from some kind of sleep disorder. In fact, over 50 percent of people over 64 years old suffer from some type of sleep disorder. While the hormonal and physical changes that occur as we age will likely affect sleep, especially in menopausal women, the increased presence of other medical conditions and disorders is also a factor that tends to upset the sleep of the elderly. One of the biggest sleeping problems the elderly experience is the inability to get deep, restorative sleep. Although they tend to sleep just as much as they did when they were younger, the elderly don’t get as quality sleep, meaning that they often suffer from fatigue and daytime drowsiness. The main reason for this is because older people don’t get as much REM sleep, the deepest, most restorative sleep phase. Dramatic weight changes, especially weight gain, are also common effects of sleep deprivation. Because the amount and quality of the sleep we get affects our hormone levels, namely our levels of leptin and ghrelin, many physiological processes that depend on these hormone levels to function properly, including appetite, are affected by our sleep.