Enter Sandman: The Forever Overlooked Game-changer.
“The creature is regenerating itself.”
In training to look, feel and perform at our best we all get caught up in the details - exercises, muscles, programs, distance, speed, time, days, sets and reps. We dial in our nutrition focusing on what we are eating, how much and when.
In the absence of quality sleep, at best it's all trivial, more likely, irrelevant.
Sleep remains a mystery largely, and any understanding we have of its purpose is divined only through what we are able to measure in its absence - physical and mental decay. We fatigue physically, but we also diminish our ability to learn new skills, solve problems and create new memories. Good sleep is essential to our health and survival. Almost everyone needs 7-9 hours of quality sleep to be at peak performance, but few get that regularly.
Adults on average get around 7 hours of sleep per night - which is about right, but 33 % of us get less than 6.5 hours, and that can lead to problems. Women tend to sleep a bit more than men, and those who carry high levels of body fat tend to sleep less than those with normal levels.
We also sleep in roughly 90-minute cycles, in which from a light surface level REM sleep, we descend into deep sleep before ascending to the lighter surface level again. We should aim for 4-5 of these cycles every 24 hours, and not necessarily all at once - worth noting if your schedule allows for a long nap.
If you find it difficult to wake up in the morning or feel groggy and unrested, it may be because you are always trying to rouse yourself from the middle of this cycle. Correspondingly, we can actually sleep less, but feel more awake and rested if we wake during the beginning/end phase of the cycle.
So why do we most of us get such poor quality sleep? You are probably already hauling the usual suspects of modern society into the lineup - high workloads, lack of time and stress, but when it comes to our (lack of) sleep, they are rarely to blame. At least not directly.
The boffins call it ''voluntary bedtime delay', but we know it better as choice.
We watch TV
We surf internet
We go out with friends
We stay in with friends
With social media, we stay in, our friends stay in, and we still spend time with them.
So although the usual suspects may be innocent on this occasion, the problem is still a modern one. Artificial lighting gave us control over dawn and dusk, and this has been further magnified by television, computers and the internet. Quite simply, we have more options. It gets dark and with still plenty of things we can be doing, no end of things competing for our attention, we no longer have to be home in bed and so most of the time we aren't. But when it comes to the consequences of late nights and disrupted sleep, we really need to wake up.
Our bodies regulate sleep in much the same way that eating, drinking, and breathing are monitored, and sleep serves a similarly critical role in our health and well-being. As relevant to our overall health as diet or exercise, if we don't sleep well on a regular basis the problems extend far beyond just being a bit crabby;
cognitive impairment
memory lapses or loss
impaired moral judgement
impaired immune system
risk of Type II diabetes
increased heart rate variability
increased cardiovascular disease
growth suppression
increased obesity
psychiatric disorders
slower healing
A lack of sleep will minimise or even nullify the benefits of any other healthy activity you do. Through training, we are intentionally damaging our bodies to elicit an adaptive response - to get better. If our sleep is not sufficient to allow for this recovery and adaptation, then we are only going backwards. Our immune system becomes compromised leading to any and every ailment - physical or mental, you can think of.
Studies also show that people who sleep less than six hours per night gain almost twice as much weight over six years than those who sleep 7-8 hours per night. Extra sleep is no better, with those clocking up more than nine hours having a similar body composition to those that sleep less than six.
Sleep debt is cumulative, meaning that the more nights with less sleep, the higher the likelihood of adverse effects taking place. Opinion remains divided on our ability to reduce any sleep debt so it would pay us to, at least most of the time, just avoid incurring one in the first place.
To get a great sleep
Cool your room. The ideal sleep temperature is between 15-20 degrees. Sheets cold enough to make you shiver are a good sign.
Make your room as quiet as possible. If noise is a problem try earplugs, or using a fan or other white noise generator.
Blackout the room. Not just dark - even a tiny amount of light can interfere with melatonin production and impair sleep so also cover the LEDs from any electronic devices. In the absence of block-out blinds, use an eye mask.
Control your exposure to red and blue light. Lightwaves towards the blue end of the spectrum such as those from TV or computers trigger wakefulness. Red light does not impair sleep. You could also download f.lux, software that changes the tone of your screen to simulate natural light. While this may not affect sleep quality via exposure to blue light consider what you are doing with the device - working, browsing, watching films. Distraction is not relaxation.
Improve your quality of sleep by strengthening the initial spike of wakefulness in the morning. Expose the body, or eyes at least, to natural sunlight as soon as possible after waking. More awake in the morning equals more tired in the evening. The best way to do this - early training!
Set, and consistently stick to, a schedule. Wake at the same time every day, even weekends. Our body and our sleep both follow cycles. In creating, and following a pattern, the body can normalise to an effective rhythm without the need for continual adjustment. Sleep you get before midnight is more regenerative so if you go to bed late, get up at the normal time and go to bed at an earlier time the next night.
Read (a book, not a screen!) for at least 15 minutes before bed, to reduce mental chatter.
Address any issues of the day that might otherwise cause you to lie awake pondering them. This does not mean things have to be resolved, just a reminder note will do - just enough to get it out of your head.
Dim artificial lighting, or use candles for an hour before bed. Try and simulate natural light as much as possible
For the brave, a cold shower before bed will help you fall asleep faster and sleep deeper. This will also help with muscle pain.
Stretch. One of the benefits to relaxed stretching is that it induces the parasympathetic relaxation response and also encourages good breathing patterns.
Exercise. Vigorous exercise (although not immediately prior to bed), leads to better sleep quality.
If you don't fall asleep within 45 minutes, get up and out of the bedroom. Keep lights low and read, or even better, try to do something involving your hands, as this is more likely to make you drowsy. Try to wait at least 60 minutes before going back to bed. Trying to sleep without success only increases stress and will ultimately only reinforce the idea that bedtime, is stress-time.
If you happen to wake in the middle of the night, enjoy it. Studies are showing that in the absence of electricity, humans revert (yes, we all use to do this) to biphasic or polyphasic sleep patterns - and a 1-2 hour period of waking is quite normal. In any case, as above, the worst thing you can do is stress about it.
If your sleep habits are not as good as they should be then like anything else this will be a process of learning and change. See what works best for you. If you still find you are having trouble getting the sleep you need, or if you just want to see if you can maximise your potential each day;
There's a nap for that
As well as providing an opportunity to rebalance the ledger from a lack of nighttime sleep, a nap during the day can have benefits even if you slept well. Napping as improves cognitive ability, memory retention and aiding creativity. You snooze, you win.
If you don’t like your chances of talking your boss around, perhaps mention this is now standard practice at leading companies like Google, Nike, and British Airways, with some even providing napping rooms.
Limit your nap to less than 30 minutes, or if you have the time - a full cycle, and preferably before 3pm.
If at home, in order not to confuse any association between your room and a full nights sleep, don’t get into bed.
Set a timer so you are not worried about oversleeping.
Listen to relaxing music to cancel out background noise if required.
This may also prove to be difficult to do initially but here you can consider sleep a bonus - just closing your eyes and relaxing will be refreshing.
Final approach
For the next 2 weeks set a bedtime and stick to it. Set the alarm to go to bed. Pay attention to how you feel when you do, and don't manage to sleep well.
Start to develop a sleep time ritual - a sequence of activities in the evening that allow you to unwind physically and mentally, giving notice to body and mind that you are on final approach. Activities such as breathing and stretching exercises support our efforts at training, our recovery and stress management, but also prepare us for sleep. It makes sense to use them as such. Also, note that research has shown that sleep from 10pm to 6am is optimal for physical and psychological recovery.
This sleep time ritual not surprisingly this has a great effect not only on how long it takes you to fall asleep but also on sleep quality. As above, look to go to sleep at a time that will allow a full cycle of 90 minutes - so you will sleep, for 6, 7.5 or 9 hours, allowing 15 minutes to fall asleep. Notice how you feel upon waking.
Sleep is a heightened anabolic state, accentuating the growth and rejuvenation of the immune, nervous, skeletal and muscular systems but, just like exercise and eating well, it is always one of the first casualties of our everyday lives - too easy to put off for work, an hour of television or social-media, any number of alternatives.
But our sleep is denied us not by circumstance, but by choice. Your health, your quality of life and body composition, your mental and physical performance all rely on whether or not you make sleep a priority, whether or not you make time.
Nothing will help you look, feel and perform better than just the right amount of quality sleep.
Sleep well.
References:
http://healthysleep.med.harvard.edu/healthy/matters/benefits-of-sleep/why-do-we-sleep
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/04/sleep-exercise-sleep-in-america_n_2784457.html
http://www.livescience.com/12891-natural-sleep.htm
http://www.strengtheory.com/sleep-pt-1/
Further reading: