10 Reasons You Have Trouble Falling Asleep

Sleep is essential to your health. During sleep, your body restores consolidates memories, produces hormones, and more. It is recommended that every adult gets at least seven hours of sleep each night. Younger children and teenagers require even more sleep to ensure proper growth and development. Knowing how much sleep is recommended is excellent; however, the amount your body needs depends on several factors, including your overall health, sleep patterns, and activity levels. Unfortunately, many people do not get the sleep they need. If you are having difficulties falling or staying asleep, you are in the right place. Here are the top ten reasons you may have trouble falling asleep and how to find some relief.

Reasons You Have Trouble Falling Asleep

Blue Light Exposure

Cellphones, televisions, LED lights, and tablets can interfere with your sleep cycle. In addition, night lights, street lights, and even digital alarm clocks can affect your ability to sleep and stay asleep. The blue light emitted from these devices disrupts your circadian cycle and melatonin production.

To help you fall asleep faster, turn off the television, stop using your phone, tablet, or computer, and lower your lights two hours before bedtime. Lined curtains or blackout blinds can also help block outside light. If you use a nightlight in the hallway, close your bedroom door completely to block out all light. Even a minute amount of light can disrupt melatonin production.

Anxious Thoughts

Anxious thoughts can keep you up at night. Looming deadlines, arguments, financial difficulties, and family troubles can have you focusing on everything except sleeping. Oftentimes, these anxious thoughts will spike correctly as you begin nodding off, causing you to wake up.

If your thoughts keep you awake, get out of bed and go to another part of your house. However, keep the lights off so you don’t wake up. Changing rooms will usually halt your anxious thoughts, allowing you to return to bed and sleep.

Hormone Changes

Hormone fluctuations can occur at any time and sabotage your sleep. When you experience a hormone imbalance, it can cause hot flashes, cramps, and nausea. Avoid caffeine and alcohol close to your bedtime, and take an herbal supplement or an over-the-counter pain reliever to relieve your cramps. Lower the bedroom temperature a couple of degrees to help with hot flashes, and suck on a piece of crystallized ginger to ease your nausea.

Changes to Your Routine

Your circadian clock functions best when it is kept on schedule. Going to bed at different times, sleeping on weekends, and taking longer than 30-minute naps can throw your entire system off.

Set a strict bedtime and stick to it every night of the week. Also, use an alarm every day. To help you sleep faster, create a relaxing bedtime routine you follow each night. This can include reading a book, listening to soft music, and dimming the lights. Lower the temperature of your home and avoid caffeine and alcohol before bedtime.

Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea affects approximately 25 million American adults. Sleep apnea causes abnormal breathing patterns during sleep. If you suffer from sleep apnea, you will temporarily stop breathing as you sleep. These multiple temporary lapses in breathing affect your oxygen supply, reduce the quality of your sleep, and can lead to several serious health consequences. Sleep apnea symptoms include loud snoring, gasping for air, choking, frequent need to urinate, dry mouth, sore throat, headaches, decreased attention span, irritability, and daytime sleepiness.

Sleep apnea is often treated with a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine. However, specific lifestyle changes can also help. These changes include reducing sedatives, losing excess weight, and sleeping on one’s side.

Avoid Eating or Drinking After Sunset

Late-night snacks can upset your stomach. Drinking too close to bedtime can cause you to need to make additional trips to the bathroom throughout the night. Cook a fulfilling meal that includes protein to help you avoid late-night hunger. If you must drink before bedtime, limit it to no more than four ounces of water.

Room Temperature

Your bedroom temperature can affect how well you sleep throughout the night. If it is too hot, you will wake up sweating. If it is too cold, you cannot maintain a comfortable body temperature. Typically, your bedroom should be a few degrees cooler at night. If you have difficulty finding the perfect temperature, adjust your thermostat to one degree warmer or cooler until you find the best one.

Exercise Close To Bedtime

Exercise is excellent for your body; however, exercising too close to bedtime can make it difficult to fall asleep. Exercise raises your heart rate, which may wake you up. Cardio workouts should be relegated to the morning. Gentle stretches, yoga, and tai chi can be enjoyed in the evening as long as they are completed a couple of hours before bedtime.

Smoking

Cigarette smokers believe that tobacco helps relax them; however, the relaxation they feel is a neurochemical trick. Nicotine is a stimulant. When you smoke tobacco before bedtime, it can prevent you from going to sleep or cause you to wake up throughout the night. Quitting smoking offers several benefits, including getting a better night’s sleep. There are several quit-smoking methods and stop-smoking medication.

Noise

If you live near a busy road or have noisy neighbors, getting a good night’s rest can be frustrating and challenging. A white noise machine can help mask those noises so you can fall and stay asleep.

Getting a good night’s sleep is essential for your health. Unfortunately, getting a good night’s sleep can be challenging at times. The key is understanding why you may have trouble falling asleep and getting a good night’s sleep. Our integrative sleep doctors can help with all kinds of sleep issues so you can sleep quicker and stay asleep longer.