Diet, Exercise and Sleep

Diet and Sleep

You are likely going to read many thing you already know here. In fact most of the information and advice about diet and sleep is common sense. And yet we all often ignore or forget to follow some of the most basic biological processes to make us happy and healthy. 

So for me and many others, here is a list worth remembering and following

1. Eat a big breakfast, a mid sized lunch and a small dinner. I know, we do it the other way around! Bit it’s not good for our bodies or for sleep. A small dinner means we don’t go to bed bloated, our bodies are not still working hard on digestion and we aren’t bouncing off the bedroom walls with energy from the huge sugar hit was just gave ourselves.

2. Don’t eat too much too late before bed. Sure, have a little heathy snack before bedtime to keep away the midnight huger pangs but try to finish your dinner a good two hours before hitting the hay.

3. Watch out for caffeine, MSG and alcohol! So that means that late night chinese takeaway washed down with a couple of glasses on white and finished off with a coffee is a BAD idea if you are looking for a good night’s sleep. Keep caffeine to the first half of the day only, keep alcohol intake moderate (as thought it might help you fall asleep in can keep you waking throughout the night) and if you are no good with MSG try to avoid it altogether.   

There is a huge list of foods that difference people claim help you sleep. These include tryptophan rich foods which the body uses to make serotonin (a calming brain chemical) such as warm milk, cheese & peanuts. There are also the magnesium and calcium rich foods which can help calm the nervous system like bananas, apricots, avocados, nuts and cereals. You can try a few out and see what works for you. Note that chocolate bars, packets of biscuits and re-heated pizza are not on the list (damn!) 

Exercise and Sleep

It’s something we feel we’ve always known. If you can’t sleep, you need to exercise more. Run around and wear yourself out and that night you will sleep like a baby. Well there is definitely some logical truth to this but equally we all can’t be running marathons every day just to get good night’s sleep either. 

Well the good news is that for improved long term sleep it is more about regular exercise than extreme exercise. Put simply, people that exercise regularly tend to sleep better. Not on any particular night or immediately after exercise, but in general and over time. The learning is to get into a regular exercise routine as over time this is going to help.

The big challenge for many poor sleepers is how to get into such as regime? If you are a poor sleeper you find it much harder to motivate yourself to do regular exercise - because your are tired! The trick is to start slowly and be in it for the long term. Forget that life changing run you are going to start tomorrow where you sprint right around the city 3 times! Even if you do it once  or twice, your chance of burn-out is high. Start slow, steady and regularly. Your sleep results will also be small and slow but they will be significant, long term improvements you will maintain. Not to mention all the other benefits of regular exercise. Summer and swimsuit season is always just around the corner you know!   

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