Short On Sleep? Maximize What You Get By Doing This...
When you have kids there are a few curveballs you know life is going to throw at you.
The biggest? No doubt it's the sleep schedule shake up.
The silver lining when you have multiple kids is that you know that curveball is coming.
When my family welcomed our second child at the start of this year, I knew the 7-9 hours I was accustomed to would be cut in half.
Yes, I was preparing for 3-5 hours of sleep on any given night. Oh the joys of parenthood.
Recently, I was having a great conversation with one of the smartest people I know, Dr. Justin Rabinowitz (seriously, he thinks on a different level, check out this podcast we did).
The Good Doctor was catching some heat after posting a picture of his immaculate sleep score from the previous night.
"Just wait until you have kids"
"Let me know when your baby keeps you up at night"
"Enjoy it while it lasts..."
I messaged him and said that he should tell all the parents sending him hate mail that they can work to optimize their sleep just like he has.
You see, just because your sleep isn't what it once was, whether it is a new kid, a new puppy, a new job, relationship stress, etc. the list of reasons why your sleep can be effected is a long one.
Rather than complain about how you don't get any sleep, work to make sure what you DO get is optimized. The picture above is from a week ago. Those were my sleep windows. Yes, a small 14 pound human being contributed to this, but I can't blame the baby for falling asleep at 2:23am now can I? That one's on me.
If you know your sleep is going to take a beating, try looking at these three factors to make those short stints as restful as possible,
1) Understand your caffeine intake. I used to say things like "don't drink caffeine past 3pm" or "limit your caffeine to 100mg for better sleep". Really, I think it needs to go a touch deeper. With caffeine specifically, it has a half-life of 5-9 hours. This means that as time goes on, specifically 5-9 hours after you drink something caffeinated, your body still has half of the amount hanging out.
Imagine this, its 2:30pm and you're looking for an afternoon pick-me-up so you go over to the local coffee shop for a large coffee. You're feeling extra spunky so you have them throw a shot of espresso in as well. That 20oz coffee with espresso can be somewhere around 300mg (or more...) of total caffeine. 9 hours later, at 11:30pm, you still have ~150mg of caffeine hanging out. That's the same amount that would be in 5 cans of Diet Coke.
Hard to achieve deep sleep cycles if you have 5 Diet Cokes swimming around inside you right around midnight.
2) Turn the thermostat down. Studies have shown that the optimal temperature to sleep is between 60-68 degrees. As your body temperature drops it is easier for you to enter REM cycle sleep. REM cycle is where deep sleep and dream state sleep occur. It's super beneficial for recovery as well as enhancing mood. Just because you have a shorter duration of sleep, doesn't mean you can't achieve this deep REM state of sleep. Turn the thermostat down, grab a blanket if you need it, and get cozy!
3) Keep it dark. Darkness sends signals to the body that it's time for rest. Those clock lights, TV lights, open blinds, baby monitor screens, all need to be blacked out as best as you can. Keep it dark and tell your body it's time to rest!
And the big one...
4) Limit alcohol consumption. Yes, this one can be hard, especially if you have kids. BUT, if you know you have other external factors that are going to contribute to poor sleep, don't throw salt in the wound, find something else to enjoy OR cut down the amount of alcohol you are consuming. The Sleep Foundation did a study that showed people's who consumed 2 drinks or less had just under a 10% decrease in sleep quality. Those who had more than 2 drinks? They saw their sleep effected upwards to 40%! Imagine having two drinks at at 6pm dinner, then trying to go to sleep at 9pm when you know you're going to have a baby wake you up at least once in the middle of the night.
Yeah, good luck getting a restful night.
Again, if you know, you can plan. Just like you would plan your workouts around schedule changes, short term or long term, you can do the same with your sleep. Turn lemons in to lemonade and make the best of this sour situation.