Why do we need sleep? 

Sleep is important for numerous reasons. Adequate sleep increases our ability to: 

• Concentrate

• Memorise information

• Make decisions

• Maintain mental and physical wellbeing

Factors that impact sleep?

There are four main factors that influence sleep: our sleep drive, our biological clock, the environment and our mind, emotions and body. 

Sleep Drive

Our sleep drive, or sleep hunger, is our need for sleep. This builds up throughout the day. The longer we are awake, the greater our need for sleep. Having a greater sleep drive at bed time helps us fall asleep easily.

Biological Clock

Our biological clock, or circadian rhythm, is our body’s clock that signals when it is time to wake up and fall asleep. Having consistency in our routine supports our body to regulate hormones so we feel awake during the day time and sleepy at night.

Environments

Our internal and external environments can be conducive or disruptive for sleep.

Emotional Wellbeing

Our mind, emotions and body impact our sleep quality. An active mind that thinks about lots of things and difficult emotions such as stress, anxiety and sadness, signal our bodies to be alert and awake, making it hard to fall asleep. A quite mind and calmed emotions tells our body that it is off duty and that it is okay to relax and to sleep.

Top tips to improve sleep 

To improve our sleep, we can look at making changes to three aspects of our lives: our behaviours, our physiological arousal and our thoughts and emotions. 

Please remember, it can take a number of weeks of working on your sleep before seeing any changes. So, it is important to stick at it and not give up. 

Behaviours: What can we do differently?

Sleep drive

• Do not nap during the day. Napping during the day reduces your sleep hunger, making it difficult tofall asleep when you go to bed. Sometimes avoiding napping can be difficult! In these times, try goingfor a walk, calling a friend or having a cold shower. If you cannot avoid napping, limit the nap to 20minutes.

• Limit caffeine and other stimulants and do not consume them past midday. Coffee, black and greentea, energy drinks, chocolate and other stimulants like tobacco increase our arousal, reducing ourneed for sleep. 

• Exercise. Exercising uses more of your energy store, increasing your need for sleep. In turn, if we exercise each day we will feel more tired when it is time to go to bed and find it easier to fall asleep.

Biological clock

• Go to bed and wake up at a consistent time each day. This sets our biological clock so our body can consistently signal when it is time to sleep and time to wake. It is tempting to try and catch up on sleep by going to bed earlier or sleeping in when we don’t get a good sleep but this can upset our biological clock, leading to us being stuck in a cycle of poor sleep.

• Eat consistent and regular meals at typical times. Our metabolism plays a role in setting our body clock and the signals it sends to sleep and wake up. Try having breakfast in the morning, a mid-morning snack, lunch at midday, a mid-afternoon snack, and dinner not too late in the evening. Avoid eating a few hours before you go to bed.

• Use light to signal when it is time to sleep and wake up. Before your bedtime, steer clear from artificial light. Dim your house lights and stop electronic use. When it is time to wake up, open your curtains or turn on your light to help set your body clock to signal it is time to wake up.

• Do not exercise 3-hours before your scheduled bed time. Exercising increases our body temperature which is one of the variables that influence our biological clock. An increased body temperature signals to our body that it is not time to sleep yet and, in turn, if we exercise close to the time we plan on going to bed, we will not feel tired and find it hard to fall asleep.

Environment 

• Make sure the temperature of your bedroom is not too hot or cold. Ideally, 18C is optimal.

• Keep your bedroom a quiet place. Noise can interrupt sleep. Either reduce the noise or use white-noise or earplugs to drown out other noise.

• Keep bed a place for sleep and sex. As a university student, the bed can become a place we eat, study and relax. Keeping the bed as a place only for sleep and sex re-trains our minds to link bed with sleep, rather than boredom or frustration, and encourages our bodies to feel relaxed and ready for bed when trying to fall asleep.

• Don’t watch the clock when trying to fall asleep. This can led you to feeling more frustrated and awake. Sometimes it can be helpful to put the clock under the bed or turn it around so you’re not temped to look at it.

• Avoid alcohol four hours before bed. While alcohol helps us relax, it causes disturbed and poor quality sleep.

• Avoid drinking too much liquids in the evenings. This will prevent the need to wake up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom.

• Get out of bed and your bedroom if you cannot sleep after about 30 minutes and don’t feel tired.Continuing to try and fall asleep when not feeling tired can lead to frustration and an association developing in your mind between your bed and being awake. Instead of continuing to try and fall asleep, get out of bed, go to a different room and do something relaxing. Once you feel sleepy, go back to bed and try to fall asleep again.

Physiological arousal: How can we calm our bodies?

• Implement a bed-time routine. The 90 minutes before you go to sleep, do things that help your body wind down and know it is time to relax. This could look like having a nice warm bath, reading quietly in a space other than your bedroom.

• Practice a relaxation strategy such as deep breathing of progressive muscle relaxation. Throughout the day and particularly in stressful periods our sympathetic nervous system is turned on, telling our bodies to be alert and preparing us to respond to challenges that come our way. This can make it difficult to fall and stay asleep. Slow deep breathing and progressive muscle relaxation are two strategies that reduce our sympathetic nervous system and tell our bodies to relax and wind down.When our bodies are relaxed it is much easier to fall and stay asleep. Click the hyperlinks for an audio to guide you in slow deep breathing and progressive muscle relaxation.

Thoughts and feelings: How can we let go of difficult thoughts and calm our emotions? 

• Develop healthy thoughts about sleep. Often we have beliefs about sleep such as “I need a 8 hours of sleep to function”, “If I don’t sleep well I won’t be able to function well tomorrow” or “I should" catch up on sleep by going to bed earlier or waking later if I don’t get a good night’s rest”. Our thoughts and beliefs are not always true and, at times, get in the way of having consistent and good quality sleep. In turn, it can be helpful to put the belief on trial, look at the evidence for and against the thought and come up with an alternative, more helpful thought. For example, more helpful thoughts for the beliefs above may be “Everyone needs different amounts of sleep and this changes across days and stages of life”, “If I didn’t sleep well l will sleep better tonight if I maintain my sleep schedule” and “Maybe I won’t function at 100% capacity but I will still be able to focus and get things done”. 

• Let difficult thoughts go. Often when going to sleep we have an active mind. Our thoughts may race about completing assignments, our performance on exams and other life commitments. An active mind can interfere with our ability to fall and stay asleep. To achieve a quiet mind that supports sleep, try practicing a present moment based mindfulness meditation. For an audio that guides you in this exercise click here. Alternatively, as you lay in bed and try to fall asleep, you could try bringing your attention to your breath. Be curious. Notice the rise and fall in your chest, the feeling as air passes through your nose and down your throat to your lungs. If you notice your mind getting distracted by thoughts, that’s okay. This is completely normal. Just simply notice this and kindly re-direct your attention back to your breath.

• Postpone the worry and put some “worry time” aside early in the day to worry and problem solve. We often try and avoid and get rid of worry, not allowing ourselves to acknowledge our concerns and problem solve. These thoughts don’t just go away and often come back in times when there are less distractions such as when we are trying to fall asleep. Try to postpone the worry by putting at least two hours before bed each day, try and set aside 30 minutes to write out all your worries on a piece of paper and then brainstorm ways you can solve these worries. Decide what you can do first, focus on one small step at a time, and think about how you can achieve each step. After having your worry time, if thoughts come up when trying to fall asleep, tell yourself that you’ve written the worry down and will continue to tackle it in worry time tomorrow.

• Distract yourself from difficult thoughts. Try various distraction techniques such as counting to one-hundred or create a detailed image in your mind of your favourite place (the beach, a forest, your family home), noting what you can see, smell, hear, touch and taste.

What can I do next? 

While it takes time and the consistent use of sleep strategies to improve sleep, improving sleep can be hard. If you feel like you would like further support to improve your sleep or are experiencing ongoing sleep problems, we encourage you to: 

• Book an appointment with your general practitioner.

• Book an appointment with a clinical psychologist who can offer evidence-based therapeutic intervention for sleep.