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Hello everybody and welcome back to the psychology of your 20s.
The podcast where we talk through some of the big life changes and transitions of our
20s and what they mean for our psychology.
Hello everybody, welcome back to the show.
Welcome back to the podcast my lovely listeners, you an old wherever you are in the world.
It is so great to have you here back for another episode.
I hope you've been well.
I hope you've been treating yourself nicely, pursuing something positive and exciting
in your life.
I've been chugging along.
I'm in the planning stages for some pretty fun projects coming out soon that I'm super
excited to show you all.
I feel like some of you have already figured it out but a little spoiler if you're a big
journal or a note taker.
I feel like you'll be pretty pumped for what's coming which I realize is actually literally
a dead giveaway.
Dead giveaway but you know what I can't keep a secret so there you go.
There's so much in the works at the moment and just taking a little moment to say I'm
so grateful for all the support you guys have shown me recently.
In every capacity the show is you know reaching so many new people.
There are so many exciting projects in the works that wouldn't be possible without such
amazing loyal listeners.
So starting with a quick shout out to you guys who make this possible but let's get into
what we're actually talking about today.
Okay so we're doing a pretty science heavy episode.
One I am fascinated by.
One I have wanted to do for ages and today we're finally getting around to an old fashion
deep dive, a big deep dive into sleep.
How often do we really think about sleep to be honest other than that it's this like
eight hour, seven hour black hole in our days that we know we need that we never feel
like we have enough of unless you're one of those insane people who can sleep for five
hours.
We are told that we should take magnesium if we want to sleep well that we should have
a silk eye mask and nighttime routine that melatonin is the key to rest that we need
to listen to the people who say to wake up at 5 a.m.
Don't use our phones before bed lucid dream you know the world has a lot to say about
sleep because it is really how we spend a third of our lives and it has become a huge
wellness topic for sure but how much do we actually know you and I the average person
how much trivia would we have in our back pockets to do with sleep for something so vital
and genuinely life giving we're going to talk about that in a second sleep is seen as
rather boring you know that's the whole cliche to be like a snooze to be a bore to be
like falling asleep at your desk at work you know I think that sleep I don't have to say
it gets a bad reputation but I don't think we think about it enough.
Why do we really care about the moments we're unconscious that's the biggest reasons you
know nothing's really happening in those hours we literally can't remember anything other
than our dreams sometimes not even those so it seems rather insignificant obviously I
don't believe that at all I think that sleep is so misunderstood and really it is the
key to unlocking a lot about our life about the fatigue that we experience the motivational
deficits we see in other areas of our lives it's even linked to being a more kind person
a less irritable person and a myriad of health outcomes you may not even notice that you
are functioning at less than a hundred percent as a direct result of poor sleep especially
in our twenties when there is this whole culture or I would say expectation around sacrificing
sleep and either overworking pushing ourselves to burnout or trying to keep up with a big
social schedule or social expectations trying to do all the fun things that can't fit into
our daytime hours and pushing off sleep hitting snooze as many times as possible I'm not
going to come out and say that that is a bad thing to do that you need to get your eight
hours otherwise your world is going to fall apart more so just I want to explore how
we can maximize good rest the hidden world to do with sleep is so fascinating so we're
going to talk about why we need sleep what happens in your brain as you fall asleep the
myth of the Russian sleep experiment I've wanted to talk about this for ages and then
some more kind of nuanced topics sleep as a form of self sabotage the concept of sleep
debt and sleep hygiene so much to be said about this topic I think without further ado let's
get into it okay first off let's cover our basics what actually happens in our brains
and in our bodies when we fall asleep I think we all hear about hitting our REM cycle that's
been everywhere recently and that's only one part of it actually when we fall asleep
when we are actively asleep we can divide this state of mind into four stages three of
those stages count as non rapid eye movement sleep or stages and our ME for short and then
we have REM sleep which stands for rapid eye movement sleep I don't think a lot of us
know that that's what REM actually stands for and it is as it describes during this stage
of sleep our brain activity our breathing our heart rate our blood pressure almost match what
they would look like when we were awake but we're not and they all increase we become almost
temporary temporarily paralyzed unable to move our arms all legs it is not the most
restful kind of sleep which is another big myth and it usually occurs about 90 minutes
after you fall asleep so it's almost at the end of a sleep cycle so a sleep cycle is where
you go from being awake through all the non rapid eye movement stages of sleep and then you end
up in REM sleep and that's where we often get the most intense dreams because we have the most
brain activity going on and it's during that stage that a lot of scientists and researchers believe
that we process our emotions we form memories if you want to learn about why it is that we
dream in particular especially in REM sleep we actually have a whole episode on that called
the psychology of dreams it's one of my favorite episodes ever but most people assume that dreams
are a productive memory formation and processing all of the thoughts feelings experiences
flashbacks that we haven't worked through during the day we still aren't completely sure why some
people have more vivid or memorable dreams than others because it's so hard to measure something
that we can't always remember but some factors include having a greater imagination also medications
sleep disruptions like if you are working up during REM sleep you'll probably have a greater
recall of your dreams and then things like stress and trauma even grief make us very vivid
dreamers we have a lot going on emotionally and mentally during our waking hours within our lives
and we can't or we don't always have the brain space to deal with that to find a place for those
memories and those experiences in our brain so it's when we are asleep that our mind kind of gets
to work filtering through all of that and voila that is why we dream okay so we're kind of starting
back to front here because REM sleep as I said is actually the last stage of sleep and it occurs
after we pass through what we now know as N-R-M-E sleep so we have three stages we have N1 sleep this
is the transition between wakefulness and sleeping it's characterized by slowed eye movements
reduced muscle activity or heart rate is dropping then we get to end to sleep there's a further
decline in brain activity temperature heart rate all the things that indicate wakefulness and then
we have N3 sleep so this is also known as deep sleep and this is where our body really undergoes
a lot of the restorative processes for fixing up everything that's happened within our mind
and our bodies during the day so then three sleep the one we just spoke about that is deep sleep
as we fall asleep our brain actually remains quite active even in that final stage processing
information consolidating memories keeping us breathing areas like our migdala and our hippocampus
they show the most amount of activity and they are the parts of our brain that help in the creation
and storage of episodic memories but they also tend to help with core functions like ensuring we
are still alive even though we are unconscious so let's talk about why we need sleep wouldn't it be
great if we could be operating at all hours of the day imagine how productive we would be how much
more of the world could be explored how many more stories we would have to tell it is a nice
fantasy but it is also not how the human body works because our body and our mind need a break
there is not an endless energy reserve that we can infinitely pull from sleep as a biological
necessity is still kind of a mystery and for something that every single creature does it's
interesting because we don't really have a consensus as to why we need it there are a few theories
floating around let's talk about them the first one is the energy conservation theory so this
theory suggests that the main purpose of a good night's sleep is to reduce our energy use
during the times of the day the nighttime when it would have been inconvenient and less efficient
to hunt for food we need to shut down at some point in the day to save energy for when we are awake
and because our brain is the biggest use of energy in our body turning it off for a set period of
the day saves us a lot of calories it doesn't mean that sleeping less burns more calories in fact
you're more likely to hold on to calories if you are not sleeping enough because essentially what
happens is your metabolism slows down and says hey wait we're used to having this like whole shut
down period where the brain is doing nothing and we can just kind of do our thing now the brain
is staying awake it's using so much more energy let's slow down how we use calories how we use
fat how we use glucose whatever energy store it's pulling from because we're going to need more
of that because the brain doesn't want to go anywhere the brain doesn't want to shut off so that's
the energy restoration theory basically we conserve energy by not using our brain or hours of the day
the other theory is cellular restoration theory which is the one I believe most in I would say
although I'm sure it's a combination the cellular restoration theory says that our body needs sleep
in order to repair and regrow cells throughout the body that have been exhausted or stretched during
the day it kind of also relates to brain plasticity as well and there's a theory around that brain
plasticity theory which says that sleep occurs primarily for our brains to reorganize our neurons
and our nerve cells when you sleep your brain's waste clearance system is high you know is well
it work there clearing out waste from the central nervous system and making sure that everything is
like almost doing like a deep clean like doing like a refresh before we wake up for the next day
it's getting rid of all of the exo excess glucose cortisol neurotransmitters that haven't been
reabsorbed which build up throughout the day so we can wake up with a clean slate and do it all
over again so research suggests that sleep contributes to memory function as well by converting
short term memories into long term memories now this is a process that we call memory consolidation
it's not just about making new memories but also clearing out a racing unneeded information
that might otherwise take up space in our minds so the saying in the feeling is is that almost all
of our memories are consolidated during sleep I remember being in high school and people saying
that if you read your notes right before bed you would remember them better in the morning
and this kind of like myth is based off of this theory that sleep is where we form long term memories
so if information is processed closer to when we fall asleep they'll be processed better
not exactly correct but really nice try it's more so that our brain receives a whole lot of
information throughout the day more than it can process because whilst we are awake we're also
actively filtering through stimuli in our environment trying to problem solve so we use sleep as a
basically you know as a way to say okay enough let's shut down we need some time we need some
quiet time to do our memory admin it's why our memory seems to decline or become a lot
more difficult why we become more forgetful if you haven't been sleeping particularly well
without sleep our brain health declines significantly as does our cognitive and mental and even
social functioning during the day sleep also helps us with emotional regulation I think we all
know that if you've ever had a really terrible night sleep and like snapped at somebody
this explains it it's the same reason why they tell you to sleep on something if you're angry
if you're angry at a partner at a friend at a coworker whatever it may be the less sleep you get
the harder it is to control your emotional state and the more irritable you'll become the more likely
you're going to say things that you don't mean so let's actually dive into this further what is
going to happen to you and I if we don't get enough sleep well a whole range of things most
importantly what's going to happen is we're going to find ourselves in sleep debt sleep debt is when
you sleep fewer hours than your body needs it's basically it it's like you overdraw your bank
account you're overdrawing the amount of rest that your body needs to function sleep debt is
cumulative meaning that if you regularly get less sleep than you should you're going to have more
sleep debt here is the scary thing so there's an article written by Harvard Health about a recent
paper that was published in the current biology journal and it said that we actually can't recover
that debt we cannot make up our sleep debt for you know over a weekend or by sleeping in because
what we have done is disturbed our bodies rhythm and given it less than it required and it's not very
forgiving or understanding of that that's especially hard for people who may suffer from things
like insomnia right they're constantly in sleep debt insomnia is this type of sleep disorder
where it's really difficult for people to fall asleep or stay asleep and obviously it makes
sense that people who are experiencing this not only are they super frustrated because it is a vital
human biological bodily need to rest but it means that they are increasing their emotional sensitivity
they're more likely to experience poorer concentration irritability it can even increase our
risk factor of things like chronic diseases like diabetes like hypertension like heart disease
I want to go back there and just correct myself it's not that they're choosing this right it's not
that they are deliberately increasing their susceptibility it's just that a failure to sleep has a lot of
secondary consequences it even contributes to hallucinations or an increase in what we call
micro sleeps so if you've seen any road safety billboards recently i think you'll be familiar with
this idea whereby our brain can flip very rapidly between being asleep and being awake in a matter of
seconds that lapse can kind of be life or death our body will start to shut down when we don't sleep
and it will force us into a place of unconsciousness because it desperately needs time to build back
up those energy stores to restore cells and neural connections and to just be a functioning
organism so this kind of brings me to the infamous Russian sleep experiment now this sleep
experiment is very famous very well known I think but it's also probably not true it probably
didn't happen very sorry to burst the bubble of my fellow dark history lovers but despite that
I do love talking about this urban myth because whoever came up with it got some things very
right about sleep so if you don't know the story the story goes that Soviet eroscientists created
this stimulant which they believed would enable soldiers to not require sleep for up to 30 days
a month let's just pause that's who thinks that that is possible that's ridiculous
but as the urban myth goes they tried to test this new gas on five political prisoners that they had
and they promised that these prisoners would go free if they survived they locked these five men
in a little chamber and they started pumping in this stimulant in gas form within a few days the
men were exhibiting the kind of paranoia and psychosis that is very typical of sleep deprivation
but as time went on they began to act even more strangely and once the scientist went in they found
that a couple of them had died and the remaining of them exhibited very violent behavior had these
strange energy bursts hallucinations and then as soon as they did full asleep they died
let's just be clear this did not actually happen because it would be physically impossible to stay
awake for more than 10 days actually the world record or how long someone has stayed awake it was
back in the 60s it was set by this man named Randy Gardner and I think he only lasted like I think
it was 600 hours I don't know I think it was like yeah maybe I don't know how many days it was
I let me I'll put it in the notes because I think it was around 600 hours I think it was like 14
days hi this is future Gemma coming back to say it was actually 264 hours let's continue but
whilst he was doing that he experienced some insane behavior and cognitive changes now I will say
he was being like heavily supervised by doctors and scientists from Stanford University but as time
went on they started asking him to do these small cognitive tests and each day they they would
ask him to do the same one so one of these tests was to start at 100 and subtract seven until he got
to zero the first few days he could do it he started to slow down by the last day he couldn't make
it past 65 before he stopped and when they asked him they were like hey why did you stop counting he
was like what are you asking me what are you telling me I don't even know what I meant to be doing
right now he also forgot his name he forgot his age even forgot his race Randy was Caucasian by
the end of this period he was claiming that he was African American and he truly believed it all
of this sounds like insane but it did happen and it's really scary to me to think about how much we
can mentally decline because of sleep deprivation for me I don't think I can last more than two days
good job Randy however many days he did it was definitely more than me when I flew to New York
last year I'm so bad at sleeping on plane so I was awake for over 24 hours I couldn't my eyes couldn't
focus I got like a terrible blood nose the first I've ever had in my life I was so irritable I couldn't
make sense of my surroundings I was like didn't know what I needed to do eventually I fell asleep
on this couch that I found in a shopping center before I could check into my hotel so I think
that that really highlights the dangers here right you know and a couple of days where we get six
seven hours it's not going to kill you you will be in sleep debt but when we consistently pursue
sleep deprivation we are going to see very real physical emotional cognitive and mental consequences
so that's one side of an extreme spectrum ultimate sleep deprivation from our friend Randy and
our Russian friends maybe maybe not but we can also over sleep which has its own set of health
risks there is a nice sweet spot for how much sleep we should be getting and act anything sleep
can be used as a form of not self-harm but self-sabotage so I want to talk about that after this
break as well as kind of getting into the interactions between sleep and mental health we'll be back
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living yours let's get into it. Oh our 20s the drunk dialing the forgetting to wash our face at
night and yes neglecting our teeth don't do that last one you only get one set of teeth so you
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or mouthwash visit pronamel.com today. The interactions between sleep and mental health are
A endless and B very well documented they are also multi directional meaning that sleep impacts
our mental well being and our mental well being impacts our sleep sleep plays a crucial role
in maintaining mental health it's not to say that it is a cure more so that just the quality
and duration of sleep directly impacts our emotional regulation as we've spoken about
our cognitive functions and our ability to filter through our thoughts so research indicates
that consistent insufficient or poor quality sleep can actually contribute to more intense
mental health symptoms this is particularly when it comes to things like depression anxiety
bipolar disorder these kinds of conditions seem to really suffer when we have
less mental energy I would say or less restorative time to allow us to function at our best and to
manage the ways that our emotions are more complex because of these conditions additionally it's
interesting because if you do have one of those mental health conditions you're also more likely
to experience disruptions in sleep patterns so you're kind of locked into this like terrible cycle
insomnia was something we spoke about before and insomnia can be a symptom of anxiety even
depression over sleeping can be a sign of the extreme fatigue that we also see with depressive
episodes or symptoms we can also use sleep as a form of self sabotage so self sabotage refers
to an intentional action that kind of undermines our ability to accomplish our goals now these are
goals that we want to accomplish there is just some part of us that maybe doesn't think that we're
worthy then maybe a scared of what would happen if we did that maybe is procrastinating or getting
weighed down by insecurity perfectionism self-doubt when we decide to sleep in stay in bed you know
indulge in a dysregulated sleeping habits and sleeping pattern this might indicate that there are
other areas of our life that we are dissatisfied with and so sleep becomes a way of
allowing us to switch off and allowing us to almost get in our own way in a sense so basically
what I'm trying to say is sleep is a way for us to feel like we're doing something productive
right we feel like we're resting our body sometimes we really do need that if we're burnt out right
and we have been chasing a goal for a long time but on an un knew the other end of the spectrum it
can also be this way of self sabotaging of being almost self-destructive so if you want a good
but non-scientific book about this there is one that went particularly viral on TikTok recently
and it was called my year of rest and relaxation I read this quite recently it basically tells the
story of this woman I would say she is a very unlikeable as protagonist but she believes that if
she sleeps for a whole year she'll somehow fix everything in her life but she also believes
that she'll be able to ignore her problems this book is great and it's not obviously about sleep
it's about the things that happen in the moments that she is awake that contribute to her wanting to
rest but I think that things are a lot easier when we are unconscious right no wonder we use
sleep as a form of avoidance from the problems that we face when we're awake there is another
concept I want to talk about here called Revenge Bedtime Procrastination this is a Chinese concept whereby
when we don't have much control over our daytime life we refuse to prioritize sleep in order to
regain some sense of freedom during those late night hours so this is actually quite common amongst
high schoolers for example who have to go to school for a set period of every day but also people
in their 20s and their 30s who are working really long exhausting corporate jobs service jobs
sacrificing their personal lives for their careers and for a service to others and they kind of
quote unquote get back at the system in the evenings to steal some of that personal time
now this idea of procrastination makes it sounds like we are doing things we have perhaps put off
and doing them when we should be sleeping not always this not always the case sometimes we are
just doing things simply for our pleasure and we feel like we need to do them right like rearranging
your bookshelf at like 3am online shopping cleaning out all your bathroom cabinets spontaneously
doing like an extravagant makeup look before you fall asleep all of this is taking from our sleep
but it's depositing time back in our leisure bank which we may be you know gravely missing because
of how much our waking hours are taken up by work or other responsibilities it's interesting because
this is being reported more and more especially as studies are showing that around 60% of us are
getting less than the recommended 7 to 8 hours we're averaging about 6 hours at the moment
averaging means that there are a lot of us who are getting less than that and the biggest contributors
to this lack of sleep that we are enduring as a society are stress busy work schedules and school
schedules people are spending more time at work more time studying more time working than ever before
then also things like pollution noise pollution sleeping environment and responsibilities that just
come with life you know our lives are increasingly busy and we are overstretched we need to juggle
work life friends relationships family fitness wellbeing eating three meals a day keeping our
houses clean just keeping up with our own needs and I think in a world that is steering more
towards the glorification of hustle culture sleep is seen as a luxury even sometimes as a point
of laziness this whole narrative that to rest is to not be self-disciplined to not be committed to
your job or to school or to your life I think it admits a huge part of the narrative which is that
sleep gives life and rest is truly truly important for us to restore connections restore our energy
levels restore ourselves and actually function optimally so that brings me to this concept of sleep
hygiene and how we can get more from our sleep how we can avoid those nights when you desperately
want some shut-eye like you crave it and you just won't stop tossing and turning our quality of
sleep does have a lot to do with our choices and behaviors from consuming caffeine to close to our
bedtime even exercising in the evenings or breaching a point of exhaustion that is so extreme
that our body actually starts to go in the opposite direction it starts to pump us with adrenaline
and cortisol to keep us awake so that when it's time to sleep we actually like physically can't
but the biggest devil of all of them in the discussion at the moment is our phones and using our
phones before bed our phones social media websites whatever you are on literally floods our brains
with information and bright lights sounds activity and of course as a resulted floods our brains with
neurotransmitters which keep our mind active when we want them to be winding down the reason this
happens is because screens emit blue light which can interfere with our body's natural production
and release of melatonin melatonin of course is the hormone responsible for regulating our sleep
wake cycle blue light is particularly bad in this situation because it tricks our brain into thinking
that it's still daytime so we should be awake we should be alert we should be ready to go
exposure to screens before bed suppresses the release of melatonin so it makes it more difficult
to fall asleep but then it bumps off our sleep wake cycle so we wake up wake up later as well
so this really disrupts our bodies circadian rhythm it leads to sleep disturbances it leads to
revenge sleep sleep debt and it just impacts our overall ability to sustainably function in our
lives in our relationships in every facet of what we do so if you want better sleep your first
step is to create a screen free bedroom or space for yourself so according to the sleep health
foundation it's really important to actually train your brain to link your bed with sleep and sleep
only so if possible you want to avoid bringing anything into your bedroom that makes you feel like
you are not resting so that doesn't mean that you can't like be on your phone or your laptop in
your room you know I know a lot of us live in sharehouses or live with our parents we don't necessarily
want to be doing everything that we do on our laptops now phones and our iPads like in the living
room or in the dining room but try and keep it out of your bed that is the space you want to
associate with rest not with alertness so I started doing this recently oh my goodness it's like
lights out for me as soon as I'm in my bed because that is the space now that I only use for one
activity and that association means I'm better able to just switch off my brain
is cured to knowing that this is the time to sleep if you feel like you hate going from like being
immediately on in your life to like immediately often having to go into bed turn the lights off
and just lie there and pretend to be asleep before you actually fall asleep you can present yourself
with alternatives I think reading before bed is amazing obviously but also sleep podcasts are a great
help there is one show that does this so well called okay it's called quite bedtime stories
and meditations and they have this episode called King Kajata I don't know when I found this show
but or I found this episode this episode is amazing but it honestly loves me into such like peaceful
rest I'm gonna be honest I've never made it past like the first 10 minutes and it's a really
great thing to add to your retain when you aren't someone who can immediately relax as soon as
your head hits the pillow so let's talk about some other tips firstly I love this one create an
environment you actually want to be in one that is cool one that is dark one that is quiet one
that is comfortable I will never understand people who can sleep in like a boiling hot room you
know I needed to be like 15 degrees Celsius in order for it to fall asleep I like to have one
too many blankets I like to cook through myself into like a little burrito it also really makes
the difference to like get nice bed sheets because you want your brain to be like this is a
comforting cozy peaceful space I enjoy being here you know you're stained white bed sheets from
your first year of uni which are like weirdly itchy they might be the economic choice but I don't
think they're conducive to restfulness this is such like an adult thing to say but honestly I
think I turned 24 and I immediately had like a sheet preference and a mattress preference and now
if I'm on a firm mattress it's not happening you know I get it it's really giving princess in the
pay but honestly sleep is an investment and as is your mattress your memory for and pillow your
cotton sheets my mom always said like sleep is not about being cheap and I didn't really understand
that when I was younger and broke but now I do and it doesn't mean that you need to spend like
an insane amount of money that is out of your budget you can get second hand really good mattresses
you can find really good sheets that are on sale I just think it's an important thing you'll have
it for a long time and it will contribute to you just feeling more alive and your waking life
so also try and be consistent with your sleep schedule I know this is really hard especially
in our 20s but at least doing it during the week is important your body circadian rhythm functions
they're set on a loop and typically they align with sunrise and sunset or when you tell your
body to switch off and then seven eight hours after that point being consistent with when you
fall asleep during the week even on weekends if you can helps kind of train your brain into being
like all right this is the time when we switch off same time every day no surprises it's really
very valuable there was a study published in the national library of medicine from 2009 it highlights
that irregular sleep patterns can alter our levels of melatonin it can alter the signals that
are telling our brain to sleep and what that will mean is that no matter how hard you try
you're not going to get to sleep unless your melatonin has been released and is present
in your body because you can't physically shut down you can take a supplement but you can
also produce it naturally so I think it may just be the case that your melatonin release is being
delayed by poor sleep habits and routine and you can get back onto a normal sleep routine by
remaining consistent so even if you get to bed by nine and nine so early maybe it's not for some
of you let's say ten put it in even ten you're in bed by ten but you find yourself like tossing
and turning till 12 good stay in bed don't go on your phone sooner or later your body is going to
get trained to be like no this is our bedtime now this is when we're hitting the hay on that note
try and expose yourself to sunlight all the outdoors immediately after waking normally within the
first hour because again this is going to help your body clock switch off production of melatonin
and reset you to a regular pattern you know humans are meant to be outdoor creatures not indoor
creatures we used to live our lives and our waking hours by the sun until Thomas Edison invented
the live hope not just kidding like in all seriousness I think the best way to do anything for your
health is to do it the way that has been done for generations and generations meaning that the
best way to get quality sleep is to align your body to how evolutionarily and biologically you were
kind of evolving and developed to seek rest I think it comes a lot easier when we do that
another tip exercise more but try not to do anything intense before bed I think it's a double
edge sword exercise obviously increases exhaustion but it also you know means that our bodies kind
of are flooded with a lot of activity a lot of adrenaline or a penneffron a lot of dopamine
that can keep us awake for longer now there has been studies into this and there was one by Harvard
health published a few years back and your average evening workout is not going to hurt you too much
but if you're doing a full on heavy cardio hit workout burning hundreds thousands of calories an hour
like 30 minutes before bed coming home sharing and expecting yourself to fall asleep I don't think
that you're going to get to that level of deep sleep that we need for restoration any quicker
so it's important to make exercise a component to you know actually use the energy stores that
your body wants you to use throughout the day but try not to do it too close to when you really
want to like be asleep be dreaming be counting sheep final tip try and avoid alcohol I know that
alcohol helps us fall asleep quicker so if you are someone who is dealing with insomnia there
is a huge urge just like have a night cap but alcohol is an inhibitor or a downer that's what
causes us to feel sleepy because it increases GABA which slows down the specific signals in our
central nervous system but as the alcohol is metabolized and processed it causes an additional
spike in glutamate now glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter so your brain is basically switching
back on as the alcohol wears off at like three four a.m. in the morning this may be why you might
notice like after a heavy night of drinking all you want to do is have a sleep in and you're waking
up at seven a.m. kind of cursing the sun can't get back asleep it's because your brain is trying
to level out the GABA that it received from processing and metabolizing alcohol by spiking the
glutamate to get that balance back to kind of a nice homeo point of aim for homeostasis a point
of normalcy alcohol caffeine nicotine those are our big sleep no no's I also just want to say
don't get too caught up in worrying about when you're full of sleep just stay kind of focused
on being present in your body and relaxing I know it can be stressful and yes I've spoken a lot
about the harms of not getting a good night's sleep don't let that become an anxiety for you don't
let that become a point of fixation your body will do what it needs to do naturally unless you do
have a sleep disorder so if you are consistently experiencing terrible sleep you're waking up in
the middle of the night that is your opportunity to go and say a doctor but eventually you will
fall asleep eventually your eyes will close eventually your brain will shut down we spoke about
those experiments before right our bodies cannot stay alert and functioning it all hours of the day
so it's going to do what it needs to do biologically and evolutionarily and just like forward survival
and it will make you fall asleep there's no need to stress there's no need to stress you're going
to be okay this you cannot stay awake forever I promise I really hope that you enjoyed this
episode it's a bit different definitely it was science heavy but we've never spoken about it before
so I thought it deserved a spot on the podcast feed if you want to come back and listen if you
want to check out our episode on dreams it's literally the psychology of dreams by the psychology of
your 20s it's a great companion episode to this one again one of my favorite episodes that we've
ever done make sure that you share this with someone who you think might need it we all have that
friend who's up to 3 a.m. and then is up again at 7 a.m. don't shame them but maybe give them a
little nudge in the sleepingness direction if you want to see more behind the scenes you want to
follow along with the podcast follow along with me you can follow us at that psychology podcast
you can also send episode suggestions over there we read every single one even if we can't get
back to you and we definitely take on board your suggestions I love seeing our community grow
over there so get in touch say hi we would love to say you make sure you're following along on
Spotify or AppleCovcast or whatever you are listening right now and give us a five star review
if you're feeling it if you're feeling especially generous all right we're gonna head off but
until next time sleep tight and be kind and gentle with yourselves
oh our 20s the drunk dialing the forgetting to wash our face at night and yes neglecting our teeth
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