How many hours of sleep you need and how to increase the quality of your sleep

This week I've seen a few discussions online about how many hours of sleep people get.

Some say they need 9-10 hours and others were only sleeping 4-5 (which is definitely not healthy!).

There is a lot of confusing advice online and it might make you more worried about your sleep than it should.

When we think about optimal sleep, we often default to 8 hours.

Somehow 8 hours of sleep has become the ultimate goal, like hitting 10k steps a day.

We start obsessing about it and if we get less than 8 hours, we think our day is ruined and we will try everything to optimize for this arbitrary number.

But there is more to the story.

If we look at the scientific evidence out there, we know that most adults should aim for 7-9 hours of sleep every night.

But there are many variables and it is just that: general recommendation.

Just like we should eat a certain number of fruit and vegetables or we should get a certain amount of exercise per week.

To figure out how much sleep YOU need, you need to understand your body and your individual needs.

Many people claim that they can cope "just fine" with 5 or 6 hours because they have been doing it for so long and they have convinced themselves their body can function at an appropritate level.

But studies have shown that those people are lying to themselves.

They are so used to being sleep deprived that they don't see the impact on their body and mind.

In fact, when they are given the opportunity to sleep longer, they often realize how much more productive and alert they suddenly are and what they have been missing out on.

So if you sleep less than 7 hours a night regularly, I would certainly recommend increasing the amount of sleep you get and adjusting your sleep schedule.

But even if you get the "optimal" amount of hours every night, you might still not feel rested and wonder what's wrong. You might feel like no matter how much you sleep, you always feel tired.

Sleep length is just one side of the coin. You should aim for 7-9 hours of QUALITY sleep.

So what is sleep quality?

It's the combination of a few variables:

How much light sleep you get
How much deep sleep you get
How much REM sleep you get
How much sleep you get overall
How disrupted your sleep is

Sleep is broken down into different stages and you cycle through these stages multiple times during the night.

Both deep sleep and REM sleep are critical and you need both to function.

Your body is usually very good at figuring out how much of each stage you need any given night to recharge and feel rested the following day.

For example, if you had a physically tasking day, you will need more deep sleep to recover. If you are working on a creative problem you might get more REM sleep to help you solve the problem faster.

But there are many things that can influence this process and can affect the quality of each sleep stage so let's break them down:

Alcohol: Drinking alcohol before bed will suppress REM sleep and also causes a lot of "mini awakenings" throughout the night. Some people think having a drink before helps them fall asleep and while that might be true, their overall sleep quality is reduced significantly.

Caffeine: I love coffee so I'm not going to tell you to stop having caffeine but we know that it stays in our system for many hours and suppresses deep and REM sleep. Try and stop drinking coffee about 8-10 hours before you go to bed.

Exercise: How much and when you exercise can have both a postitive and negative impact on your sleep. Working out will help you increase deep sleep but your cutoff for any rigrous exercise should be 2-3 hours before bed.

Breathing: This is an area often underestimated but how you breathe at night makes a big difference to your sleep.

If you tend to breathe through your mouth a lot, you can try using a mouth tape for sleep to encourage nose breathing but be careful because if you snore a lot or struggle to breathe through your nose in general as there is a chance that you might make it worse.

You should refer to a medical professional and check if you could have obstructive sleep apnea or other breathing issues.

There are also many exercises you can try to improve your breathing which

will have a positive impact on your sleep and wellbeing in general.

Try box breathing, 4-7-8 breathing or yogic breathing and see what works best for you.

Temperature: In order to sleep, our core body temperature needs to drop. This happens naturally but to encourage this process, your bedroom should be between 60°F and 68°F (15.5°C and 20°C). You can also take a hot shower or bath around 30mins before bedtime as this will draw the heat out of your core and accelerate this process.

Exposure to light: Our eyes are very sensitive to light and our ability to sleep is driven by our circadian rhythm (see my post on this topic here).

Make sure to get plenty of sunlight exposure during the morning and at midday and reduce lights in the evening.

Make sure your bedroom is completely dark (even the light from your alarm clock can affect you!) Use blackout curtains or a sleep mask if necessary.

Noise: We all know that noisy environments are not ideal so make sure to block out any noise that might affect your sleep.

Sometimes, this can be tricky if you have small children or live near a noisy street but you can get white noise machines or headphones designed to fit your ears.

Stress and mental health: No one can avoid stress in their lives and stress is not always negative. The right type of stress can help us be more productive and achieve our goals.

But when we go to sleep, we need to reduce stress to an absolute minimum level and calm our nervous system down.

This can be done by introducing mindfulness into your routine for example journalling before bed and "brain dumping" your worries or listening to a guided meditation. You can also use the breathing exercises mentioned above to reduce stress and anxiety levels to help you achieve more quality sleep.

Remember, sleeping longer doesn't always mean better.

Yes, we should aim for 7-9 hours most nights. But we all have different needs and they can also vary night by night.

What's more important is the QUALITY of your sleep!

6 hours of uninterrupted quality sleep is much better than spending 10 hours in bed, taking an hour or more to fall asleep, waking up several times and snoozing your alarm 5 times before getting up.

So make sure you look at all the variables of quality sleep and go to bed when you are actually ready and sleepy rather than forcing an early bedtime.

Let me know in the comments how you're planning to increase the quality of your sleep this week!

If you have any questions or want more personalized advice, schedule a free consultation with me.

See you next week.

Until then, sleep well! 🛌😴🌟

Anne - The Sleep Nerd