Why Can’t I Sleep? - 6 Effective Sleep Supplements You Haven’t Tried Yet
Have you experienced a terrible sleep?
You gave the answer 99.9% of people will give.
For most, the “yes” would extend even further to agree that a string of days, weeks or even months of poor sleep is a reality. Sleep is the golden chain that links our ties health and our bodies and health together.
The truth is, sleep is a delicate beast. So many factors can effect our ability to shut the eyes and drift off without disturbance for the entirety of the night. We need sleep to survive.
The reason for this necessity is interestingly largely unknown but there are experts in the field that have dedicated their lives to exploring the nuances of sleep. We have compiled a 5 natural sleep habits and 5 epic sleep supplements that you probably haven’t tried yet.
We know one things for sure, sleep is inevitable when you combine a couple of these supplements & habits to create the ultimate sleep combo routine that works for you!
Why Sleep Is A Pillar Of Recovery
Being one of the 4 pillars of recovery that we love to harp on about, we have done our own research into sleep and go deep into it in our own personal experimentation. The thing is, we understand it is easier said than done to get the recommended 8 hour minimum, which seems like a pipe dream for most of us.
What we aim for in improving sleep is both ‘quality’ and ‘quantity’. Of course we would all prefer to avoid having to supplement or use devices to be able to get a proper nights rest. There are plenty of tips for an effective approach to doing so as we’ve mentioned in previous blog posts and we will briefly touch on some habitual approaches before we move on to effective sleep supplements that work.
Natural Sleep Tips
#1 Our master clock, or circadian rhythm is the physiological response that determines our sleep-wake schedule. In order to have the best habits to encourage the most effective master clock, we need to feed it regularity. The regularity in sticking to the same bed time and the same waking time, will really set the precedent for when we are telling our body clock that it is time to go to sleep.
#2 Temperature. Brain and body also need to drop their core temperature to initiate sleep and stay asleep by about 1 degree celsius. Current recommendation is to maintain a room temperature of about 18 degrees celsius. This sounds cold, but it an essential part of establishing the right conditions for triggering sleep. The Chilipad range is the best way to attack this area and we have touched on it in more depth in another post
Natural ways to improve sleep
#3 Make it dark. This may be a suck-eggs tip, but true darkness is another significant factor in establishing the best conditions for sleep. The fact that we are an ever increasingly digital society glued to our screens, particularly in the evenings when we should be winding down and preparing for rest, means that we are constantly drowning the eyes with sleep destroying blue light.
Same goes for general light pollution in the bedroom in terms of street lighting, a lack of pure darkness does not allow the best chance to being to produce hormones like melatonin which are an essential hormone to trigger sleep. So switch of the phone, roll down the block out blinds and slide on the eye mask.
#4 Bed association. Another rule of thumb is surprisingly to get out of bed and walk around to break the association of wakefulness. The idea is to break the wakefulness, move around a little and break away from the wakefulness trigger.
The idea from there is to only return to bed once you feel some sort of sleepiness, giving the brain the chance to associate the bed with sleepiness.
#5 Stay away from caffeine and alcohol in the afternoon and evening. Alcohol and caffeine block REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep, an extremely important phase of sleep associated with dreaming. Enough said. More on that research presented in this article.
6 Best Sleep Supplements You Haven’t Tried Yet
At RG we are all about setting a wind down routine. The perception that sleep is a light-switch and we should be able to jump into bed and turn the light off, drifting away shortly after is a far cry from reality.
We’ve tested out more sleep supplements than most insomniacs.
In fact, we have a list of 6 natural sleep supplements that even insomniacs would approve of and we don’t think you would have tried them yet.
Access premium doctor medical services while discovering the 6 best sleep supplements you haven't tried yet. Our experts ensure comprehensive healthcare and guide you towards better sleep with effective supplements tailored to your needs.
The star of the sleep show - The Reishi mushroom has been used for many millennia in Asian cultures, it is regarded as a symbol of health, longevity, success and divine power and it is commonly referred to as “The mushroom of immortality”. Drop a few squirts to sleep superchill a tea or even straight into a glass of water.
This good gear is a powder that can be spooned into any pre-bedtime drink, tea or just warm water. It is made of a unique combination of adaptogenic herbs including Ashwaganda, Schisandra and Chamomile Extract which specifically affect sleep to help you zen out and crash out.
We understand that alot of people searching sleep supplementation recognise the need to avoiding over supplementing or over using Melatonin, which we prefer to limit to only using when we are looking to recover from a change in time zone or feeling jetlag and need to reset our sleep patterns to a different time zone. This mixture has no Melatonin and just pure sleepiness instead using Ceramides, CoQ10, Ferulic Acid and Valerian Root.
Sleep easy with a quality sleep supplement that you know also looks out for planet earth and its precious animals. Future Kind Vegan sleep has been awarded the Sleep Foundations Top Pick for Best Natural Melatonin Supplement. We think that speaks volume with the amount of sleep supps on the market! Includes Lemon Balm, Camomile and Melatonin also eco-friendly with a carbon offset.
This one is one of our personal favourites and widely used brand in our recovery supplementation. Bulletproof Zen Mode elevates you to a new level of calm and is a proprietary formula of clinically studied adaptogenic herbs and neuro-nutrients including L-Theanine, 5HTP and GABA.
Now Foods are a quality, low cost supplement brand that we regularly use when we have been going a bit too hard on the spending but still need to supplement. Costs approximately $25AUD for 90 capsules which is just about the best value for a Melatonin, 5-htp and L-theanine combo that can send to the sheep counting station with ease…90 times over.