All right, welcome back team to the Building Lifelong Athletes podcast. Thanks so much for stopping by. I really appreciate it. If you haven't a chance to meet yet, my name Jordan Renke, and I'm a dual board certified physician in family and sports medicine. And the goal of this podcast is to keep you active and healthy for life. Through actual evidence informed education. So today we're talking about a kind of a big overview on one of the biggest rocks of health, which is our sleep. We're going to treat it kind of like a skill that can be trained because it can be. And we're going to kind of hopefully build a protocol here to look at the big pillars: environment, your behaviors, biochemistry, and your mindset, and just understanding. How do we actually get to sleep, right? So, the goal of this podcast is to help give you like actually actionable advice to get to sleep faster. That's like the main goal. If you're having trouble sleeping, this is what we're going for. So, let's dive in. So, first and foremost, we have to understand that these are pillars, they are just not a suggestion, right? So, they are like fundamental four things, right? So, they look Good and they look simple, but they're really the bedrock of good sleep because they definitely help. They regulate your body's internal clock. It sets the circadian rhythm, does all these big things. And so that's kind of what we're going with here. So, pillar one. Is going to be our scheduling consistency, right? So, what I mean by scheduling consistency means that this may be the most important thing that probably nobody does, myself included. I'm guilty on this, but if you're having trouble sleeping, this is really important. What this means is having a consistent wake-up and bedtime seven days a week. That's like the goal. Like optimally for optimal sleep, you're doing that. Do most people do that? No, because life gets in the way. And I totally understand that. And you need to be practical, right? So the idea here is trying to keep, if possible, your weekend schedule within one hour of your weekday schedule to avoid what's called social jet lag, meaning, hey, You go out on the weekends, you're up way later, and then you're trying to catch up, and it's just a whole thing there. And so you can have this social jet-like. So, pillar one would be having a consistent schedule. I understand that's not necessarily It's something you can always do all the time, right? I get that. I don't do that either. That's not something I do every single day. But for the best sleep, it's been shown that usually can be helpful. So, once again, these are all things that. You can try them, take a couple of things that you like, don't like, try to tweak them, see if they're helpful for you. But I'm just kind of going through what the literature shows. Pillar two then is strategic light exposure. So, light is an important and powerful signal that sets our internal clock, right? So. Getting daylight exposure every day, specifically shortly after waking, if possible, is ideal. You know, that's ideal. This kind of helps anchor your wake cycle and lets you know: hey, yep, I'm up, and this is when the sun's rising, and we're going there. But, however, for those of us who live in northern latitudes, this can be tough, right? You can do your best. You'll see, I hate it. I hate it when I see influencers. They sends you feel bad for not being able to wake up and do an optimal morning routine, right? Like, hey, I'm sorry I don't live in Costa Rica and have a job where I have to get to the hospital before the sun comes up. Life happens, and I totally get that. But if you have the luxury of apparently, like those social media influencers, like not have a job, you can just like get up and go look at the sun for three hours. Like, that's fine. Great, but if possible, trying to get some morning sun may be helpful for you. And then in the evening, it's kind of the opposite. Dimming the lights in your house in the hours leading up to bed to allow melatone to kind of naturally rise, kind of mimicking that circadian rhythm, right? So, circadian rhythm. Just means kind of cyclical going through it. You know, in the morning, light exposure gets us started and gives us wake signals. In the evening, when the sun goes down, that's when melatonin rises and we kind of get ready for bed. So, this natural circadian rhythm, we can kind of help augment it with our light exposure. Pillar three, then, is going to be our bed-sleep association. This is a core principle from behavioral sleep medicine. Your brain needs to have a powerful, clear association between your bed and sleep. And so the bed. Should be used for essentially, we say sleep and sexual activity. Those are like the two main things that we say: like, that's what the bed's for. It shouldn't be for working, shouldn't be for watching TV, shouldn't be necessarily about Just hanging out, lounging on the bed, scrolling on your phone, or even just sitting there worrying in bed. Like if you're trying to sleep and you're worrying, it's obviously not ideal. And that actually weakens the connection. So if you're not asleep after about 20 minutes of trying to fall asleep. Get out of bed, go to another room. This prevents the bed from becoming a place of frustration or something associated not with sleep. And so that can be a challenging one as well. But that's another pillar. Once again. Is everyone doing all these things? No, these are just kind of good strategies for you to say, hey, oh, I'm actually pretty guilty of that. I'll try this. And then the last pillar, pillar four here is strategic destimulation. So the hours before you get ready for bed should hopefully have a gradual ramp down. Not a hard stop. For those of us who are parents out there, that may not be the case, right? It's just chaos until the hard stop happens. But ideally, you have a gradual run, right? So this means kind of avoiding. Stimulus, like a really stimulant-rich environment. Also, avoiding actual stimulants like caffeine and nicotine at least four to six hours before bed. Some people find that eating before bed messes with their sleep, so it may be helpful to stop eating a few hours before bed. On top of that, things like exercise, like high-intensity exercise, specifically that should be avoided within the final two hours or two to four hours before going to bed. You know, if you got to get a workout in, you got to get a workout in. I get that. You got to pick your poison, though. If you're doing high-intensity right before bed, may lead to some issues there. But they say gradual kind of slow exercise shouldn't be an issue, but really high-intensity stuff might get you there. What it does is essentially elevate your core body temperature, increases adrenaline, that could be counterproductive for sleep potentially. May also be helpful to avoid things like blue light an hour or two before bed. You know, people talk about that, you know, not being on our phones, trying to be with a book or whatnot, and we'll talk more about that. And, you know, some people go bananas about this and use incandescent lights instead of LEDs. They have wearing the blue blocker glasses all the time. For me, like, start simple and easy, right? So, the first thing is, like, hey, I'm just going to avoid my screens for an hour before bed. Like, start there. And then, if it needs to go more and more and more. Or you're trying to optimize and squeeze out every little thing in one go down the rabbit hole, you can do that. But those are kind of general points. So these are kind of huge pillars of sleep hygiene, right there. Like, these are like the main things. If you just started doing these things, you probably get improvement in your sleep. I'd probably get improved in my sleep as well. And it's these are kind of the bedrock of just getting good sleep hygiene. So that's the thing you'll hear: sleep hygiene. That just means getting ready. For bed, your routine, all that stuff, but yes, sleep hygiene is what we're looking at. Next, moving on to engineering the perfect sleep environment, right? So, your bedroom shouldn't be a passive space. We need to kind of engineer it to send the right signals to our brain, ideally, right. Think of this kind of creating a sleep cave. That'd be great. First is temperature. A slight drop in core body temperature is a critical trigger for sleep. So the optimal range. Is between 60 and 67 degrees Fahrenheit, which is 15. 5 to 19. 4 degrees Celsius. But nobody's looking to pay $1,000 per month in energy bills. And so most people can't get there. And so the idea. The takeaway is a little colder is probably even a little better. That being said, if you live in Florida or you're in the South or whatnot, that's going to cost you a lot of money. And so You're gonna have to be creative. So, you can do things like putting a fan on you to feel cooler, which may be helpful, and that triggers that cooldown, which is great. Or if you're really fancy, you can get one of those pads that can cool you. Your actual mattress pad cools you down, which is pretty cool. Those are pretty expensive though. But a lot of things. Other tricks you can do, you can do a hot bath or shower one or two hours before bed because it essentially raises your temperature, and then slowly you'll have that drop, and that drops kind of that signal as well. And hopefully helps you get drowsy. Next, we want to talk about light in the bedroom. Light, especially blue light from screens, is a potent suppressor of melatonin. That's why we care so much about blue light, right? It suppresses melatonin. The goal is hopefully near total darkness using blackout curtains or a good eye mask. I found that blackout curtains, like, if you look and search for them, like specifically, can be very expensive. And so, if you look for like felt curtains, they pretty much act as blackout. My wife taught me this one. Shout out to my wife, she's the best. But we have felt curtains and they are like blackout as far as I'm concerned, and way cheaper than quote unquote blackout curtains. And so that can be helpful. On top of that, you want to cover or remove any light-emitting electronics in the bedroom. If you do need some sort of light in there, use a dim red spectrum light as it's the least disruptive. So you can have that red one in there if you need to. Otherwise, you can have it. Pure blackout's fine. Next, we'll talk about sound. So, sudden intermittent noises are far more disruptive than consistent low-level sound, right? I think we can all p Equate to that. It's the sound of a crying baby is, well, first of all, it's just piercing. It's in our DNA, but that's much more disturbing than just kind of a low-level background hum of the street or whatnot. And so You can have a white noise machine or a fan or a sound app that can create a stable auditory environment that makes that kind of masks other sudden noises, right? So, kind of that low-level one kind of takes away sudden noises and can be very, very helpful. I can't sleep without now. Like, I literally, if I'm somewhere, I have a sleep app on my phone for a fan, it just sounds like a fan. So, um, yeah, maybe helpful, maybe not. Ever since. You know, we use it with a child, it's just like, well, they did it, and now I do it, and it's just I love it, it's for comfort and psychology. I love it now. On top of that, the bedroom should also be a sanctuary. So, this is a both a physical and psychological process here: investing in a comfortable mattress, pillows, and sheets. And typically we think of mattress has a span of about a decade. So you're investing something that you can use for a lot of hours in your life. And so a good one can last quite a while as well. Um, sheets can make a big difference. I was not a believer in sheets at all until my wife got nice sheets, and now I can't go back. So, I'm spoiled by my wife. She's improved me in so many ways, is the takeaway from this podcast, I guess. But you can also spruce up your bed by buying a memory phone topper. That's one thing. If you have a, you know, say, hey, I can't drop a huge amount of money on an actual bed. Well, you can try adding on a mattress topper. That might make it seem higher end. That can be a little hot at times as well, but it can make you feel way, way nicer than the bed you actually have. If you want to get a whole new bed, but yeah, overall, the goal is to psychologically have the bedroom feel like a sanctuary. A cluttered, disorganized room can also contribute to mental stress. And keeping it tidy, you remove stress reminders of your day, maybe. So when we step in the bedroom, it's like, ah, that's the idea to have that kind of feeling. Next, I do want to talk about a pre-sleep routine. A consistent pre-sleep routine is a powerful form of classical conditioning, right? So, your brain learns the cues and begins to wind down automatically. It's like we're training a dog. So, you say, okay, when this happens, this is what's going to happen. So. I'm going to tell you what the literature recommends. Not what's necessarily practical or even what most people do, but here it is. My routine is an absolute wreck at this moment with a newborn in my family. But hey, that's okay. That's a trade-off: being human beings. I will take that 10 out of 10, having that blessing. But it's not ideal for sleep, that's for sure. So, ideally, 90 minutes before bed, we are done eating or drinking, right? So, finishing any large meals, ideally, even two to three hours before bed. And we're saying, if you're having a snack. 90 minutes is the cutoff, but big meals, hopefully, even two to three hours before to avoid indigestion, reflux, or just kind of not helping you fall asleep. That can some people say when they eat bigger meals, it affects how they sleep. If you do have a light, digestible, easy snack, maybe okay if you're hungry or if you're trying to hit your shirt in macros, that's fine, but just understand the risk reward there. Some people say avoid simple carbohydrates before bed to avoid glucose spikes. All this is going to be personal preference, right? You might find that, hey, when I eat a more protein-filled snack, that I feel better or I sleep better. You're just gonna have to experiment. The idea is: don't just be like gobbling down snacks and then hop into bed, like, or like eating a bag of chips in bed. Like, not a good idea there. So, that's the general idea. And then, ideally, about 60 minutes before bed, digital sunset, meaning this is a window we're trying to eliminate blue light from. So get rid of all the screens, and this allows melatonin to rise unimpeded. Good alternative to your device is to read a physical book under a soft, warm-hued lamp, not necessarily a blue-colored light. This is what it is. You can do your best, or you can wear the blue blocker and glasses. If you're like, hey, I can't actually turn off devices, we can try that too. And then, about once again, 30 to 60 minutes before bed, engaging in calming activities, right? So, the goal here is to shift your nervous system from fight or flight to rest and digest. So, choosing something genuinely relaxing, whether that's a warm bath, light reading, listening to calm music, gentle stretching. Journaling, whatever it is that calms you down, that's fine. Maybe even a brain dump, writing down your worries or a to-do list for the next day, can also be effective to offload any burdens you have so you can just focus on sleep. In fact, one study I saw showed that writing a specific to-do list helped people fall asleep significantly faster. So that can be helpful for you. Once again, I'm saying the things that are in the literature are not practical, right? But this is ideally, if you have all the time in the world and want to optimize your routine, you can do these things. And then, about 15 minutes before bed, you can start either relaxing even more, doing relaxation techniques. These are potentially targeted exercises to hopefully reduce arousal or before sleep, things like diaphragmatic or belly breathing. We have slow deep breaths focusing on raising your abdomen rather than your chest. There's another method with us: you can do the 4-7-8 method where you inhale for 4. Hold for seven, exhale for eight. It gives your mind something to focus on besides anxious thoughts. You can also do box breathing where you send you four in, hold. Bore out, whole, all these things. Lots of things you can do. Another one is called progressive muscle relaxation, where you systematically tense and then relax and release your muscle groups throughout your entire body to promote physical relaxation. You kind of work from top to bottom or bottom up. And it can be helpful. I've done this before. I've done guided ones before. I was on the gym floor for an exercise and residency, learning about it, and I fell asleep in the middle of the day on the gym floor. So 10 out of 10 would recommend. Felt great. But these are all tools you can do. The general theme is: hey, let's limit electronics. Eliminate blue light, try to calm things down. Like that's the general signal. And these are, you know, differing levels of intensity that you want to have. Now, moving on to, let's talk about the actual biochemistry of sleep. So, fueling for sleep, talk about diet, exercise, stimulants, all that stuff. The choices we make during the day definitely set us up for sleep at night. So, a balanced diet, generally a health-promoting diet, has been associated with better, more restorative sleep. And I'll be honest with you, here that 100%. This diet's going to be up to you, you, and your preference. But an overall health-promoting diet seems to help. Would I say, Hey, I'm going to switch a diet to optimize sleep? Well, no, probably not, unless the diet was really bad and already have terrible sleep. So, if you're saying, Hey, I have pretty good sleep. And my diet's pretty good. I wouldn't say, well, let's change our diet just to optimize sleep. You can try that if you want to, but it may or may not help you. We'll see. Meal timing also matters. Eating at regular intervals may help regulate your scanning rhythm. Trying to get more of your calories early in the day, once again, seems to really be helpful. That's the one thing I learned prepping for this: oh, I should probably be eating earlier in the day instead of later. Also, then talking about physical activity, that's a big one. So, one of the big things you can do for your sleep, you know, there's that myth I mentioned that exercise, like all exercise is bad, and it's high-intensity exercise seems to be problematic right before bed. Low to moderate intensity exercise. Is actually probably generally fine. The key is avoiding that high intensity or vigorous exercise within two to three hours as it kind of raises, once again, your core body temperature, which we talk about is good, but when you get too high, It may take longer to get down. You want to have that natural cooling. And then also, it stimulates and leads to things like the stimulating hormones, which could be over-stimulating for sleep. So, exercise in the evening could be okay, depending on your intensity. Next, let's talk about caffeine. Probably a good idea to avoid that before the evening, right? So caffeine works by blocking adenosine, which is an important chemical. That builds up during the day to kind of create a sleep pressure. So, this buildup of adenosine is kind of what gives us this feeling of, hey, I'm getting sleepy, and caffeine blocks that receptor. So, it significantly reduces deep sleep, which is The most physically restorative sleep when we drink caffeine. So, you might be able to fall asleep potentially, but not even realize that the quality of your sleep has been compromised. So, caffeine has a very long half-life. A conservative recommendation is to avoid all caffeine. For a minimum of four to six hours, ideally, even eight hours before sleep. But some evidence even suggests a longer window, saying, like for larger doses, it should be pretty much just in the morning and then give yourself the rest of the day to get out of your body. I know that may not be the best advice for a lot of people. It's like, I need my coffee, but it looks like that would probably be one thing to cut out. And then I want to talk about alcohol. So, alcohol is pretty much like. People use this as a sleephead, right? They drink alcohol to go to bed. And while it is a sedative, that can help you fall asleep faster. That benefit is definitely short-lived, right? As your body metabolizes it, you kind of get this rebound arousal effect in the second half of the night, leading to fragmented, shallow sleep. And it's a potent suppressor of your REM sleep, which is critical for memory and emotional processing. And also, potentially could worsen snoring and sleep apnea. And so, overall, alcohol-like, it's like those things where you're taking like a Benadryl, right? So, this is a sedative medication, it might help you get asleep a little faster, but you're not leading to restorative sleep long term. So, it may trick you into thinking, yeah, I'm sleeping well, but It's probably not fixing any problems right there. So, consider that to minimize the impact, the idea is to have your last drink at least three to four hours before bed, or just don't drink at all. Like, I generally recommend for health. I don't really have a healthy reason to consume alcohol, but if you do that, it's part of your social structure. Trying to limit it before bedtime might be helpful. Next, let's talk about the midnight awakening protocol. So if you're saying, hey, Jordan, I fall asleep fine when it's when I wake up. What do I do? Well, let's talk about that. It can be incredibly frustrating, right? It's the worst. You're sitting there in your eyes, you're trying to sleep, and you're like, okay. Okay, if I wake up now, I have this many hours left. That's awful. So, the goal here is not to force sleep, but to kind of protect your sleep in the long term. Give you get you when you get back and you wake up at night. To get you to fall back asleep. So, if you can't wake up or fall back asleep within 20 minutes, the idea is to get out of bed. So, staying in bed while frustrated strengthens the brain's association between bed and being awake and anxious. So, you're saying, oh, and this is not a safe spot for me anymore. We want to break that cycle. So, step one is: do not clock watch, right? It kind of increases your stress. Turn your clock around if it's, if you're like looking at the clock saying, oh my gosh, this much time has passed, get that out of there. Two is once again, get out of bed, go to another room. Then, step three, engage in a quiet, boring activity. Read a dull book or listen to this podcast. Cast. Just kidding. Don't. This is very engaging. But you can do something that is not necessarily intellectually stimulating, not bright lights, anything like that, just like trying to calm you down. And then, step four: return to bed only when you're sleepy. Wait for the genuine feeling of drowsiness to return. And then, step five is repeat as necessary, right? And this is kind of we're trying to retrain our brain. This will not happen overnight. If you wake up consistently, like you're going to have to retrain your brain. And Yeah, that's the kind of ideal repeat these things as necessary. And this is kind of important. No matter how bad you slept, you need to get up at your regular time. Don't sleep in, ideally. Obviously, if it's like one bad night, you're like, I slept bad. Okay, then we'll deal with that. But if you're like consistently having this problem, like we can't sleep in, we have to wake up in the morning to then build up that sleep pressure so we help sleeping at night. And ideally, we can avoid napping as well. If you must keep it under 30 minutes and before 3 p. , that's kind of the ideal nap time. And then The idea is when we wake up early, and once again, we're building that sleep pressure for the following night to help break the cycle of insomnia. And so it's tempting when you don't sleep well. You're like, oh, I didn't sleep well. I woke up a bunch of times. I'm gonna wake up later, that's not necessarily helping you in the long term. Once again, one bed night here or there, like sleeping in, it's gonna be fine. Like, I don't want you to freak out about things, but this is more for people who are having trouble or issues. That's what I want to talk about. And so now I want to talk about supplements. So, taking a step back, everyone talks about supplements. These are not a substitute for good sleep hygiene. Like, I will tell you right now, you do not need any supplement to sleep well. You don't. There might be some that may be helpful for you potentially, but you don't need this. So, as I know, as I mentioned before, the supplement industry is not tightly regulated. And so, quality and dosage can be inconsistent. And as all things, you should be talking about like with your physician about this, like what you're taking. The big ones that I've seen while looking this up were melatonin. Obviously, it's a huge one. It's a hormone that regulates the sleep weight cycle. The strongest evidences for shifting the body clock was things like jet lag, and there's evidence for chronic insomnia. But it's less clear there, and the effects are often small. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine devises against it for classic insomnia use. It's more for like shifting stuff. But once again, if you're not sleeping, it's worth trying things because you're miserable. If you do start, start with a low dose around 0. 5 to 3 milligrams. And yeah, it's probably one of the most common ones that I see. And people have pretty good effects with it and very low side effects. So, once again, low cost, low risk, it's worth trying. Next is magnesium. This is an essential mineral that has a calming effect on the nervous system, potentially. Evidence suggests it may improve sleep quality, especially in older adults or those with a magnetic infant deficiency. You can have some GI side effects, though. That's one of the big things that can happen. But that's that can be definitely helpful. Another one I looked at was valerian root, which is an herbal supplement. The evidence here is mixed and inconsistent. Some studies show modest benefit, but others may show no difference at all from a placebo, and any benefit may appear only after taken for a couple of weeks. And so. Yeah, you know, question mark, I'm not sure. And then L-theanine, an amino acid from tea that promotes, you know, wakeful relaxation without causing drowsiness. Seems to improve sleep quality by reducing the anxiety and potentially can help with some sleep, but it's not like generally well tolerated, but not entirely sure. So, like, for me, like. The big ones seem to be like melatonin and magnesium. Like, those are the things I'd take away. Like, oh, those are things I would actually try. Like, and I'd probably recommend for people to do if they're having issues. But I just wanted to mention these supplements because I know a lot of people talk about it. Maybe I can do an entirely different podcast about supplements for sleep. But it's worth mentioning that there is some evidence saying supplements can be helpful, but it doesn't help everyone in every instance. Next, I want to talk about some more advanced strategies about falling asleep. This is getting into more of like the clinical realm where you're probably going to see someone here. The gold standard is something called cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, or CBTI. And as I mentioned, it's the first-line treatment for chronic insomnia. Its benefits are often more durable than any medication, can be Yeah, it can be through a bunch of different ways how we're doing this. So, one can be through stimulus control therapy or SCT. This is the formal name for what we've already kind of talked about earlier, right? Rebooting the bed, sleep connection. By using the bed only for sleep, getting out of bed when you're not sleeping, once again, stimulus control, meaning, hey, when I'm in bed, that's for sleep, that's for sleep, and removing all the other things. That's one part of it. Another is sleep restriction therapy. So, this is actually interesting. It is powerful but counterintuitive, right? So, people with insomnia often spend too much time in bed trying to sleep, right? Their goal is like, I can't sleep, I need to be in bed to sleep. The goal is to improve what's called sleep efficiency. So, the percentage of time that you're actually asleep in bed. And this SRT aims to get that number to over 85 to 90 percent. So, the goal is when you're in bed, you're actually asleep. Here's how it works: it's kind of interesting. First is get the data, right? Keep a sleep diary for a week and find out how much time you are actually sleeping on average each night. So you'll notice by looking at the clock, right? You're like, okay, I was in bed at nine. Didn't fall asleep till 2:30, or you know, you know, that understand that, and you get that. And then you set your sleep window. So, your new restricted time in bed is equal to the average sleep time. Let's say you've been On average, sleeping six hours. So if you're only sleeping six hours per night, despite being invent for eight, your new sleep window is six hours. So six hours. And what you're going to do then is step three is anchor your wake time. Pick a non-negotiable wake-up time and stick to it. Seven days a week. Your bedtime is then calculated by counting backwards from that time. So, example, 6:30 a. wake up time means 12:30 a. m. bedtime. That gives you six hours in bed. And it seems like it's not a lot because it isn't. It's not a lot. But here in step four, it's important. We're building sleep pressure, right? So, this first week is going to be rough and you're going to be tired. And that's the point. We're building a strong, consolidated drive to sleep so that when you get in bed, You fall asleep quickly, right? So, this is less than you want, but it's what you've been actually sleeping. So, we're doing this to build that up. And step five: gradually extend. Once you're sleeping soundly through your restricted window for a week, your sleep efficiency is high, meaning, hey, I actually am falling asleep quickly. You can start adding time back in 15-minute increments by going to bed earlier. So, a big caveat here: this is a pretty advanced technique, and it's probably best done under the guidance of someone who does CBTI. But if you're like Jordan, I'm going to try for it. That's okay to understand. This could be problematic, but just gradually moving that back in 15-minute increments till we're having that hopefully eight, seven to nine hours-that'd be wonderful. That's like the goal. The principle is all about consolidating sleep and building up that pressure to start, and then hopefully getting it back. And that's that'd be awesome. And on top of that, another trick that you can do or therapy can do is called cognitive restructuring. So, this involves identifying, challenging, and replacing. Negative catastrophic thoughts that often surround sleep, right? So instead of, oh, I don't sleep tomorrow, it's going to be a disaster, you work to reframe it to something more realistic: like, hey, I might be tired, but I've managed this before, I've had bad nights before, I've survived. We're in here right now is not going to help. So, just kind of reframing things. These are all things you can do. A lot of times we're getting more into the actual clinical side of things to have someone help you with this and do this, but These are options that if you are struggling and haven't done the generic stuff and this is not working, then I would for sure try these things. And Talking about mists here, before I jump into that, I do want to talk about medications real quick, right? So, like sleep meds. A lot of times we talk about the Z drugs or whatever, and people take meds and they say, hey, it makes me feel good. And I like It gets me to sleep faster. Like, once again, same thing as we talked about before, like Ben and Drill or alcohol, like it is not helping you sleep in the long term. Like, it is disrupting your sleep, leading to fragmented sleep, and you're not getting the restorative sleep that you need. So, it is a crutch. That's how we should view this. This is a crutch. Are there times to take sleep aids? Yeah, I think it's reasonable, specifically like shift workers or you know, have things going on in life circumstances. I understand that I will prescribe those for a short term. But what happens, some of these you can build dependence on, right? You say, Hey, I take it and I fall asleep, I feel good, and I need it, and then all of a sudden you're on a chronic medication for three years. That's what happens. Ideally, it's not leading to restorative sleep. You just become dependent on it and not getting good sleep. So, the idea is to break free from any medications. So, I'm not mentioning them here because they're all pretty much the same in that they're not long-term. What I want you to do, some are better than others, absolutely, but that's probably a whole nother podcast. But. I do want to talk about now demunking pervasive sleep myths. So, myth number one is that you can catch up on sleep on the weekends. So, this is only partially true and it comes at a cost, right? So, think of sleep debt like a financial debt, right? Making a big payment. On the weekend helps, but it doesn't erase the interest you've accrued, right? So, performance doesn't fully recover either. Studies show that while sleeping in might make you feel better, objective measures of performance like reaction time and attention don't fully rebound to based on levels. After just one or two nights of longer sleep, the deficit is cumulative. Metabolic issues also persist. So, even after a few nights of poor sleep, it can impair your insulin sensitivity and glucose regulation, which are super important for overall metabolic health. And then weekend recovery doesn't necessarily seem to completely fix this, meaning that you're still at a higher metabolic risk if you're just having a couple of things. Also, when you do this. Sleeping later, trying to create this social jet lag, the concept I mentioned before. When you shift your sleep schedule dramatically on the weekends, whether sleeping in, staying up late, you're essentially giving yourself a mild case of jet lag, and then your internal clock gets thrown off. Which is why that Monday morning could just feel so brutal, right? So that's what happened. You're forcing your body to readjust to the weekday schedule. And the bottom line is: while sleeping in on the weekend is better than being sleep deprived, like, definitely sleep, it's ideal. Catch up, you know, if you're having a You go to a wedding and you have you, yes, go ahead and sleep. That's totally fine. But doing this every weekend is not ideal. It's not a true substitute for consistent sleep throughout the week. So, consistency is always going to be the best long-term strategy. Myth number two is adults only need five to six hours of sleep. Jordan, I've only sleep slept five hours every day. I feel fine. Well, the odds are you're probably not feeling fine, and you're probably could feel a lot better if you get eight or nine. The vast majority of adults need seven to nine hours for optimal health. And performance and the number of people who can truly thrive on less due to some sort of genetic mutation is extremely small. So, you know, sleep experts will say, you know, when people say, I sleep four hours a night, five hours a night, they'd say, well, Maybe you do that, but how much caffeine are you drinking? And actually, like, are you performing well? Are you just like so used to being chronically tired that you now think this is your life? And you could actually be performing way better and feeling way better and having better health outcomes if you slept more. So, if you tell me, Jordan, I don't need sleep, I don't believe you. I shouldn't say I don't believe you, but. I probably don't believe you because you probably don't fit that build. Myth number three: now, if you can't sleep, stay in bed and try harder. We talked about before, this is a bad, bad myth. So, it conditions your brain to associate bed with anxiety. The evidence-based approach is to get up, get out of bed, reset through the whole things I talked about. But yeah, don't just like try harder, that's not going to be helpful. And then now moving on to myth four. So hitting the snooze button is harmless. Jordan, I love the snooze button, it's not a big deal. This one, like, I'm triggered by this because I remember having a roommate in college who he, you know, it's eight o'clock class, which is funny now as an adult, like eight o'clock, like, dude, that's so late in the day, but as a college-age kid, so early. He just hit the snooze, snooze, snooze, snooze, and then just skip his class. And I was like, dude, this is my one day to sleep in. But so don't hit your snooze, but it's not harmless, right? So it leads to A bunch of issues. So it can lead to, it's you get fragmented sleep, first of all. It's not restorative and can lead to sleep inertia, which is what that means. So essentially, this leads to an impaired performance. So, sleep inertia is a technical term for that groggy, disoriented, and cognitively impaired feeling you have. Right after waking up. Your brain is caught up in this transitional state, not fully asleep, but not fully awake yet. The snooze button then confuses you further, right? So when your alarm first goes off, Your body starts the wake-up process, pulling you out of a deep sleep stage potentially. And then when you hit the snooze, you drift back off. Your brain can get confused and try to initiate a new sleep cycle. And then it could wake you up from even deeper sleep potentially. The next time your alarm goes off in nine minutes, it's often interrupting you from, once again, a deeper stage than you were in the first time, potentially. And this abrupt awakening is what makes your grogginess just feel worse and worse. It feels Like it lasts a lot longer, and so the bottom line is that that extra sleep from the snooze button isn't restorative, it's low-quality, fragmented sleep that prolongs the period of morning grogginess and makes it harder to feel alert and ready for the day. So, there you go, don't hit the snooze button. Myth 5 is that snoring, it's just it is what is. Some people snore and it's harmless. Well, the fact is that loud habitual snoring is a concerning symptom. Right for obstructive sleep apnea, a serious medical condition linked to high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, lots of bad things. So, if you are snoring out there and you wake up and you do not Feel restored, you might have sleep apnea. That's worth screening for. There's something tools online you can look for, like the stop bang, and kind of classifies things like your, you know, your age, your sex, your next circumference. Different things out there to kind of see what are your odds of having that. And if you're high on that, it'd be worth talking with a physician about it because I've had people say, Oh my gosh, like this is life-changing. Getting a sleep at you know, CPAP machine, it's life-changing. I can actually sleep now. So Snoring for some people is normal. I'm not going to say it's not for everyone, but it's not necessarily harmless because a lot of people will have sleep apnea online. And then, myth six here is that falling asleep immediately is a sign of a good sleeper. Like, I hit the pillow and I fall asleep. That may be the case, but a lot of times a healthy sleep latency is about 15 to 20 minutes. So consistently falling asleep under five minutes is often a significant indicator of chronic sleep deprivation. Personal example: this is. Recently, with my wife giving birth, I was up for about 30 plus hours. My wife was 36. She's a stud. She did great on that. I hadn't slept in 30 hours. I don't remember putting my head on the pillow. I fell asleep so fast. I'm pretty convinced I was actually like sleeping mid-going down. But did that mean, like, oh, I'm a good sleeper? No, it just means like I had an enormous sleep deficit and needed to catch up. So. Can some people just have the gift of sleeping fast? Yeah, absolutely. People have that and they can do that, but it doesn't necessarily mean that that's just something I wanted to mention. And so. I do want to talk about just like taking you all the way here, the big rocks, right? So, what are the big rocks? So, your environment, right? Your bedroom must be a cool, dark, and quiet sanctuary that sends unambiguous signals to your body. It's time for sleep. Next is our behavior, right? So, the cornerstone of a consistent sleep-wake schedule, ideally, even the same time, seven days a week, is hopefully supported by a relaxing pre-sleep decompression routine. That's ideal. Rock three is that being mindful of what you put in your body and exercising, limit caffeine and alcohol, time your exercise appropriately, and then maintain a balanced diet can be helpful. And then, rock four is your mindset, right? Break the cycle of frustration. Don't rely or try to force your sleep. Get out of bed if you can't fall asleep. And once again, get out of that environment and reset and kind of get the negative thoughts out of your head if possible. That's the idea. And so. Those were the big key takeaways, as you mentioned there. And hopefully, hopefully, you found this helpful. Hopefully, you're saying, hey, actually, this is pretty cool. I have some actionable techniques here. The goal of this one is to be really actionable. I don't want to get into the nerdiness of sleep because there's a lot there that even I don't understand. But these are the practical tips: like, hey, if you're having trouble sleeping, like, you can just refer to this podcast and try these things. Like, I hope you have like a dozen or more things from this podcast you can try and then see if it helps you. And if it doesn't, then it might be time to probably talk to somebody. But hopefully, this gives you a good idea of what to go for. But that's going to be it for today. Thank you so much for stopping by. If you enjoyed this podcast, it would mean the world to me if you either share this with a friend, leave a five-star rating on your podcast platform of choice. Or subscribe on YouTube. But now get off your phone and get outside and have the rest of your day. We'll see you next time. This podcast is for entertainment, education, and informational purposes only. The topics discussed should not solely be used to diagnose, treat, or prevent any condition. The information presented here was created with an evidence-based approach, but please keep in mind that science is always changing, and at the time of listening to this, there may be some new data that makes this information incomplete or inaccurate. Always seek the advice of your personal physician or qualified healthcare provider for questions regarding any medical condition.
