This is the healthiest way to improve your sleep
One third of Americans suffer from insomnia – that is 108 million people. While sleeping pills help, science has a safer solution for everyone, as CNN reports.
Exercise can reduce insomnia, as extensive study says. “In one study I did, for example, older women suffering from insomnia said their sleep improved from poor to good when they exercised. They had more energy and were less depressed,” Rush University clinical psychologist Kelly Glazer Baron said.
“There are more solid studies recently that looked at people clinically diagnosed with insomnia disorder, rather than self-described poor sleepers,” agreed the University of Pittsburgh’s Christopher Kline, who studies sleep through the lens of sports medicine. “The results show exercise improves both self-reported and objective measures of sleep quality, such as what’s measured in a clinical sleep lab.”
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While exercise may not be as effective as sleeping pills, the downsides of pharmaceutically induced shuteye shift the equation, according to Arizona State University sleep researcher Shawn Youngstedt. “Sleeping pills are extremely hazardous,” Youngstedt said. “They are as bad as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. Not to mention they cause infections, falling and dementia in the elderly, and they lose their effectiveness after a few weeks.”
“It’s less expensive, healthier and just as easy to exercise,” Youngstedt added, “and there’s an added bonus: Research suggests those who are physically active a have lower risk of developing insomnia in the first place.”
For the longest time, experts strongly advised against exercising within six hours of bedtime. Meanwhile, they changed their minds.
“One common myth is that exercise should be avoided at night,” Youngstedt said. “There are about 10% of us for whom exercise at night does disturb sleep, but I personally think that’s because they aren’t accustomed to it. For most of us, exercise at night, even if it ends just a couple of hours before bedtime, will help with sleep.”
Those who stay up late will benefit from this. “Night owls have problems getting up in the morning; they just can’t do it,” Baron said. “Their mood and ability to apply effort just isn’t there. If you’re sacrificing sleep for exercise, is that a good tradeoff?”
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