It’s no secret that teenagers don’t get enough sleep. Just ask their parents and teachers! Whether this lack of sleep is due to insomnia and other sleep disorders or is the result of poor lifestyle choices, the result is the same. Teenagers who need between 8 and 9 hours of sleep every night aren’t getting it and this is leaving them sleep deprived. Fortunately, there are some sleep remedies for teenagers that are easy to implement.

As the parent of a teen, I had to stand my ground when it came to making sure my child got enough sleep every night. The first thing we did was establish a proper sleeping schedule.

Going to bed at the same time every night and waking up at the same time every morning works to train your body to know when it’s supposed to be sleeping and when it should be sleeping. (And this is good advice for adults as well as teens.)

Another helpful thing that parents can do to help their teens get more sleep is to make turning off electronics such as tvs and computers at least a half-hour before bed a household rule. Be prepared to stand your ground on this one, and move the electronics out of your teen’s room if you have to. As I wrote in an earlier article on creating the perfect sleep environment, there shouldn’t really be any electronics in the bedroom anyways. (Easier said than done, I know!)

Turning off the cell phone at night is another way to ensure that your teen’s sleep isn’t interrupted by other non-sleeping teens. Voice mails and text messages can always be left and dealt with the next morning.

When it comes to sleeping remedies for teens, common sense and good sleep hygiene apply just as for adults. Following these tips will help to ensure that both you and your teenagers will all benefit from a good night’s sleep.

Using Exercise as a Natural Sleep Remedy

Did you know that how well you sleep at night is directly related to how active you are during the day? The more sedentary your lifestyle is, the more likely it is that you will also have sleeping problems.

The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way, and you don’t have to become a “gym junkie” to get the sleep benefits of exercise. Sleep experts suggest that as little as 20 to 30 minutes of moderate exercise a day will go a long way toward getting rid of insomnia from your life.

How Does Exercise Help You Sleep Better?

One of the main ways that exercise helps you sleep better is through the effect that it has on your body temperature. Since your body temperature needs to be lower for you to sleep well, experts believe that by exercising before bed time the cooling off period afterward actually prepares you for sleep. The catch is that you need to be careful what type of exercise you do, or you could find yourself wide awake instead of ready to nod off.

The second way exercise affects our sleep patterns is by acting as a stress reliever. Researchers have discovered that people with insomnia often have elevated amounts of stress hormones such as cortisol in their blood. Even though these hormones increase while you’re exercising, the long term effect is that they actually lower over time. Hours after your exercise session is over, your stress hormone levels will be even lower than if you had not exercised at all.

What Kind of Exercise Works Best?

The best type of exercise to use as a sleep remedy is aerobic exercise. Done early enough in the day, it will have the stress-relieving effect I talked about earlier. The two schools of thought on when this should be are first thing in the morning, and mid- to late afternoon. Experimenting with both is really the only way to figure out which time will give you the best results.

As for what type of aerobic exercise is best, that is totally up to you. Anything that you enjoy that gets your heart rate up for 20 to 30 minutes is the best. This could be walking, jogging, taking an aerobics class or even doing yard work. The more you enjoy it, the easier it will be to keep active on a consistent basis. There is one study that suggests that choosing activities which make strenuous use of your leg muscles is best because this has a tranquilizer effect that can help you sleep better.

For mild, pre-bedtime exercise you can try activities such as yoga and stretching. The body positions and breathing techniques used in yoga will help to slow down both body and brain and get you relaxed and ready for sleep.

Tai Chi is another form of exercise that has been shown to have a positive effect on sleep. In a 2005 study, participants who did Tai Chi for one hour three times a week improved their sleep quality and decreased daytime drowsiness. The authors of the study speculated that the main benefit was a modification of the participants circadian rhythms through relaxation and breathing.

In the end, it doesn’t really matter what type of exercise you choose to do. Simply making regular physical exercise a part of your daily routine allows you to harness its effects as a natural sleep remedy.

As always, remember to talk things over with your health care provider, before starting an exercise program, especially if you have other health challenges that you are dealing with.

Here’s to a good night’s sleep!

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How much sleep is a good night’s sleep? Is it 4 hours, or six or eight, or even ten hours a night? Experts can establish guidelines to tell us how much they think we should be sleeping, but in reality the amount of sleep each person needs is as individual as our DNA. Quality is much more important when it comes to sleep. How well you sleep determines how much of it you actually need.

How do you tell how much sleep you need?

The best way to judge how much sleep you need is by paying attention to how you feel when you wake up in the morning. If you wake up refreshed and eager to face the day, then you have most likely got the amount of good quality sleep you need. If, on the other hand, you wake up feeling tired and cranky even though you’ve been sleeping for eight hours, you might want to examine the quality of your sleep. You may find that you’re not sleeping nearly as well as you think you are.

One of the best ways to determine sleep quality is to ask your sleeping partner (if you have one) for their opinion. You may not know if you talk in your sleep, have restless legs or snore, but they certainly will. And if you are keeping them awake all night, chances are they’ll be more than happy to let you know about it.

If you do suffer from physical sleep disorders, the best thing to do is talk to your family doctor or health care practitioner to arrange for a sleep test to determine exactly what’s wrong, and what to do about it.

If, however, you can rule out culprits such as sleep apnea, or restless leg syndrome, then the next place to check for sleep saboteurs is in your pre-sleep routines. There are several ways that your actions in the hours before bedtime can keep you from getting the sleep you need. For example, drinking caffeine or alcohol will keep you up at night, as will eating midnight snacks high in sugar. Other actions that stimulate the brain before sleep are watching television, playing computer games, and even some medications.

Changing your pre-sleep routine to eliminate some of these habits may improve the quality of your sleep. Replacing them with mind-calming activities such as meditation or light reading can relax your body as well, making it easier to fall asleep and stay asleep long enough to get rested.

The bottom line is that only you know what a good night’s sleep is for you. It will vary from person to person, and even from year to year as you age. Babies and growing children need much more sleep to be fully rested than adults do. Creating healthy sleep habits will go a long way toward giving you the quality sleep you need to ensure the quantity is perfect for your needs.

When you’re trying to find ways to get better sleep one of the first things to do is create healthy sleep habits. Proper sleeping habits will not only help you get more restful sleep at night, they will also help you be more productive and energetic during the day.

Good sleep habits don’t just start in the bedroom. In fact, one of the best habits you can develop is to limit your use of stimulants such as caffeine, chocolate, and alcohol in the hours leading up to your bedtime. Sleep experts suggest that it’s a good idea to avoid these foods and drinks for at least four to six hours before trying to sleep.

By avoiding stimulants in the evening you are giving your brain time to slow down on its own. Even little things like turning off the television and the computer an hour earlier can have a positive impact on your sleep experience.

A second way to create good sleeping habits is to develop a consistent pre-sleep routine. What you do in the hour or two before you go to bed can determine the quality of sleep you will have. The whole idea of the pre-sleep routine is to train your mind and body to expect sleep at the end of it.

A pre-sleep routine is an individual experience so there is no right way to do it. You should experiment with different ideas to find out what works best for you. Some ideas you can try include:

• a warm bath to relax
• light yoga or stretching exercises
• meditation
• 20 to 30 minutes of light reading.

Consistency is the key to a successful routine. If you do the same things every night you will begin to associate the routine with sleep and by the time you’re done you will be ready to nod off.

Creating healthy sleep habits is one of the most important ways to help yourself get better sleep. By making sure that you are as relaxed as possible when you get into bed, you are taking the first step toward getting a good night’s sleep.

The environment in which you sleep can have a great impact on how you sleep. It’s no secret that if your bedroom has a calming and restive energy, you will sleep much better than if your bedroom consists of a mattress on the floor in the storage room.

Here are five easy ways you can create a healthy sleep environment:

1. Make sure that your bedroom is the right temperature for you.
Experts suggest that the ideal temperature for sleeping is between 65 and 70 degrees F. Everyone has their own comfort point though, so you should experiment with various temperatures to find what works best for you. (Just to give you an idea, my perfect sleep temperature is between 50 and 55 degrees F.)

2. Make sure that your bedroom is properly ventilated.
If you can, sleep with the window open at least a crack to allow the fresh air in.This makes it much easier for you to breathe while you’re sleeping.

3. Try and keep your bedroom as quiet as possible.
I know that if you live in a city, it’s pretty much impossible to shut out all the noises like traffic and neighbours. If you find yourself continually waking up to outside noises you can use ear plugs to get the silence you need to sleep well.

4. Try and keep your room as dark as possible.
In addition to keeping your room as quiet as possible, you should also keep it as dark as possible. This allows you to experience the full benefit of the day/night cycle. You can accomplish this by the use of heavy curtains or blinds to keep the light out. If that fails you can also try using an eye mask when you sleep.

5. Use your bedroom only for sleeping…
and of course, for sex. That means no television and no computer to keep your brain occupied. You want to train your body and mind to expect only sleep when you’re in this space.

These are just a few of the ways you can create the perfect sleep environment in your bedroom. By adopting any or all of these suggestions you can give yourself a better chance for a good night’s sleep.

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