My Nightly Routine
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The magic of night
There are two metrics I use to measure my health: quality of sleep and quality of digestion. Funnily enough, they are closely related!
I used to have a terrible time sleeping. I would have trouble falling asleep as my brain thought about work. Then I’d wake up at 3am every morning and start thinking about work again. I’ve made some significant changes to my life that have made these issues a thing of the past. My night time routine has a huge part in helping me sleep, but so does changing my diet to BulletProof, making sure I get early morning sun, doing lots of exercise and yoga every single day, and not paying as close attention to stressful things outside my area of influence (like the news).
This post will cover my nightly routine!
My nightly routine changes a lot but a few things are always there:
1) Get my light right:
A few things I’ve done to my environment: I’ve changed out my light bulbs to the Lumi Sleep+ Red light.
I wear my Blue light blocking glasses all day and my Sleep+ blue light blocking glasses for the last two hours before bed.
I also *try* to get out into the sunset sun to get some of the red light into my system.
I also do get to see the early morning sun which helps my body sleep well that night. Read more in my Morning Routine blog post.
2) Don’t eat within 2 hours of bed
I try not to eat after sunset. Again, this isn’t always possible especially in the winter! But at least 2 hours before bed, I try not to eat anything.
Also I really try not to drink much alcohol. I recently got a subscription to Dry Farm Wines which sells very low sugar wine. These don’t interrupt my sleep! I only started getting them a month ago, but I love them so far.
Don’t eat fried ever… Fried food is like so terrible for your digestion! And don’t eat spicy food too late.
3) Drink my sleepy time hot chocolate one hour before bedtime. (Recipe below)
4) Stretch out
5) Lotions and chin/neck exercises (same ones from my morning routine)
6) Use my new BluBlox Hive Red and Infrared light box on my face
7) Write in my gratitude journal
These steps really help me get relaxed so that when I lay down I fall immediately to sleep. I rarely have any issues, but if I do, here are some sleep hacks that my good friends have taught me.
1) EMDR - My dear friend Beth taught me to move my eyes back and forth to calm my brain after a stressful day. This is the same technique that trauma victims are taught to avoid PTSD. For whatever reason it also works for falling asleep. I do this a lot if I remember to before I fall asleep.
2) Listen to a Night Time Story. I recently discovered these. Audible has some. I listened to one on the history of math. it put me right to sleep. The Calm app also has some. I’ve really enjoyed all that I’ve tried. I often listen while I am stretching out.
3) Design a house in your head. This is one my friends Leslie and Linda told me about. You design a house with dimensions and as many details as you can. I’ve tried it a few times when I used to wake up in the middle of the night.
During writing this post I actually got a new sensor to measure my sleep quality. It is called an Oura Ring. I only have had it for a few days so I’ll give more info once I’ve got it.
I hope these tips are beneficial to you. If you have more tips on sleep, please email them to me. I have lots of friends who have struggled with sleep and I will pass them on. bettworld at gmail
Sleepytime Hot Chocolate Recipe
Sleepytime Hot Chocolate Recipe
Here is a document that gives more info. https://www.bulletproof.com/sleep/sleep-hacks/the-top-6-ways-to-improve-your-sleep-using-food/
My specific recipes which I’ve been playing with.
1 TSBP Coconut oil or MCT
1 TSBP Ghee (refind butter or grassfed cow butter)
1 TSBP Raw Honey
a few shakes of sea salt (not exactly sure how much, but salt to taste as they say)
splash of goats milk (optional)
1 TSBP cacao powder
Splash of unsweetened vanilla extract
Hot water
Blend all this together in a blender or with a handheld blender for 20 seconds or more.
