Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Life Makeover: Sleep

sleepWe all need it, 8 hours of sleep a night, but for some reason I am finding it difficult to give up each day to sleep.  I am staying up later and later and it has totally ruined all that I have done so far.  I wouldn’t even mind if I were productive in these hours but I merely read forums or watch tv.  Even then, that would be fine if it were the only time I got to do those things, but I am doing them during the day – it is holidays! 

And I think that is the problem, I don’t ‘have’ to get up to take the kids to school.  But want to wake up to go for a run in the mornings, I don’t like being tired – I am not doing anything with the kids because I am simply exhausted from going to bed at 3am, and waking at 7-8am.  I’m putting off getting dressed and ready in the morning so it is near lunch time before I am doing anything productive.  I get a bit of cleaning done but even then, because I haven’t gotten dressed, I can’t complete things – taking the rubbish out, hanging out washing, sweeping out the front, etc.

I’m not getting to the gym (I can barely function let alone workout), am only just keeping up with the habits I have laid out so far and not at all with the ‘eating dinner at the table’ habit!  So at this point I have to stop and take a reality check.. I need my sleep!

I’ve done a fair bit of research on sleep in the past, the layman type research anyway, and have learnt that one of the best ways to get into a good sleeping habit is to simply set your alarm and wake up at the same time everyday, no matter when you go to sleep.  At night, go to bed when you are tired, a warm shower a while before hand is good as it mimics the bodies drop in temperature, warm milk as well – there are proteins in milk that help to induce sleep.  I think tidying up my room might help as well and honestly, I really need a new mattress!  But I will start at the beginning by setting my alarm for 6am.  I think that is a good time to wake up each morning.  I will have the time to go for a run, come home and shower and dress, and have time to get the kids ready for school and get some housework done!  Bedtime would have to be 9pm –10pm to make sure I am getting enough sleep! 

Habit: Wake up at 6am no matter what!

1 comment:

  1. This is a great post! I am struggling with sleep and early wake ups, too, simply because my little girl is still does at least one nightly wake ups and I spend to much time late at night either zombied out on the couch on a really busy day or getting housework done. On a good day I wake up 5.30am and get my morning run done and dusted before breakfast. But on a bad day I can't wake up earlier than 7.30am, it's like my body won't let me. And then I fall into the pattern of postponing my workout till lunchtime, afternoon and then I don't get to it at all! I definitely need to get my "sleeping" act together. So thank you for posting this!

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