After all the unpredictability that the outdoor conditions of July and August brought, here at fourfive, we can understand you pining for a bit less drama as we shift… dare we even say, downshift… into September. In fact, the coming months might even be an occasion for you to catch some winks, or at least, a few more than you might have been accustomed to getting in recent times.
Did you know that according to recent research, about a third of us only sleep for five to six hours a night? While there isn’t a single magic number for how many hours we should be sleeping, there is a consensus that about seven to eight hours is a good amount to aim at. Having said that, it is the quality of sleep that truly matters, rather than a specific number.
“Sleeptember”, by the way, is an annual awareness campaign by The Sleep Charity, aimed at promoting the benefits that a good night’s sleep can bring, and how one can sleep well. The campaign runs from 1st to 30th September 2023, and as leading providers of CBD for sleep in the UK here at fourfive, we are proud to throw our own weight behind it.
But why is it so crucial to sleep well each and every day, and what can you do to help make it a reality for you this autumn?
Sleeping well goes beyond simply feeling recharged the next day
You might imagine that the principal benefit of getting a good night’s sleep is that it will help you feel “raring to go” the next day – and of course, that is hardly an insignificant benefit.
However, achieving consistently good-quality sleep is also crucial for broader health and wellbeing. Someone who sleeps well, night after night, can expect to enjoy better brain performance, mood, and all-round health than someone who doesn’t. Meanwhile, poor-quality sleep is linked to a higher risk of health problems, ranging from obesity and dementia to stroke and cardiovascular disease.
And in today’s world, amid all the additional immediate distractions that smartphones, tablet computers, and similar technologies have brought us, it has arguably never been more crucial to concentrate specifically on achieving that great-quality sleep, time after time.
So, what steps can you take right now to help you sleep better?
When you know that you wish to improve your sleep quality, some measures for achieving this can be more obvious than others. Here, then, are a few that we would point you towards:
- Minimise your use of technology before bed. If you’re accustomed to scrolling your social media feeds in bed before attempting to drift off, the blue light emitted from your device will probably be interfering with your body’s circadian rhythms, including by suppressing the sleep-inducing hormone, melatonin, in the brain. This, in turn, is likely to prevent you from feeling sleepy. So, be sure to establish a healthy routine that has minimal contact with technology.
- Find alternative ways of winding down. If your current pre-bed routines don’t seem to be helping you to drift off, there’s nothing wrong with experimenting with something different. What about putting on some quiet, soothing music on the turntable instead of that social media “doomscrolling”, reading that biography you keep meaning to read, or enjoying a warm bath with relaxing scents? Others even find that it helps to make them feel sleeper if they precede their bedtime with gentle exercises, such as stretching and yoga. Complementing such activities with taking the right CBD products could further help you feel snoozy at the right time.
- Make the right nutritional choices for your brain health. As we touched on above, great-quality sleep is partly about enabling your brain to recover so that it can deliver its best performance during each and every day. This might also influence your choices on your diet and supplements; research has suggested that eating fish twice a week, for example, could drive down dementia risk by 41%, compared to eating fish once a month. It has been speculated that such benefits may have something to do with the high levels of Omega-3 contained in oily fish such as mackerel, salmon, and tuna. In addition, research has suggested that Omega-3 intake may help improve sleep quantity and quality.
- Take a daily biotic that will support your gut-brain axis and help lower stress levels. The existence of the term “gut feelings” alludes to the awareness that many of us already have of the physical and biochemical connection between the gut and the brain. Indeed, the term “gut-brain axis” refers specifically to the communication system between these two parts of the body. And according to research, probiotics (friendly bacteria) could play a key role in improving your gut health as well as, indirectly, your brain health. It is believed that probiotic supplementation can be key to enhancing sleep quality and relieving stress.
With our own online store at fourfive constituting one of the best sources of CBD for sleep in the UK, to say nothing of our other extensive stocks of vitamin supplements, bundles, and more, we have the premium-quality and independently tested supplements that can play a big role in supporting your health and wellness this “Sleeptember”.
So, why not shop now, to learn more about exactly what all the fuss is about, and to help make sure you catch more “Zs” over the coming months?
