2 Nov 2016

Notes on Sleep

Since leaving home and going to university, sleeping has become more of a battle and less of a given; often erratic and occasionally non-existent until about 5am. A variety of factors has contributed to this and it comes in waves; sleeping is undoubtedly habitual for me. The main circumstances that hinder sleep are staying at somewhere other than my house, or the night before something out of routine (travelling the next day, an interview, an irregularly early start..). Combine this with late-nights over the weekend and you have a prominent lack of zzz's that can seriously affect morale. I think this is probably quite common and I'm far from an insomniac, but sleepless nights are becoming more of a regularity than I care for so naturally, I've started to develop remedies the next day, aside from the obvious (coffee, water and sugar in abundance)..

Sleep Spray


Sleep-spray is a debatable one; some swear by it and others are adamant it's a fad. I'm somewhere in-between; having read the reviews of the This Works Deep Sleep Pillow SprayI was quickly swayed into buying it and although I do think it helps sometimes with a sounder sleep, it's not quite powerful enough to put to sleep an active brain on a very restless night. If you are struggling to fall into a deep sleep and wake frequently through the night, this is definitely worth trying. Sleep anxiety, for me, begins the cycle of not being able to fall asleep, provoking worries of not sleeping at all and being a zombie the following day as a result. The spray has been clinically proven to reduce sleep anxiety and promote feeling fresher in the morning. 


Technical Difficulty
Winding down before sleep is becoming more and more difficult in the ever-evolving digital-age that we are encompassed in as a society. Binge-ing on the latest Netflix series or simply scrolling through Instagram in the dark (we're all guilty of it), we don't give ourselves a chance to switch off before expecting to fall into a deep-sleep. Reading before bed is a fail-safe way to give your body a chance to detach from the daily stresses you encounter through the day and let your mind finally relax. It also distracts you from over-thinking into sleep anxiety and lets your mind wander. Atmosphere is just as important; lighting candles on your bed-side table and switching on Spotify creates the kind of ambiance your body will thank you for. Diptyque's Vanille is my favourite candle at the moment, burning soothing, aromatic scents prior to bedtime and just generally looking dreamy.


Do Not Disturb
It's not only the laptop that is provoking a restless night. Switching on that little moon before you start to drift off is sometimes harder than it should be. I have always been reluctant to put my phone on do not disturb in the rare case of an important call, text or notification, but in reality there is not much you can be sent that is worth disrupting precious sleep and it is always harder to nod off again after you've started a blinding screen in the face. I've also stopped sleeping with my phone under my pillow to resist that temptation to check it every five minutes whilst you're meant to be switching off from technology for the day.. For me, breaking this habit dramatically improved my quality of sleep. 


Softening the After Effect
Taking on advice from the Kardashian's, eye-cream is one of the most important stages in your skincare routine; such a delicate area requires even more moisture than the rest of your face (it's the first area to show signs of ageing so naturally it's a vital part to target). The ideal eye-cream is one that contains caffeine to wake-up the area around your eye, reducing puffiness and stimulating collagen. Since using the Origins GinZing Eye Cream (which contains both coffee beans and natural optic brighteners) the delicate under-eye skin that is so affected by lack of sleep has looked much more radiant as a result. The skin is also much smoother therefore a lot easier to apply under-eye make-up  to disguise dark circles when necessary without it creasing and looking cake-y. I'm an eye-cream convert since buying this and hopefully the effort pays off in the long-term..



Ph. taken from Pinterest

xx
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