19 Useful Tips To Help Moms Get Better Sleep

Getting good sleep is so important for Moms to stay healthy and positive. Author, Michelle Crouch, wrote this amazing post on Parents.com, listing 19 very useful tips and tricks to help Moms get good sleep. There's always great parenting advice and tips that every Mom should read on Parents.com. Here's a quick preview of this list:

1. Reserve the hour before bed for relaxing activities. Many moms and dads have a to-do list a mile long to tackle once the kids are asleep: laundry, bills, catching up on e-mails. “Parents tend to push, push, push until the minute they fall into bed, but if you're having trouble sleeping, that's not a good idea,” says Dr. Silberman, author of The Insomnia Workbook. Try to go to bed at the same time every night, and spend the hour beforehand reading, talking to your partner, or listening to soothing music. Avoid TV; it can get your mind going, and if the screen is too close the light will interfere with you falling asleep.

2. Put a white-noise machine in your baby's room. (Just don't have it on too loud.) For starters, it'll help your baby sleep, says chiropractor Robert Oexman, D.C., director of the Sleep to Live Institute in Joplin, Missouri. “But the real reason I advise this is that it masks the little noises they hear on the monitor of their baby sighing or rolling over in his crib. That's a wonderful thing.”

3. Curb screen time. Using a tablet, a computer, or a mobile phone within an hour of bed can throw off your circadian rhythms. If you must use a gadget, a recent Mayo Clinic study found that lowering the brightness and holding it at least 14 inches from your face will reduce its effect on your sleep. Another option, a blue-light filter to fit over your screen.

4. Try this yoga pose. The viparita karani, or legs-up-the-wall, pose puts the mind and body into a state of deep calm, says Juliana Mitchell, a yoga teacher in New York City. Before bed, lie on your back on the floor, and then extend your legs and rest them straight up against a wall. Stay in the position for five to 20 minutes with your eyes closed, noticing your breathing. (Avoid this pose if you have untreated high blood pressure, a propensity for blood clots, glaucoma, or other ocular issues.)

5. Eliminate all sources of light. Even a small amount suppresses the release of the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin and increases alertness for up to 90 minutes, research shows. Recent studies have found that the blue-wavelength light produced by electronic devices and many kinds of energy-efficient lightbulbs is especially disruptive. The glow of a TV screen, a phone, an alarm clock, or a baby monitor can all interfere with your snooze.

6. Use night-lights. “If you have to feed the baby or go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, never turn on the lights,” says Michael J. Breus, Ph.D., founder of TheSleepDoctor.com and a clinical psychologist in Scottsdale, Arizona, who specializes in sleep. “Light tells your brain to stop producing melatonin, so it will be much harder to get back to sleep.” Use a dim night-light or one that filters out the blue wavelength like those at lowbluelights.com.

7. Try “banana tea.” Dr. Breus, who has researched the links between diet and sleep, is a fan of this unusual drink. “Take a banana in its peel, cut off the top and bottom, put it in boiling water for three minutes and then put the hot water through a sieve,” he says. “You get three or four times more magnesium from drinking this than from just eating a banana, and it's very calming.” While banana tea hasn't been studied, a study published in the Journal of Research in Medical Sciences found that taking 500mg of magnesium daily significantly improved sleep quality and the ability to fall asleep.

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19 Useful Tips To Help Moms Get Better Sleep