Studies are showing, more than ever, that good sleep is essential to the proper functioning of the body and mind. In fact, good sleep hygiene is more important than ever, given how much time is currently devoted to electronic screens: an amount that shows no signs of diminishing. There are four surprising health benefits that will follow when good sleep hygiene and practices are kept.
Good Brain Function
Getting a good night’s sleep is vital for good brain function. When you are deprived of REM or Rapid Eye Movement sleep in particular, you can experience memory problems, difficulty concentrating, slower thought and social processing, and decreased productivity. Research is suggesting that sleep aids memory and learning in two main ways: when you’re sleep-deprived, you cannot learn efficiently because you have difficulty focusing your attention, and sleep is useful in consolidating the memory, vital for taking in new information.
Good Physical Health
Your body functions at its best when it has received a good night’s sleep. Even the health of the heart is improved by sleep, as it decreases stress and is involved in the repair and healing of the blood vessels and heart. Healthy sleep lets your body regulate levels of blood sugar better. Sleep deficiency has the result of higher blood glucose levels, which can put you at higher risk for diabetes. Proper sleep also keeps up the proper function of your immune system. Lack of sleep can also lead to instances of microsleep, or bursts of brief sleeping moments that happen when you are normally awake. This leads to dangerous accidents.
Good Skin Health
It may come as no surprise that good sleeping habits are good for the immune system, but you might be startled to hear how right the phrase ‘beauty sleep’ can be when it comes to your skin. While you are receiving your night’s sleep, your skin is replenished and repaired; made ready for a new day. Stages three and four of sleep are when your body makes HGH or human growth hormone. For every hour that you take away from the amount of healthy sleep you receive, you are creating that amount less growth hormone and it shows up in your skin, especially in that of your face.
Good Healthy Weight
Several studies are showing that sleep might be a key to your ability to manage a healthy weight. These studies link sleeping more to weighing less. One particular study of teenagers showed that every hour of lost sleep increased the odds of obesity. It is also a risk for people in other age groups. Sleep helps you to maintain a healthy balance of those hormones that cause you to feel full or hungry. The hungry hormones go up when you do not get enough sleep, and the full hormone levels go down.
Sleep deficiency is on the flip side of good sleep hygiene. It happens when you are out of sync with the natural clock of your body, you are not getting enough sleep in general, you do not sleep well or do not get through all the stages of sleep. Avoid sleep deficiency, which brings with it such complications as depression, chronic pain, loss of memory, and difficulty taking on new tasks with proper sleep hygiene, a good mattress, and healthy habits.
Author Bio: Paige Jirsa– I work with Top10.Today, a shopping comparison site, where we strive to help consumers find the best quality and priced products.