Do you struggle to get the recommended seven to nine hours of sleep a night? You’re definitely not alone, as the Sleep Foundation reports that 35.2% of all adults in the U.S. sleep less than seven hours a night. To help those of us not catching enough Zs, BuzzFeed asked readers to share their best sleep hacks that actually make a difference and help them sleep. Some of the hacks are pretty surprising, and hopefully, they’ll really work:
- “One of the best tips I ever got was to never look at the time if you wake up in the middle of the night. It puts a stop to the 'Oh, no, only four hours until I have to get up' cycle.”
- “Separate blankets for hubby and me. And weighted blankets.”
- “Disposable self-heating eye masks are amazing!! Not only do they relax you, soothe tired eyes, and help relieve headaches, but they also give that extra push to inspire rest.”
- “If I’m having trouble falling asleep, I’ll flip around and put my feet toward the headboard and my head at the bottom of the bed. I usually fall asleep within minutes. I’ve done this my whole life and thought everyone did until my boyfriend woke up with my feet in his face and said it’s absolutely not normal.”
- “Counting sheep, but with a twist: I picture the sheep as random celebrities. It’s funny enough that I can focus but boring enough that it lulls me to sleep. Counting regular sheep is too boring, and it’s easy to be distracted.”
- “To keep my mind off stupid things that happened that day, I make up stories about characters from fairy tales. What is the origin story of the mirror in Snow White? I’ve made up dozens of them. Except I fall asleep before I write them down.”
- “The podcast Nothing Much Happens is my favorite thing to go to sleep to!! It almost always has me asleep before the end of the 20- to 30-minute episode.”
- “On nights that I can't turn my anxious little brain off, I play the alphabet game. I pick a random topic and try to think of something for each letter (like candy bars: Almond Joy, Butterfinger, Clark bar...). I rarely make it all the way to Z before I fall asleep.”
- “If I wake up and feel anxious, I put a wet flannel on my forehead. It's weird, but the cooling sensation seems to cool the negative thoughts in my brain.”
- “For some reason, when I wear blue-light-filtering glasses when I'm working (I work in IT, so I work on my laptop all day), I sleep so much better that night than days where I won't wear it.”
- Listening to songs in a language I can't understand helps to shut my brain off so I can fall asleep.”
Source: BuzzFeed
Scott's Thoughts:
- Tonight I’ll be counting celebrities as sheep, how about you?
- 3 MG of melatonin does it for me! Backup plan is Xanax.
- That whole counting thing never did anything for me.