The importance of sleep

THE IMPORTANCE OF SLEEP!!!

What else makes it difficult to be a mother?

Are you affected by a short fuse? Do you have difficulties focussing? Is your immune system ‘ruined’ and do you get sick or feel unwell at the slightest circumstance?

This could be caused by your sleeping pattern, or lack thereof!

The reason why you don’t sleep well or not enough can differ tremendously and could be contingent on the (life)stages of your child(ren).

If you have very young children, then these sleepless nights should sound familiar! Regularly having to get out of bed in the middle of the night to feed or burp them, change their diapers or replace a pacifier…

But even when your children grow up, your sleep could still be interrupted. An accident that leads to you changing your child and refreshing the bedsheets in the middle of the night. When children get sick, they are not the only ones waking up – so are you. This could be to comfort, to reassure, to clean, to give out medication, etc.

Your son or daughter might suffer from nightmares or terrifying dreams – which means that you are always on stand-by, right?!

This is why a good night’s sleep is of paramount importance!

Sleep deprivation influences your biological rhythm and could thereby also influence your sense of hunger, sleep and alertness, your blood pressure, your hormones, your mental clarity and your immune system.

A good night’s sleep ensures that you make better decisions.

Waking up too early leads you to become a ticking emotional time bomb. This is because your mind processes experiences in the so-called REM sleep cycle, which makes the impact less intense. But this is the sleep that gets interrupted and puts you emotionally off balance.
Getting a good night’s sleep allows you to learn quicker and remember things for longer – this is an accurate explanation for the reason behind your brain turning into a sieve…

It’s not an optimistic picture!

If you have had a bad night, I have a few short-term tips I can share with you:
– Drink plenty of water, preferably fresh. And avoid coffee.
– Do breathing exercises for more air.
– Ensure you see enough daylight: go outside when you can and ensure that you let in as much light as possible.
– Catch up on your lack of sleep. BUT… do it right, in a way that actually does work.

Would you like to know? Click HERE

It would of course be great if you didn’t have to deal with the consequences but could tackle the (root) cause head-on!

Sleeping with earplugs, turning off the baby monitor and just letting your child lie when they are crying and need a parent? NO, this is not the solution. But… don’t you have a partner with whom you could split these tasks? And when your batteries are drained, you could agree that you could sleep through the night for a few of nights in a row and that your partner could take over all these tasks.

It is also possible to rely on parents, parents-in-law, brothers, sisters or friends that could all pitch in. As this is not a constant in their lives, the burden will be less significant for them. Give them the short-term tips to catch up on a lack of sleep and they will survive the night

And remember that you should be kind to yourself! If your energy level is low, expect less from yourself. Let it be, switch off the ‘have to’ compulsion, maybe even skip one of the five basic food groups for once and make it easier on yourself. Get some rest, do something fun (relax), give your body and mind a boost and order in.