Christian Healthy Lifestyle 

David Sandstrom 0:08
Welcome to the holistic health matters podcast where it's all about maximizing your health potential in body, mind and spirit, so that you can pursue the abundant life more effectively. I'm your host, David Sandstrom, Naturopathic Doctor and Biblical Health Coach and this is episode number seven.

This episode is the second part of a two part masterclass on sleep. If you haven't already listened to part one, I suggest you go back and listen to episode six now. Today we're going to talk about effective tips for getting a better night's sleep. Imagine waking up every morning feeling refreshed and well rested, ready to face the day instead of groggy and feeling like you need a couple more hours of sleep. In this masterclass, I'm going to share some tips to help you do just that. There's gonna be a lot of tips here and I don't want you to feel like you have to implement every single one of these recommendations I don't even do all of this… Just implement the things that you feel are pertinent to you… or that you can benefit the most from and don't worry about the rest the last thing I want you to do is to get overwhelmed and give up before you even get started making some manful changes to your lifestyle. Because it's a masterclass is going to be a lot of information here. And it's probably worth listening to this episode twice. And you may want to take notes. I know when I'm listening to a great podcast, I often wish I had the ability to take notes, but I'm usually listening on the go in my car or some type of activity maybe at the gym, so I can't take notes and I'm often frustrated. So what I've done is I've created some cliff notes that you can get if you go to my website, DavidSandstrom.com, and in the show notes for this episode episode Seven, you can download a PDF of the pertinent notes that you wish you could have jotted down while you're listening. In the show notes for every episode, you can always read the full transcript online or download the transcript and take it with you and read it later. Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. Please ensure that you're taking tables and seat backs are in their full upright and locked position. Electronic devices turned on this masterclass is ready for takeoff.

People that have not yet tuned into natural and holistic health will be tempted to go to the doctor and get some sleeping pills if they're having difficulty with their sleep. But it's a good idea to avoid sleeping pills; they been been shown to be highly addictive. They can cause daytime drowsiness, dizziness, headaches, and they can even cause digestive difficulties such as irritable bowel syndrome and alike. So it's a good idea if you can avoid sleeping pills to do to do just that. So I suggest that we start preparing for sleep during the day. One of the ways we can do that is to reduce our alcohol consumption, especially in the evening. Alcohol may help us fall asleep, but it interferes with our ability to stay asleep and it will disrupt our sleep later in the night. So, it's a good idea to limit alcohol consumption or avoided altogether if you can if you're having trouble sleeping, and if you are going to consume a beer or glass of wine, do it earlier in the day, as opposed to before you go to bed. Another fairly obvious tip is avoid caffeine, after noontime. If you need a cup of coffee in the morning, go ahead. That's something that's a ritual that most people do enjoy. But I suggest that you don't have any caffeine consumption afternoon time if you're having difficulty sleeping. Another fairly obvious tip is if you're having difficulty sleeping, you'd want to limit your daytime naps. Now, if you are not having difficulty sleeping naps are encouraged. But if getting to sleep at night is a problem for you. You may want to consider not doing the naps in the afternoon should help with your ability to fall asleep. Also exercise. If you exercise during the day, it brings on better deeper motivation. To sleep, but you don't want to exercise within two hours of, of hitting the hay. Another thing that we can do to prepare for sleep during the day is to get sunlight on our skin, especially your face during the day. The pineal gland which is responsible for the production of serotonin and melatonin, which help us to relax and sleep is located near our foreheads and it responds to daylight and darkness. So we want to stimulate the pineal gland with sunlight during the day, and then let it respond to the darkness at night and help pump out serotonin and melatonin preparing us for sleep. So one of the ways that we can help prepare for sleep during the day is to get outside and get some sunlight on our skin, especially our face.

Another thing we can do to prepare for our bedtime rest is to avoid eating within three hours of bedtime. Eating that close to bedtime can sometimes interfere with our ability to relax and explore peaceful sleep, especially if we're consuming foods that we have food sensitivity to. So I'm going to be talking a little bit about food sensitivities later. Another thing we could do to prepare for sleep is avoid exercise within two hours of going to sleep. Exercise is actually a form of stress, good stress, but it will increase our cortisol levels and high cortisol levels at night are not conducive to a good night's rest. Our cortisol goes through a rhythm. It spikes around eight o'clock in the morning and stays very high between 8am and noon time and that helps us get going in the morning. It helps wake us up and gives us alertness and motivation. But then afternoon time, it starts to taper off. And our levels of cortisol especially start to decrease around 8pm preparing us for sleep so we have low cortisol in the evening. And high cortisol especially in the morning, in the afternoon, and it goes through a cycle that will help our circadian rhythm sync. So being aware of those activities such as exercise that will spike cortisol is a component of preparing or getting us ready for a good night's sleep. Another thing we could do to prepare for a good night's rest is to stay away from electronics in the evening. Electronics such as computer screens, phones, tablets, televisions, have blue light that interferes with our production of melatonin. Again, the pineal gland responds to light and darkness and we want to move towards darkness at night. So one of the ways we can do that is to stay away from the electronics in the evening after dinner. That's not possible for some people. What you can do if you need to use your computer or your cell phone is if it has the capability, put it on night mode, and that will limit the amount of blue light that the screens emit, which will help with your sleepiness. Blue Light is stimulating and it helps to keep us awake. One of the things you can do is you can blue blocker glasses. Amber colored glasses will filter out blue light and keep it from reaching your eyes. And that can help us with our sleep. There's a study I found published in the Journal of psychiatric research in 2018. And participants wore blue blocker or clear glasses for two hours before bedtime for one week. And here's what they found. Overall quality and soundness of sleep were significantly higher in amber versus clear lenses. So buying a pair of blue blocker glasses and wearing them two hours before bed could be very helpful, especially if you're having difficulty falling asleep. They're pretty inexpensive to buy. This is part of the low hanging fruit. And I'll put a link in the show notes to quality pair that I think you might find useful.

Okay, moving on from the daytime preparation for sleep. Now let's talk about turning our bedrooms into a sanctuary. You want your bedroom to be a peaceful place that's conducive for sleep. One of the first things we can do and this is completely free, is remove the clutter. If your bedroom is a mess, your your bureau or your nightstand is full of junk... clean it up. Get that stuff out of there and it'll bring it'll bring on a more restful state of mind if you remove the clutter. Since our bedrooms should be a sanctuary, I recommend not having a desk or an exercise machine in there, make the bedroom a place where you sleep and have interaction with your spouse or other family members but don't do work in there. And don't exercise in there. If at all possible, find another place in the house for that or go to the gym. Another thing and I know this is difficult for some is keep the TV off. Or better yet, just take it out of your bedroom. Now, I know that's going to be difficult for some. If you just need to watch some TV before going to bed. I highly recommend not watching the evening news. Those news shows those media outlets they are experts in getting us wound up. When it comes to the news at night, just say no. Get your news in the morning and I recommend limiting your exposure to the news throughout the day. I like to I like to limit my my news consumption to 15 to Max 30 minutes a day. I used to do a lot more but I found it to be a very, very stressful practice. Another thing you could do to turn your bedroom into a sanctuary is bring in some indoor houseplants, they add beauty and they also supply oxygen so they can increase the quality of the air that you're breathing at night. A couple of good plants for indoor use are Peace Lily, also Philodendron and any type of Fern are good houseplants.

Another thing we can do to turn our bedroom into a sanctuary that's more conducive for sleep is turn the thermostat down a little bit. Studies have shown that a temperature around 70 degrees is probably Ideal for most people for sleep. Our core body temperature needs to drop upwards of a couple of degrees at night in order for a restful sleep to take place. So if our bodies are struggling to cool down, that can make it quite difficult to enjoy productive sleep. Another thing you can do along the lines of creating a sanctuary is has some soft music available. Dim the lights and the ideal light for the bedroom in the evening would be candlelight. Another thing you can do is set up your room for complete darkness. Ideally, you don't want to be able to see your hand when you put it right in front of your face. Now this is a big deal. Don't underestimate this. Again, our bodies are designed to be awake and alert during the daylight hours and drowsy and sleepy at night when it's dark out. Remember in order to maximize our health potential we need to align our lives more closely with gods ideal design for spirit mind and body. Here we have an obvious indicator as to what at least part of that design is… Awake during the daylight hours and sleeping at night in darkness. As an airline pilot for the last 30 plus years I've learned a thing or two about how to get good rest in a hotel room and a lot of times hotel rooms are very bright. They'll They'll have light coming in from the hallway underneath the door. So one of the things I'll do is I'll take a bath towel, roll it up and stick it on the gap between the door and the carpet. And that helps to darken the room a great deal. And I also carry a roll of black electrical tape with me to cover up lights from the television or especially the smoke detectors. Sometimes they can have some pretty bright strobe-like lights on them and it's very, very irritating when you try to sleep. Another source of light in hotel rooms is either street lights or daylight coming in through gaps in the curtains. So I carry some clips with me clothesline clip or something like that. And I clip the curtains together to lessen the gaps that can be quite useful as well. And also sometimes unplugged the clock radio or at least throw a pillow over it to make it darker.

The things we've talked about up to now or more or less free, but this recommendation is going to have a little bit of a price tag but not not too bad really, is buy some blackout curtains. I installed some blackout curtains in our bedroom from that I've got on Amazon from a company called Nicetown. And they're very good quality and super effective at blocking out the light, especially even even bright daylight. You have to install them with a curved curtain rod because if you put it on a standard curtain rod, there's going to be a gap there between the curtain and the wall. I installed these curved curtain rods that take the blackout curtain and wrap it around and it almost touches the wall and they're very, very effective and surprisingly inexpensive. Again, I'll put some links in the show notes to both of those items. They're a worthwhile investment for sure. Another thing you want to think about is reducing the noise levels in your bedroom. Now if you live on a noisy street or neighborhood, you might want to consider picking up some of those foam earplugs. You can get them at the drugstore. We use them around the airports all the time while we're out doing our walk around inspection on the airplane. It gets quite loud out there on the ramp. And you really need hearing protection to protect your ears out there. And they're quite good. You roll them up between your index finger and your thumb, put them inside your ear and it will block out a lot of noise and I, I will sometimes use those when I'm napping during the day even at home. low noise environment is very conducive to a better night's sleep. If you have a noisy sleeping environment and you don't like the ear plugs or you find them uncomfortable another thing you can implement is some type of white noise. There are a number of apps available for your phone where you can listen to the surf or a flowing stream or a campfire…those types of things. I’ve found white noise can be very useful in a noisy room such as in a hotel. Even if you're not a noisy room you may find those sounds enjoyable and a useful adjunct to your nighttime routine. Another thing we can do, just expanding upon the spa like atmosphere, is this going to cost a little bit of money as well buy an essential oil diffuser. You can get those fairly inexpensively too, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't get the really cheap ones. You want to spend somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 to $75 on one and you put a little water in a few drops of essential oil like lavender, and doing that type of aroma therapy can really help induce quality sleep.

Another thing that I suggest you do for a better night's sleep is to implement some strategies. One is establish a bedtime routine Ideally, you want to go to bed and wake up at the same time every day, even on the weekends. Our bodies thrive on routine. I know that's impossible to do all the time. But that should be your goal. If you go to bed at the same time, you'll wake up at the same time every day without an alarm clock. And by the way, waking up without an alarm clock is a much healthier way to go. It's very stressful to wake up to an alarm clock. Instead of TV at night, set some time aside to talk with your spouse. Ask them about their day. What can you pray about for them, it's easier to let go of our stress when we get the focus off of ourselves. And relational connectedness is very health producing so it also will help us to shift gears. If we have a routine we set some time aside each evening to talk with one another. It's something that's healthy to do all the time, but it can also help us establish a good routine and put us in a better frame of mind for falling asleep. Another thing we can do with our bedtime routine to help us shift gears is to read. Of course, I would recommend reading The Bible. That's one of the best things you can read. But if you enjoy novels or something relaxing is a great idea to help bring on more restful sleep. Another thing you can do, and this is pretty huge, his journal, by writing your thoughts down in the evening, it gives you permission to let it go until tomorrow. One of the reasons why people have difficulty sleeping. This is true for me, especially when I'm flying and at work, is I have repetitive thoughts that I can't let go of. And I'm thinking about the day I'm thinking about what I'm going to be doing tomorrow, or maybe a difficult conversation I'm going to have tomorrow. If you journal and write those things down. You give yourself permission to let those things go and let tomorrow worry about itself. So this is a really huge strategy for reducing our stress levels, and preparing us for a better night's sleep. Now, the thing you probably guessed it is I would recommend prayer. in prayer we acknowledge that we're not in control God is. So I like to pray a prayer that goes something like this, I give everyone and everything to you God. Again, it helps me let things go. And that helps put me in a better frame of mind for falling asleep. Another thing you can do for your bedtime routine is take a bath, or you could receive a massage from your spouse. Now, the thing that's been proven to help bring on restful sleep, is to have sex. And something that goes along with that is to sleep naked. couples that sleep in the raw have been shown to have higher levels of oxytocin in their systems, which is a love hormone, which will also help bring on a more restful, peaceful, relaxed state of mind. Another thing I recommend in your bedtime routine is to get to sleep by 10pm or 11 at the latest. One of the reasons for that is our adrenal glands recharge between 11pm and 1am. If we're not asleep during that time, we miss out on a very important daily opportunity to recharge and increase our energy levels in the morning. And remember from last episode, we talked about the deep stages of sleep stages three and four. Well, those stages are longer before midnight. That's one of the best reasons for getting to sleep earlier is that you get more productive, deep sleep. Our deep sleep cycles start out longer and get shorter as the night progresses. So that's a really good reason to get between the sheets before 10 or 11. Another thing you can do is do some deep breathing. You can inhale through your nose slowly and exhale. through your mouth, the exhale should be shorter than the inhale. And this stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system which is our rest and digest side of the autonomic nervous system.

Deep breathing is especially effective if you combine it with progressive muscle relaxation or PMR. progressive muscle relaxation will help us let go of physical tension and has been demonstrated to greatly reduce sleep latency in other words to reduce the time it takes to fall asleep. muscle relaxation can not only help you fall asleep, but it can increase the benefit from sleep as well. I found an interesting study from 2015 looking at night eating syndrome or any s.

In this study, they divided people into three groups. One group got education only another third got progressive muscle relaxation. And the last third got progressive muscle relaxation or PMR plus exercise. What the researchers found was that all other participants reduced their night eating. But they also experienced a reduction in depression, anxiety, and perceived stress. Everyone knows that lowering our anxiety and stress levels will bring on better sleep. Here's the more significant part of the study. The group that had the most reduction in stress was the group that did progressive muscle relaxation only. So this study speaks to the effectiveness and the value of doing progressive muscle relaxation. So you might be saying, right, but now well, what is that, Dave, I've never heard of that before. Well, here's how it works. You start with the lower body and work your way up. While inhaling, you contract a muscle group. Let's say you start off with the calves, and you hold that tension for five to 10 seconds. You do that while you're inhaling, and then you exhale And quickly release the muscle tension. Then you're relaxed for 10 to 20 seconds, and then you move on to another muscle group maybe move on to the thighs from there. When you're releasing the tension, you focus on the physical changes you feel. And you gradually work your way up the body contracting and relaxing muscle groups. You finish with neck and head, and you can repeat if you want. Again, this technique has been demonstrated in the published medical literature to have dramatic effects and dramatic impacts on the quality of people's sleep. You can even take your progressive muscle relaxation to the next level by using mental visualization. Now, visualization is a gift from God. There is a strong mind body connection associated with it as well. visualization helped many Nazi concentration camp survivors make it out Live. So this is a powerful technique. To use visualization for stress reduction, you could use your mind's eye and imagine a full bathtub, the water represents the stress you're carrying. Now, open the drain and watch the water flow out. Imagine your stress is getting sucked down and removed by the little Whirlpool as it proceeds down the drain. As the water level gets lower, it represents your level of stress being reduced. Or you could imagine stress leaving your body like bubbles rising from a glass of champagne. Or imagine an Alka Seltzer tablet and a glass of waters dissolving. The tablet represents your stress. And as the bubbles rise, the tablet gets smaller and smaller until eventually disappears

by using these types of visualization techniques along with your progressive muscle relaxation It's a one two punch and it can really help change the dynamic of the way you approach your sleep. quick story. I used to live in Florida grew up down there, and I lived in the Fort Lauderdale area. And I got my restricted driver's license or learner's permit when I was 15. And I actually drove a motorcycle on the road. So this is before I had my license. So I'm thinking I was about 14 years old, I think was to put me at probably ninth grade. One day I got off the school bus and decided you know what, I don't feel like going to school today. So I just started walking towards the beach and I found myself at the beach about an hour later, and I laid down on the sand. I took my shirt off and use it as a pillow. And I just absorbed the sunlight and the warmth, the sand underneath me and I actually enjoyed the little bit of sweat rolling down my temple area. And it was a very relaxing day for me. And I remember that day I got got into a little bit of trouble when I got home when they my parents found out that I'd skipped school. But I held on to that scene, because it was so enjoyable and so relaxing for me. And without knowing anything about visualization, or anything about natural and holistic health, I would imagine that seen in my mind, as I was going to sleep at night, I found that to be a very useful tool to bring on restful sleep and fall asleep more quickly. So I did that for years. And now, my wife will tell you, I don't have any trouble going to sleep now because I practice that for many years, I almost don't even need the scene anymore. I can just close my eyes and go to sleep. In an amazingly short period of time. My wife is amazed at how easily I can fall asleep. And I believe that that's probably one of the reasons why because I use that tranquil scene in my mind for many years. So I encourage you to implement something like that in your nighttime routine.

One last thing about progressive muscle relaxation. It not only helps you fall asleep, but it will help you tune into your body and help you to become more aware of the signals your body is giving you to let you know when you're being affected by stress. Have you ever been in a stressful situation and you realize, Wow, my neck is super stiff right now. That's your body trying to communicate with you to say, Hey, we're stressed. I'm wishing you would do something about it. So by practicing progressive muscle relaxation, you become more aware and tuned in to where you're holding on to that stress. And when you need to do something about it. It's very useful. Okay, ramping things up a little bit. We're going to talk about some of the things that we can do that may cost a little money or a little more work. One of the things you should pursue is to reduce the amount of emf in your bedroom. EMF stands for electromagnetic frequencies, some people called electromagnetic fields. So we're constantly bombarded with electromagnetic frequencies all day long. We sure don't want to have them peaking in our bedroom because they will interfere with sleep. Where does EMF come from? Well, it comes from our cell phones comes from the clock radio. It comes from the television set or perhaps a modem in the room. Something like that comes from the electrical wiring in the walls, comes from the ceiling fan. So if you really wanted to get serious about this, you could actually go out to your circuit breaker panel and turn off the breaker in your bedroom at night and just have no electricity in your room whatsoever. That could be a real breakthrough for you if your body is struggling with these electromagnetic frequencies. When I was living in Florida in October of 2005, Hurricane Wilma hit South Florida and the ayah. That storm came directly over our house. And we're without power for a couple of days. But it was a quick moving storm, some of these hurricanes kind of Park on top of you and hang out and it's pretty miserable. But Wilma kind of went through relatively rapidly, but we lost power. And being was in late in hurricane season in October, we actually had some cool air behind it. And we open the windows. And I slept that first night, better than I'd slept in years. And I started talking to some of my neighbors and they said the same thing. They said, Wow, I slept so good last night with no power, no air conditioning. And I believe one of the reasons for that is that we just reduced the level of the electromagnetic frequencies in our homes, and it was very beneficial to our rest. So one of the things you can do, I mean, it's hard to shut down all power in your room, but you could shut down the Wi Fi at night. You don't need the Wi Fi while you're sleeping. So I would recommend using a power receptacle with a timer on it. So that you can just have the thing automatically turn off at, say 10 or 11pm when you don't need it, and you can have it turned back on at six in the morning. That way, you'll reduce some of the EMF in the room. Move your alarm clock further away from the bed, you know, maybe within arm's reach if you need it, but at least three feet away would be a good idea. Put your cell phone on airplane mode. And again, don't watch TV in bed. It's not just about the blue light. Those TVs those big screens emit an awful lot of electromagnetic frequencies as well.

So ramping it up a bit more. One of the things to consider his food sensitivities. Now we've all heard about food allergies, one of my daughters is actually allergic to peanuts, and that's where you have an idg reaction and you'll get hives or, even worse, nF alactic. If you are exposed to that allergen, well, the food sensitivity has an immunoglobulin reaction, but it's not as pronounced as a full blown allergy. So they're more subtle and we see most of the time are not aware of the food that is actually affecting us. So if you're consuming a food that you're sensitive to on a regular basis, it could be interfering with your sleep. So that begs the question, Well, how do I learn what my food sensitivities are? Well, the best test out there is called mediator release test. And it's by Oxford biomedical laboratories. And what they do is they have a patented method, they measure the pro inflammatory cytokine release from our white blood cells. So you have to go to a lab and give them blood and they spin it in a centrifuge and separate the white blood cells in the plasma from the from the red blood cells, and you send it off to them and they expose those cells to a whole bunch of different foods, and they monitor those white blood cells for pro inflammatory cytokine release. This lets us know if you're sensitive to that food. It's a really great test. I'll put a link to their website in the show notes. And we're actually going to have Ethan Mitchell, the Director of Marketing for Oxford biomedical laboratories on the podcast here in a couple of weeks. So I'm looking forward to that show. Again, I'll put a link in the show notes for their website. Another thing you can do is sleep on an organic mattress. If you're sleeping on a regular boxspring mattress, all that metal underneath your body is acting like an antenna, attracting electromagnetic frequencies to your bed, so you're much better off sleeping on a rubber organic mattress. Another reason for sleeping on an organic mattress is if it's not organic, your mattress is soaked with flame retardant chemicals, namely antimony. There is a YouTube video again, I'm going to put a link to this in the show notes. I encourage you to go They're in watch it. The video is pretty shocking. It's a test of how they certify a mattress as being flame retardant. The standard used to be if you dropped a lit cigarette on the mattress, it couldn't catch on fire. Well now it's about a three foot long blowtorch. And in this video, they turn this blowtorch on for a couple of minutes. And when the flame stops, the mattress just smokes a little bit and it's not on fire. It's crazy. I can't imagine the amount of chemicals that must be on that mattress to keep it from igniting. So the reducing your chemical load is a great reason for sleeping on an organic mattress again, we spend a third of our lives in bed asleep. So you want to take this stuff seriously now buying an organic rubber mattress is not cheap. A king sized mattress is probably cost you upwards of $3,000 but you can find some other alternatives that are Natural that meet the flame retardants standard. The way they do it with an organic mattress is the fabric is tightly knit wool. And that will not ignite very easily at all. So I think they can meet the flame retardant standard without the chemicals. That's a huge reason to be sleeping on an organic mattress. By the way, there are a lot more comfortable as well.

I'm going to put a link in the show notes to a good source for organic mattresses. Another thing you can do is consider buying earthing mattress coverings. There's a reason why everyone enjoys a barefoot walk on the beach, especially by the water because our bodies are designed to make contact with the earth. And when we do we get grounded. Again I mentioned earlier that we are constantly exposed to a myriad of electromagnetic frequencies throughout the day, from radio frequencies television antennas, cell phones. Bones, you name it. Our bodies need to detox from that EMF. And the way we do that is we ground with the earth. Well, this company called earthing, they've developed a mattress cover that you can actually connect with a wire to the ground outlet in your house. Or you can connect straight to a grounding rod installed outside the house. This is really a pretty little known but huge thing you can do to benefit sleep. When you sleep on a grounded bed. You sleep deeper, more soundly. One of the things that they've proven with research is that you will help normalize your cortisol rhythm and we talked about the cortisol rhythm earlier. Well, you don't want your cortisol high during the night. If you sleep on a grounded mattress, it helps to establish the rhythm of high cortisol in the morning, less than the afternoon and much less than evening. Just that one fact alone is worth considering. Some of these products also, it acts like powerful dose of antioxidants when you're grounded. It's like taking a handful of antioxidant pills while you're sleeping. There are all kinds of health benefits to sleeping on a grounded mattress. I have one at my home, I have one that I travel with, and I put it on my bed at hotel rooms. And it helps me sleep I get much more productive, better sleep when I'm sleeping grounded, highly recommended. Again, I will put a link in the show notes to their website, you can check them out as well. Another thing to consider for a better night's sleep is our spiritual condition. I put fear in the category of nurturing the spirit. Fear plays a significant role in insomnia. And the Bible says in Proverbs chapter three, verse 24. When you lie down, you will not be afraid. When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. Now in common Text what this passage is talking about is embracing and being obedient to the Word of God, which will always reduce your stress levels. But here it says it's gonna reduce your level of fear. And that will bring on better, more sweet sleep. So the contrast is also true. If we are afraid if our fears heightened, our sleep will not be sweet. So dealing with fear and anxiety is for some people an extremely important component of getting a good night's sleep. I've got a chapter in my book on this and I've made it available as a free download, and I'm going to put that in the show notes as well. If you go to my website, David Sandstrom calm for this episode, you'll be able to download a PDF version of that chapter.

And other first Bible has to say about fear is second Timothy one seven. For God has not given you a spirit of fear but of power. Love a sound mind, there's a lot to say on fear. We don't have time in this episode to really treat the subject for what it deserves. We're going to have some more episodes on this in the future. But for now, I recommend downloading that free chapter and reading it. It's a it's it's worth reading. And it's it could be the ingredient for a better night's sleep for you. One of the last things I want to say about strategies is, if you're a snore, you may be experiencing sleep apnea and not even know it. Sleep apnea, as most know, is a lack of oxygen while you're sleeping. When your muscles relax, your throat tends to close up, your tongue falls back in your mouth a little bit and you snore, and your breathing can be obstructed to the point where you're limiting your oxygen intake and it wakes you up at night. Now if you suspect that you have sleep apnea, it's best to get that treated by a medical doctor. But if you just have an issue with snoring, I recommend a product that's a tongue sleeve. I use this my And it's I used to snore quite a bit but this thing virtually eliminated my snoring. What it is, is it looks a little bit like a pacifier and you squeeze it, you stick your tongue inside and let go and it creates a little bit of a suction and it pulls your tongue forward and keeps it from falling back in your throat and prevents you from snoring. You can test this out right now, just stick your tongue out and try to make the snoring sound with your nose. It's it's really difficult to do. When your tongue is forward this thing really works. Just a word of caution. If you try for an attitude, you might not like it because it does take a little getting used to. One of the things that helps me Makes my lips make a seal on this thing is I make sure I put some lip balm, of course natural and organic on my lips and it helps make the seal that is required for the device to work properly. Again, this may take a little getting used to if you pick one up I recommend that you give it at least a couple of weeks before you determine if it's right right for you. It's very useful. Again, a highly recommended device. I'll put a link in the show notes to that product as well. Well, one more thing I'd like to talk about in I know a lot of you have been waiting for this and that is the supplements we can take for better night's sleep. We already talked about getting off the sleeping pills. We don't we don't want to go there. So forget sleeping pills. That's not the answer. Another thing that's quite popular these days, but is better avoided, in my opinion, is melatonin. Melatonin, I'm surprised that you can buy it without a prescription because it's a hormone. And like any hormone, when you take it artificially, the body has ways of measuring how much of that hormone is going around the system. And if you have plenty of it, the body says oh, we need to reduce our production of that particular hormone and it will. Well once you do that, you have a hard time getting off of that supplementation because your production is reduced. So it messes up The normal rhythm and cycle to your melatonin production by taking it artificially. That's not to say you couldn't take it once in a while when you're traveling internationally or that kind of thing is not a bad idea. But you don't want to take melatonin on a regular basis, take it judiciously. My favorite product for a good sleep is a product called rescue sleep. And it's a homeopathic you can get it at Whole Foods or almost any health food store. It's very common. What does is the mechanism of action is it helps you let go of those racing thoughts. And if that's your struggle with sleep, then rescue sleep is going to help you a great deal. And because it's homeopathic, it is non toxic, you can give it to a child, even a baby. And there are no side effects and it's a great product. I always keep a bottle on hand. I frequently use it when I'm traveling because after flying all day, it's sometimes difficult for me to let go of the of the day's activity and what took place in the airplane. So I use rescue sleep now and then when I needed it, it's a great product. I'll put a link in the show notes for rescue sleep as well. Another product worth considering is the essential oil lavender. I like to take now you can't use essential oils 100% they have to be diluted in something maybe it's olive oil, maybe it's coconut oil, but find a good product, find a good supplier and you can put a couple of drops on the palms of your hand, rub them together. And then cup your nose and your mouth and breathe deeply. That is a good way to get the essential oil into your system. You can also put a couple drops on your feet and rub it in.

That'll get the lavender into your system very quickly and lavender is helps with the relaxation and will help bring on better sleep. It's it's a great combination with rescue sleep actually. Most of the time All I need is rescue sleep when I need something but lavender is is a good product as well. Another supplement that can help with sleep is magnesium. Magnesium is used for countless bodily processes. And if you're low in magnesium, you could have difficulty relaxing and falling asleep. So that's a supplement with considering that we'll take it in the evening if you're going to try it. Another one is five HTP. Five HTP is five hydroxy tryptophan. Now, you can't just take tryptophan and expect it to work because it won't be absorbed by the body very efficiently. But the form five hydroxy tryptophan is far more bioavailable. So if you are having difficulty falling asleep, I would recommend taking five HTP maybe 20 to 30 minutes before bedtime. And what it does is it helps the body increase serotonin output, which then is converted into melatonin, which is beneficial for sleep. So if you think you might be having trouble with hormonal disruption Or a neurotransmitter issue. Five HTP is a product worth considering. Another product would be valerian root. My favorite brand of valerian root is made by a company called neutral medics. And they call their product M and Tia. And their products are have a proprietary enhancement process. So it takes it's not just a normal valerian root, its enhanced to be more effective and more bioavailable. And the same is true with kameel. Genetics has a product a cameo product called a buena, and they're both used for sleep, and very, very effective. And new genetics has one more product that I would recommend for sleep, and it's melatonin, believe it or not. The reason why I like the new hermetics brand is that their products are so bioavailable that you need far less of that substance to make it effective. So a normal dose of melatonin that you might pick up at the health food store. would be three milligrams dose of melatonin from pneumatics products has like one half of one milligram. So you're taking one six the amount of melatonin as you would in a standard melatonin product. Again, I wouldn't even take that one on a regular basis. But if you're traveling internationally, are you having real difficulty with sleep? This is a good product. This is a good melatonin product. And if you're really having difficulty sleeping, if you have neurotransmitter issues or something along those lines, you can take all three of these products together. That would be new dramatics. mmta, the boonah and melatonin. I consider these products, the big guns, these are only if the techniques and the routines that we've been talking about on the show here haven't worked up to that point, then I would consider something like this. Here's a final thing to consider if you've implemented everything on this show and you're still having difficulty getting to sleep it's time to see a functional medicine practitioner because you could have a hidden, underlying infection. If our bodies are fighting a fungal bacterial or parasitic infection your immune system gets jacked up 24/7… and as a result we’ll end up with high cortisol in the evening and that will interfere with sleep…So if you've done everything here and you're still having difficulty with sleep that's something to investigate.Well, I told you we had a lot to cover today. This was a real masterclass. I appreciate you hanging in there with me. Again, go tomorrow. My website David Sandstrom calm you can download the masterclass summary notes that I put together. You can also read the full transcript or download the transcript if you wish. And if you want to get in touch with me, you can also leave a comment. As always, thank you for listening. I'll talk with you next week and be blessed.