Dr. Oz's Ultimate Sleep Challenge

Now's the time to identify your biggest lifestyle choices that could be affecting how you sleep. Are you a smoker? If so, then this is just another reason why it's time to quit. Several studies have linked cigarette smoking with instances of disturbed sleep. This includes the effects of nicotine and nicotine withdrawal on sleep, the link between smoking and snoring and a tendency for non-smokers to be more alert and energized in the morning.

Giving up tobacco is the single most important thing you can do for your overall health. We're not asking you to go cold turkey - we're not even asking you to do it alone. The success rate of quitting jumps from 2-5% to 30-65% with professional help. Follow Dr. Oz's Kick the Habit Challenge for a flexible timeline that eases you out of nicotine addiction.

Smoking isn't the only lifestyle factor that can drastically affect how you're sleeping; alcohol consumption, anxiety, stress, being overweight or obese, lack of physical activity, certain medications and caffeine intake can all prohibit a sound sleep.

Examine your daily routine. Do you have coffee everyday at 4pm to beat the afternoon slump? Do you have more than 1 alcoholic beverage a day? Do you eat dinner after 8pm? Do you workout? Do you generally go to bed/wake up at the same time each day? Take note of these behaviors. Identifying them now will help you along your search for sleep.

Part of your sleep surveillance includes keeping a sleep diary. Get a handle on your sleep patterns and expose unhealthy habits. Make sure to note:

• What you are doing before bed
• The time you went to bed
• When you woke up
• How long it took you to fall asleep
• What time you awoke
• The time you spend, if any, napping during the day

Recently, the National Sleep Foundation asked people what kept them up at night, and it’s no surprise that the most popular answers included financial worries, job stress and relationship stress. At the most basic biological level, the brain perceives these problems as threats it needs to process, deal with and solve; it can’t turn off its alert system so that your sleep drive can take over.

Eliminating the stress in your life might seem like an impossible task. And it is. Instead of eliminating stress, trying minimizing it by employing effective coping mechanisms. For some, stress can be handled with meditation, yoga, walking or jogging. Ten-thousand steps a day (combined with a healthy diet) will help you lose weight, but stress reduction can be gained in short bursts of activity, like 10 quick jumping jacks or push-ups, or stepping away from your workday stress with a short walk. For more tips on coping with stress in your life, visit the Stress-Proof Your Life Challenge.

Bookend each night’s rest with some light physical exercise: before you go to bed, do a soothing, 20-minute yoga routine to stretch your muscles and free them from the stress of the day, each morning, try Dr. Oz’s 7-minute workout.

All health improvements benefit from keeping a schedule. Whether that’s working out everyday before work, stretching every night before bed or automating your meals, creating a schedule helps you to be prepared, and therefore, less susceptible to excuses, lapses and temptations.

This is your schedule:

• Set a bedtime that works with your schedule, both during the week and on weekends, and stick to it
• 4-6 hours before bed, do not eat or drink anything containing caffeine
• 2-3 hours before bed, do not eat a full meal
• 60 minutes before bed, turn off all electronics (unless you are a doctor on call, blackberries, cell phones and pagers should not enter the bedroom) and dim the lights. In the middle of your brain is something called the pineal gland. It releases melatonin, the hormone that readies the mind and body for sleep in response to lowered light levels.
• 30 minutes before bed, have something to drink. Water is preferable, but warm milk can help soothe you to sleep.
• 5 minutes before bed, make sure your bedroom is dark, quiet and slightly cool. The ideal sleeping temperature is 65F.
• Wake up at the same time every day, during the week and on weekends

Helpful hint: Reserve the bedroom for sleep and sex only. You are strengthening the association between your bed and sleep. Do not bring work into the bed, watch TV, talk on the telephone or perform any other wakeful activities.

The one-third of our life that should be spent sound asleep can cause serious harm to your back and your overall health. Whether you’re a side sleeper, stomach sleeper or back sleeper, here’s a breakdown of how to get in a prime position for better sleep.

• Side Sleepers This is the best position for a healthy night’s sleep. It helps protect the alignment of your back’s 3 major curves: the lower back, middle back and lower neck. Improper side sleeping can result in the over-constriction of shoulder and neck muscles. To avoid pelvic rotation and lower spine contortion, place a fluffy pillow between your knees. A second fluffy pillow can also be used to fill the space between your ear and the outer edge of your shoulder to equally support both sides of the neck.
• Back Sleepers Never use a fluffy pillow if this your favored sleeping position – it pushes the head forward in an uncomfortable reversal of your neck’s natural curve, resulting in neck pain, headaches and decreased breathing capacity. Use a thin pillow under your head and a lumbar pillow to maintain the natural curve of your spine. Money-saving tip: create your own by rolling up a bath towel.
• Stomach Sleepers This is the worst sleep position for your spine. Turning your head to one side distorts the alignment of the spine and neck, leading to chronic lower back pain, neck pain and headaches. In addition, your body weight compresses the lungs impeding the ability to breathe fully and deeply. The best solution for stomach sleeping? Change to side- or back-sleeping if you can. If you can’t use a very thin, flat pillow to minimize the above side effects.

For more helpful hints on sleep positions, click here.

More often than not, we are awakened at least once a night: we can’t keep ourselves from waking, but we can help ourselves to go back to sleep.

Here are some tips to keep minor disturbances from interfering with a full night’s sleep:

• Keep a notebook and pen on your bedside table. Begin writing to-dos and reminders an hour before bed so that you aren’t compiling a mental list for the next day. If you awake suddenly remembering an important task, write it down rather than trying to commit it to memory.
• Keep a glass of water on your bedside table so that you don’t have to get up and go to the kitchen if you are thirsty.
• Try counting backwards from 300 by 3s. Simple math can keep our thoughts from wondering and yet isn’t so difficult that it will frustrate you.
• Use progressive relaxation, a technique that involves tightening and relaxing groups of muscles. Start with the hands and move up to the arms, shoulders, neck, and head, and then down to the legs and feet.
• If you're still awake after 15 minutes, get up and do something quiet, like reading a book. Don’t turn on the TV or read the latest Facebook updates. You have to let your body and mind slow down to be able to slip into sleep – so that means quiet activities only.

One surefire way to fight your fatigue is to ban the snooze button. You’ve decided what time you are going to get up every day – and that does not mean 15 minutes early and snoozing until it’s time to get out of bed.

Sleep involves several stages: REM sleep is accompanied by vivid dreams and memory consolidation; the third and fourth stages of sleep are deep and restorative. Each night you cycle through these stages. When you hit the snooze button, you alternate between wakefulness and light sleep, which might feel comforting – but there is no physical or mental benefit from this. Set your alarm later and get more REM or quality sleep.

Replace your afternoon caffeine lift with something that is not only better for you, it’s cheaper! Aromatherapy can wake up certain parts of the brain, and by inhaling some fresh lemon you can give yourself a lemon lift without spending $5 at Starbucks. If you’re also trying to lose some weight to improve your sleep hygiene, squeeze that lemon into hot water in the winter or seltzer in the summer for a calorie-free afternoon pick-me-up.

Another Dr. Oz fatigue-fighting tip is to counteract the energy drain caused by a heavy lunch with a preemptive multivitamin. Vitamins C and E open arteries and increase circulation; heavy meals laden with fat constrict arteries and make you sleepier.

Boost your energy by taking D-ribose, or ribose, daily. Some research has found that natural D-ribose supplements can significantly improve energy. It’s available in pill or powder form and is an essential energy source for your cells.

Give your body some time to adjust to the changes you’re making: cutting caffeine, quitting smoking, limiting alcohol consumption, establishing a patterned bedtime, incorporating exercise into your daily routine and transforming your bedroom into a sleep sanctuary.

Getting 7 hours of sleep a night will help you look and feel younger, improve circulation, help lower blood pressure, reduce levels of stress and inflammation, strengthen your immune system, improves memory and helps to control body weight.

If after 4 weeks (longer if you’re attempting to quit smoking) you don’t see a marked improvement in your sleep pattern, speak to your doctor about your circumstances. If you’re taking medications, that could be affecting the way you sleep – or you could simply need professional help to de-stress and identify those life factors that are prohibiting you from getting the sleep your body so desperately needs.