An Acupuncturist's Guide to the Best Sleep of Your Life

Oh sleep, you beautiful sweet temptress. I love sleep. I’m a solid 9 hours kinda girl, and I’m not even ashamed. Not being able to sleep is extremely frustrating and negatively impacts every aspect of your life and health. Coming from a perspective of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), let me share some tips that might help.

One of the most wonderful things about TCM is it breaks down a single symptom into several different patterns that could be causing that one symptom. I could treat 8 people for insomnia and treat every one of them with different acupoints and herbs. So in this article I’m going to share with you some universal tips as well as break down the most common patterns for insomnia with tips for your specific needs. Have I mentioned how bad ass Chinese Medicine is?

One of the easiest things you can do to give yourself a restful nights sleep is put your phone on do not disturb a few hours before bed and don’t look at it until the morning. Check out this article: Blue light from light-emitting diodes elicits a dose-dependent suppression of melatonin in humans. Yum, what a sentence. Basically the blue light from your phone keeps your body from releasing melatonin which is what tells your body it's time for nighty night.

In addition to that juicy research, being on your phone before bed is also just mentally stimulating. The hours before bed should be spent relaxing with your family or doing a hobby, not being annoyed by the Karen's of the world on social media. Also truly sorry if your name is Karen and your name has been turned into a verb.

So let's recap on rule 1. Put your phone away 2 hours before bed and read, knit or finally work on stop animation Jumanji remake you’ve always talked about.

Another simple sleep strategy is to get daily exercise. You don’t need to do anything crazy, just making time for a brisk after dinner walk should do the trick. Shoot for 150 minutes of moderate to vigorous exercise in a week. This ends up being about 30 min 5 days a week. And if getting better sleep isn’t enough of an incentive for you, just imagine how good your calves will look.

My next tip is to maintain a regular sleep schedule- even on the weekends. Your body has an internal clock running in the background called the circadian rhythm. This is influenced by your pineal gland which is located between your eyes. This glad is often referred to as the third eye, and interestingly enough there is actual retinal tissue on this gland. The pineal gland tells your body when to release hormones to keep you alert or tired and this is determined largely by when you are seeing light. Keeping a regular sleep/wake schedule will keep this internal clock running smoothly and by maintaining a regular sleep schedule on the weekends, your Monday mornings will suck significantly less.

I intentionally leave my curtains open so the sun wakes me at 6 am every day. Sometimes this just results in less sleep because I’m not always willing to sacrifice weekend night fun for sleep. I would say YOLO but I’m afraid if I do the dean of my alma matter will Kool-aid man through the wall and take back my doctorate.

Before you close your eyes, set your intention for the next day. Get your heart right with God and decide what you want tomorrow to be, we are the creators of our own destiny.

My final tip is to fall asleep before 11pm. 11pm- 1am is the time that your gall bladder is most active and from an energetic perspective your gall bladder has to do with blood storage as it is energetically linked to the liver. By falling asleep before 11 you are setting yourself up for better quality sleep and a higher likely hood of falling asleep quickly.

Now lets talk about a few common patterns for insomnia…

If you find yourself waking up constantly through the night it might be an issue of what we in the Chinese Medicine biz call blood deficiency. This could and sometimes does have a biomedical correlation to poor blood quality, such as anemia, but not necessarily. Sometimes this is simply an energetic pattern. Look at your tongue in the mirror, is it pale? This is an easy sign of blood deficiency. The easiest way to correct this is to eat leafy greens, high quality beef, beets, black strap molasses and berries. Sometimes blood deficiency will arise from poor absorption of nutrients due to poor digestion, or in women from excessively heavy menstruating. Make sure to talk to a health care professional if you are worried about either of these underlying issues.

Another common pattern to watch out for is called heart heat. Traditional Chinese Medicine uses elements of nature to categorize and diagnose imbalances in the body. The symptoms of this pattern include anxiety, palpitations (the sensation of feeling your heart beat), disturbing dreams, thirst, dark urine and/or mouth ulcers. This pattern is more difficult to correct with food and lifestyle changes, so in this case it may be best to see an acupuncturist to get herbs and treatments. Heart heat can be caused from a variety of factors, but sometimes it is simply from stress, alcohol and stimulating drugs such as tobacco.

The last insomnia pattern I’m going to talk about is the one that causes you to wake between 1am-3am. The body moves through a pattern of certain organs being at their peak and the liver time is 1am-3am. Waking during this time reflects an unhappy liver. The emotion of the liver is frustration and often times this pattern is an indicator that emotional hygiene is in order. What might you need to be processing emotionally or what difficult conversations need to be had are good places to start. Waking during this time can also be caused from lack of movement. The liver has a lot to do with keeping the smooth flow of qi in your body and if we are sitting for too much of the day this can cause stagnation which makes for a crabby liver. Try getting 30 minutes of vigorous exercise as that will move liver qi and will likely clear up that frustrating insomnia pattern. For more info on your bodies energetic cycles check out my article on how to optimize your day.

There is a lot that needs to happen to have a good night sleep but it is a worthy pursuit. Once mastered, sleep is the easiest way to be healthy. Feel free to reach out with any questions, and sleep well my friends.