Sleep is a vital part of our lives, we cannot operate without it, and it has a direct impact on our quality of life. In order to better your quality of life, you need to improve your sleep. Many of us avoid blue light and caffeine before we sleep because we know it affects our sleep, but lots of people don’t know the affects that alcohol has on our sleep.
One of the ways that alcohol can affect your sleep is through waking up and needing the toilet. Your bladder functionality gets shutdown when you sleep in order to allow you to sleep, however with alcohol being a diuretic, it often does interrupt your sleep causing you to wake up and need the toilet more.
Another way it can negatively affect your sleep is by it changing your natural circadian rhythm. We’ve mention the importance of our circadian rhythm before in many podcasts and blogs and alcohol can knock your rhythm out of balance, which will affect your quality of sleep having a knock on effect on the rest of your life.
Alcohol also decreases your melatonin production which is the hormone that encourages your body to sleep. Without the normal amount of melatonin being released into your body, you will lose sleep or have a poor night’s sleep.
Keep in mind the effects that alcohol has on your sleep and be sure to give yourself the best night sleep you can as often as possible. If you want to learn more about how you can improve your sleep, listen to our latest podcast where we speak to Chuck Hazzard where he tells us about the popular “Oura ring”.