Free Depression Help:
Improve Your Sleep

Our website is made for free depression help. So here is an excellent advice for those who have trouble sleeping at night. Dim your lights at least 90 minutes before bed time.

Studies have shown that using artificial lighting in the hours before bed time, can cause sleeplessness. As we’ve explained in our depression self help website, sleep deprivation is a major contributor to depression.

Try as we might our bodies cannot fight mother nature. The human body is programmed to have some darkness before sleep time, and turning our bright lights only confuses the body.  So here are some simple suggestions to ensure a restful sleep:

• Dim your lights. Dim them about 90 minutes before your sleep time. As the article suggested, dimming your lights will give your body the darkness it needs to prepare for sleep.
• Get a full amount of sleep. Follow our sleep advice given in our website. Go to bed early enough to get the right amount of sleep. Count the hours you need to get up, and ensure you go to bed no later then what you need to.

Obviously in the middle of winter, where many places there’s no sunlight in the late afternoon, living without light can be an impossibility.

The following article explains this light phenomena. This is an excerpt from Science Daily, the article entitled “Room Light Before Bedtime May Impact Sleep Quality, Blood Pressure, and Diabetes Risk:”

According to a recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM), exposure to electrical light between dusk and bedtime strongly suppresses melatonin levels and may impact physiologic processes regulated by melatonin signaling, such as sleepiness, thermoregulation, blood pressure and glucose homeostasis.

Melatonin is a hormone produced at night by the pineal gland in the brain. In addition to its role in regulating the sleep-wake cycle, melatonin has been shown to lower blood pressure and body temperature and has also been explored as a treatment option for insomnia, hypertension and cancer. In modern society, people are routinely exposed to electrical lighting during evening hours to partake in work, recreational and social activities.

Results showed exposure to room light before bedtime shortened melatonin duration by about 90 minutes when compared to dim light exposure.
Furthermore, exposure to room light during the usual hours of sleep suppressed melatonin by greater than 50 percent.

So there you have it, free depression help, and a very useful piece of information so you can get your well deserved rest. Sleep well, live well, and be depression free.

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