Hey y'all and welcome to the everyday athlete podcast recorded live from Omaha, Nebraska and I'm your host, Katie danger U S army veteran and founder of Red H Nutrition providing everyday athletes just like you, clean, effective nutritional solutions, custom formulated to help you reach your absolute potential every single day.
00:27 Hey athletes, what is going on? I hope that you're enjoying the everyday athlete podcast and all the content that I have and it's so far to you. We are on episode eight and I am incredibly passionate about sharing the lessons and experience that I've accumulated over the years. So perhaps maybe I can save you some grief and help you learn something before it has to be learned the hard way. I said it once, I'll say it again and it probably won't be the last time you hear me say it, but I want to leave this world a better place than I found it. And if I can save someone out there a painful mistake or if I can improve someone's life and I have done my job. So episode number eight, that's where we're at right now. And this episode is all about sleep and how sleep should be the number one priority on your list when it comes to how you can improve your life before he shares some really good nuggets with you though about sleep.
01:08 I want to share with you how far my sleep game has come and what my experience has been in the past. So about 10 years ago I started to struggle with my sleep. I'm really not sure what the onset of my struggles were other than I was in a poor relationship. And my mindset and emotional status weren't the best, but I was struggling with my sleep. So I went to the doctor and she quickly prescribed me Ambien. I had never taken any sleep medications before prior to this, other than maybe, you know, use Tylenol PM or NyQuil or something like that. But as far as prescription strength, Ambien was my first go. So let me tell you one thing. First. Ambien works. Now we'll get into why it's not actual sleep, but as far as knocking you out, helping you put your head down and shut the thoughts up in your head, it works.
01:55 Or it did work until it didn't. And I went back to the doctor, she upped my dose, I took Ambien again and we went through that dance a few times where she prescribed me a higher dosage, I'd take it, wouldn't do the trick, you know, even sometimes I was doubling up so I was taking like two times the recommended dose. And you guys, I'm a small human, I weigh 120 pounds. I'm a female. So a lot of this stuff like it should affect me. Right? It should affect me. Good. But what I was quickly realizing is that I just couldn't keep up with my dose of Ambien and I'll be honest too, it's not like my sleep was that great. Like I was passing out, but I wasn't waking up refreshed. I was groggy, I was emotional. It was like I was sleeping, but I wasn't reaping any of the benefits of what sleep usually entails.
02:39 And usually sleep is meant to help you with hormonal regulation improve that deep REM cycle sleep. You know, you often have dreams when you're in the REM cycle. It's supposed to help promote muscle recovery and repair and ultimately resetting your body so you're ready to go. The next day. And when I was training at a really high level, about 10 years ago is when I started to really into training competitively and CrossFit. So not sleeping adequately and using Ambien is a recipe for disaster. So prescription sleeping pills like Ambien, they don't provide natural sleep, they damage your health and they have been shown to increase the risk of life threatening diseases. So well taking drugs like Ambien may help you become unconscious. Sedation is not the same as sleep. So passing out and being unconscious is not the same as sleeping. These are hypnotic drugs and they actually restrict the deeper brain waves that are produced during that rapid eye movement.
03:34 REM sleep. And this leads to grogginess forgetfulness the following morning. And in fact, there's been lots of reports that people who've taken Ambien and they've done shopping on Amazon and purchase things that they would never normally purchase or they've gotten in their cars and driven or they've heard somebody. In fact, one time I remember taking Ambien and I thought that I was in a jungle and I had a machete in my hand and I was chopping down tropical vegetation. It was crazy. Like I totally believed that I had a machete in my hand and I was in the tropics chopping down vegetation. It was crazy. So imagine if like this is the same thing. Imagine if you wanted to get to sleep every night and what you did is you went up to your partner and you said, Hey, knock me upside the head with this baseball bat.
04:16 I got a pass out. If you did that every single night, you know, you wouldn't wake up feeling refreshed and good the next day. You wouldn't feel good. Right? Well maybe you think that, that's a crazy example, but it's essentially the same thing that's happening. Sedation is not the same as sleep. Going unconscious is not the same as sleep. So here's some stats on how sleepless Americans really are, and this is the, these are the 2019 statistics from a sleep advisor.org sleep advisor.org is where I pulled these from in 1942 Americans had 7.9 hours on average per night compared to now it only 6.8 hours on average. That is a 13% decrease. 37% of people between 20 and 39 years old report that they have a short sleep duration. This is less than seven hours of sleep. The population of Hawaii has the shortest sleep duration. While South Dakota has the highest sleep duration, 37.9% of people reported unintentionally falling asleep during the day at work in the last 30 days.
05:16 That means nearly 40% of people when they go to work the next day are falling asleep at their desk and they're not intending to do so. So you're not getting enough sleep at night. 30% of the U S adult population reports to suffer from insomnia and 10% from chronic insomnia. So that's lasting over six months. This makes it the most common sleep disorder. Insomnia is the most common sleep disorder. And did you also know that 9 million Americans currently take prescription drugs to help them fall asleep? It is very clear. It is very evident that sleep deficiency and lack of quality sleep is a public health epidemic, but what can you do? What can you do if you're struggling with sleep right now? What can you do if you suffer from chronic insomnia? Will never fear athletes because this podcast is here and I've got eight actionable steps that you can take right now to help you optimize your sleep so you can get the best night's sleep that you've ever gotten before I'm going to go through all eight of them.
06:08 I'll recap and then I've got a special bonus number nine for you to ever heard the same. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. A major component to your competitive success will be your nutrition prep and I create a competition nutrition guide to help you utilize pre intra and post-competition nutrition protocols. Boost your confidence heading into a competition, recover quicker post comps, you get right back to training and increase your power output and max capacity so you can own that podium. I created this guy just for the everyday athlete and you can get your free copy at competitionnutritionguide.com. I'll say again, competitionnutritionguide.com.
06:46 number one, avoid caffeine, stimulants and alcohol. Caffeine and stimulants will excite the nervous system and it's gonna make it damn near impossible for you to sleep. Now a lot of people will use alcohol to sedate them, but this is the same concept that we talked about for sedation is not sleep. Alcohol will not help you sleep. In fact, it could actually excite you in the middle of night and you could wake up often tossing and turning. So avoid caffeine. Stimulants and alcohol. Number two, make sleep a priority. Now are you just going through the motions and sleep just fits in whenever it can. You've got to make sleep a priority. Just like exercise. Sleep has got to be viewed as a non negotiable part of your day. Make sure you do it right and if you have to schedule it in, if you have to put it down then at 9:00 PM nine 30 10 whatever it is that you need to go to sleep, make it happen.
07:41 Make sleep a priority. Number three, keep your bedroom dark, quiet and cool. Typical recommendations are at 70 degrees or less is what cool is. So this helps promote that ambient atmosphere to help you sleep. Number four, limit your use of electronics. Have you guys ever heard of blue light before? Well, blue light is emitted for most of our electronics and it is a powerful, powerful, powerful melatonin suppressant. And melatonin is a naturally occurring hormone in the body that helps you regulate your sleep wake cycle. So if you're getting a lot of blue light, your melatonin is suppressed and your body's going to have a really hard time regulating that sleep. Wake cycle. Number five, establish a pre sleep routine. Find a common routine like a bath. Read a book, listen to calming music, meditate, breathe. Avoid stimulants, loud music noises in anything that could excite your nervous system.
08:34 Don't have deep difficult conversations with your friends or your partner or your parents or anything before you go to bed. Anything that is going to excite your nervous system, get rid of it. Establish that calming pre sleep routine. Number six, don't just lie in bed and stare at the clock. Sitting awake actually causes more stress and anxiety and certainly prevents you from falling asleep. If you can't fall asleep in less than 20 minutes and you sit there and you still haven't fallen asleep, pick up a soothing activity from that pre sleep routine that we just talked about in step number five. Number seven, go to bed at the same time every night. We are creatures of habit. Humans like to do the same thing day in and day out. So if you find a sleep routine that works for you, it's imperative to stick to it. Find a time, hit the sheets every night and your body is going to respond by being in that receptive state to sleep every single night.
09:23 So go to bed at the same time every night. Number eight and this one. This one might throw some of you but don't exercise too late. Exercise is stimulating, and when we stimulate our central nervous system, it is not calm. It is not receptive to being deregulated. If you can, if you can avoid working out at least three hours before you want to sleep. This allows your body to regulate its hormones properly. Cool. Your body temperature, which improves the conditions for sleep. So if you can, don't exercise too late. Try to get your workout done more than three hours before you want to be asleep. Okay, so I'm going to recap. I've got these eight actionable steps that we just went through all incredibly important. Number one, avoid caffeine, stimulants and alcohol. Make sleep a priority. Keep your bedroom dark, quiet and cool. Limit your use of electronics.
10:12 Establish a pre sleep routine. Don't just lie in bed. Stare at a clock. If he can't get asleep in less than 20 minutes, go back to a calming activity, go to bed. At the same time, we're creatures of habit. Your body will be receptive to that timing and don't exercise too late. So those were eight actionable steps you can take right now to get yourself the best sleep. But I've got a bonus number nine because I think this is very, very important. We're going to talk about supplementation and using supplements, all natural supplements to help you get into a receptive state in which your body wants to promote that hormone irregulation which helps promote an ideal body temperature and down-regulates that central nervous system supplements can be a game changer for your sleep, especially if you're utilizing them properly. So this is the number one reason that I formulated our Zen REM Zen REM is our all natural sleep support.
11:04 It's under the red ACE nutrition brand. It's custom formulated and it's because I have personally struggled mightily with my sleep. I just told you about my prior experience with ambient and how I struggled for years on getting quality sleep rather than just being sedated. And I knew there had to be a better solution. So this is where Zen rank comes in and here's the formulation. It works in two separate ways, ways that you should already be familiar with as important to getting sleep. One. It helps balance your hormones to promote a deep restful sleep. And two, it helps calm the nervous system to deregulate it, tone it down so you stop tossing and turning all night. The racing thoughts come to a pause and you can get some actual quality shuteye. So the formulation is very, very simple. It's magnesium, it's zinc, it's lemon balm, valerian root, melatonin and GABA.
11:55 And all of those ingredients help promote that deep restful sleep balance your hormones, deregulate your nervous system so you can get the sleep that you deserve. And guess what? You guys can grab your bottle for money shop.com right now and we have a very special code just for our listeners. Use code podcast 20 to save 20% on your bottle right now. You can get Zen rem@readyshop.com and remember, use that code podcast 20 to save 20% okay, athletes, now you know how you can optimize your sleep. You know how you can get some RNR that actually feels like RNR, no more tossing and turning.
12:31 Put these steps into action tonight. Put them into action right now tonight. Don't delay and I really hope you enjoyed this episode. I also really want you to tune in to episode number nine because it's also very, very near and dear to me. For episode number nine, I'm going to be diving into mental illness and how you can use fitness to overcome your anxiety, depression, and any other mental blocks holding you back. I got you fit, fam. I hope you have a wonderful day. Athletes. This is Katie D episode number eight. Over and out. Get some sleep tonight.
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