Body temperature and sleep

Happy New Year and welcome to this first blog post in the new year!

Today I'm going to talk about body temperature & sleep and all that entails.

Many people have asked me when to exercise, when to take a hot bath, if body temperature is something they should consider? What is the perfect room temperature and so on..... I'm going to tell you a little bit about the science behind it all and give you some tips on what you can do to get the most out of it.

Main pillar for sleep

The first thing you need to know or what is basically the mainstay of body temperature and sleep is the following: When you go to sleep, your body temperature drops. In general, it is very often said, if you can help that cooling process, it can help you fall asleep faster. That said, let's look at exercise, for example.

Sports and cooling off

We all have different ways of cooling our bodies. Some of us are really great at regulating that body temperature, while others struggle with it. Body temperature will also play a role when I recommend exercising, because some people have a higher body temperature during exercise and they cool down pretty quickly, so they fall asleep faster. For others, however, it can be more difficult. If they get warmer and cannot cool down quickly, they may have a faster heart rate and a slightly higher body temperature, and therefore it may take longer to fall asleep. In addition, if you are in an environment that is sheet lit with very loud music, for example a spinning class full of pumping energy, it may also be harder for you to cool down. So I would tell you to experiment and see what your body does. When in doubt, exercise in the morning. Also look at what kind of exercise you're doing.

I really like athletic yoga. Where at the end you can lie down in a nice dark area to cool down, comfortably tired and let the body temperature rise, and at the same time cool down, do relaxation pose at the end of your exercise. I like that, for example, but as usual, it's totally up to you! That's my recommendation on that front. The same goes for hot baths. If it manages to cool your body down and helps you drift off to sleep, it's perfect. However, if you have a hot bath and keep everything at a higher temperature and you have a faster heart rate, it can be detrimental to your sleep.

Again, you have to see how your body reacts. In the summer, when everything is very hot and you don't have air conditioning, you can very easily take a towel, put it in the freezer and put it on your neck when you want to go to sleep. That cooling feeling also helps you cool down faster. The other thing though, which is a little controversial compared to what I just said, is that skin actually likes heat or likes to be warmed up a little bit. It doesn't like to be cold. If you have to shiver because you are cool, your body produces energy. That will make it difficult to fall asleep. A comfortable skin temperature can help you fall asleep. Studies have shown that a warm touch on your skin can increase your deep sleep by 30%, which is a lot, and it can also help you reduce early morning awakenings.

Bed with ventilation and temperature system

The reason I know this is because I am in Frankfurt this week at the HEIMTEXTIL TRADE FAIR along with a company called FRESHBED. They have a bed with ventilation and a temperature system that stays at a stable temperature. This of course becomes very individual to each person's preference, but once you figure that out, you can just input it into their system. It measures your body temperature and keeps it stable so you can sleep better. You don't have this constant game of covering and exposing yourself and being active that way. It's a very neat invention that I really like and statistics have shown that it helps.

So you have a body temperature and a skin temperature. In general, the cooling process helps you sleep. However, a warm touch on the skin can also be very helpful. So there are two different ways to look at it, basically two different effects and again, it's individual. This can be helpful if you don't know when to exercise or if you don't know if you should take a bath or not.

Now that you know why it can help you, you might better understand why you couldn't sleep if you did all those things some people advised you to do, like exercising really hard, but if you still can't sleep, maybe it's because your body temperature is just too high!

I hope this was helpful and that you were able to learn something new!

I hope you enjoy exercising, bathing & sleeping!

This is a blog by our guest blogger Christine Hansen. Broring and Christine work together to provide the best sleep experience for our customers.

Christine Hansen
Sleep Expert to CEOs, Executives and Successful Entrepreneurs who want to sleep but can't, Sleep Like A Boss
https://sleeplikeaboss.com/