Healthy Sleep Important To Rejuvenating Hair [An Actionable Guide]

Maintaining natural, healthy, glowing hair is often an uphill battle for many. Even some of the best shampoos for hair loss still need all the help they can get! Many of these products contain rich, natural compounds from organic botanicals that have been shown to stimulate natural hair growth. Supplying your body with compounds needed for new hair growth is important, but helping it utilize those components for hair growth is important as well.

The Importance Of Quality Sleep

One of the most powerful ways to support healthy natural health growth is to ensure healthy sleeping habits. Sleep is the period of time during which each of our bodies undergo powerful rejuvenate actions to repair existing damage. Additionally, sleep is when many hair growth stimulating hormones are released in their largest abundance. Here are some easy tips to help ensure you’re getting the best sleep you can, which will in turn help ensure you’re supporting natural hair growth as fully as possible.

Get A Decent Mattress

This consideration is almost so obvious that it gets overlooked by many. Ensuring you have the best mattress possible can help ensure you are getting the best sleep possible. Now, before you say “but mattresses are so expensive!”—realize that you don’t have to buy the best mattress on the market to get a better night’s rest. For every budget, there is a mattress that offers the best possible quality. The key is to take an educated survey of existing mattress brands, compare some of their top products within your budget, and then make an informed decision.

Mattresses have come a long way in recent years—in terms of their overall quality—and can now be purchased directly from companies such as Casper, Purple, Nectar, or other leading mattress manufacturers. This allows one to avoid paying the nasty markup of retail. Generally speaking, the more money you spend the better mattress you’ll get. For every budget however, there’s likely a better option than the mattress you’ve already got!

Establish A Nightly Routine

Just like morning routines can help get the day started, nightly routines can help bring it to a close. Taking time to engage in such practices as meditation, yoga, or other relaxing physical activities can help to calm the body and sooth the nervous system. This type of activity can helps signal the body to begin relaxation in such a way that one will be able to enter the first cycle of nightly sleep with more ease. This initial sleep cycle is all about allowing the body to recognize that the day is over, it’s no longer needing to focus on survival, and that it’s safe for it to start changing gears—-so-to-speak.

Research suggests that refraining from electronics such as smart phones and television for a period of at least 1 hour prior to sleep can help promote healthier sleep. One of the primary hormonal triggers for sleep is a compound known as Melatonin—released from deep within our brains—which responds to levels of light. When staring at electronics screens, this release process may become a bit delayed or underperform.

Natural Sleep Aids

Before considering pharmaceuticals for sleep there are many renowned natural sleep aids. As mentioned above, Melatonin is a natural compound produced by our bodies to help initiate sleep each night. This compound can be found in supplement form in nearly any health food or dietary supplement store.

Generally speaking, natural sleep aids come in 1 of two varieties; those meant to help fall asleep, and those meant to help stay asleep. Compounds like Melatonin, GABA, and L-Theanine all promote the calming of brain waves which leaves the body in a state more likely to drift to sleep faster. Other compounds such as Magnesium, Calcium, and 5-HTP are all regarded as being effective in helping to keep the body calm to help support deeper sleep cycles.

Each night, our bodies go through several sleep cycles, each of which consists of server different phases of sleep. The first phase is when we are drifting to sleep, the next phase is REM sleep (where we are thought to dream) and then there is NREM (the deepest sleep) where many physical repairs are made to the body.

Disturbances within the deepest of sleep states can cause our bodies to restart its entire sleep cycle. This is like running a race, messing up on the 2nd to last lap, and having to start over. Natural sleep aids can help support natural and restorative sleep by helping to support the body’s natural sleep cycles.

How Sleep Helps Hair Grow

Now that we have a better idea of how to support healthier sleep patterns, we can better understand how better quality sleep can support better quality hair. In essence, sleep can help to repair damage to existing hair and also stimulate new hair growth. Poor sleep has been shown to limit the amount of new hair growth. One study found (pdf), that among men, sleep deprivation can reduce the rate of new beard hair growth by nearly 20%! Another powerful facet of new hair growth, as well as the growth of many other soft tissues, is the levels of growth hormone available to the body.

The largest amounts of GH are released at night while we sleep which peak around the 3rd stage of our first sleep cycle. Interestingly enough, it’s been shown in research that a disruption of sleep after the first sleep cycle can actually trigger a second spike in GH release! This would have to be carefully timed to not disrupt the first release, but helps demonstrate just how creative one can get while working to deepen natural hair growth!

Especially during such cases of body ‘hacking’ its importance to assure that all necessary conditions are met optimally. In this case, when manipulating sleep cycles in such an irregular manner it’d be critical to assure the deepest sleep possible was occurring during the rest of the night.

In addition to growth hormone, there is also a myriad of other hormones which play a role in regulating hair growth. Some of these include estrogens, prolactive, thyroid hormone, cortisone, and—of course—androgenic compounds such as testosterone. Helping to ensure your body is in a healthy, natural rhythm will help better support these natural hair growth compounds.

Final Considerations:

Hair growth can become a burdensome task to support for many around the world. As we age, hair growth naturally begins to slow down. This can cause thinning lead to many types of baldness over time. Less discussed is how simple mis-care earlier in life can also lead to sub-optimal hair growth. By helping to ensure your body receives the rejuvenating amount of sleep each night you can help work towards ensuring the healthiest hair possible.

Buying a better mattress, establishing a calming nightly routine, and considering natural sleep aids are all effective approaches for getting better sleep. When we sleep, our bodies release many hormones responsible for hair health and hair repair. Helping to ensure healthy sleep is one of the most effective ways to help support overall health, which includes hair health as well!

Garry McMann

Garry McMann

Garry McMann is an automotive journalist who specializes in giving his readers the nitty-gritty details of car performance. He has years of experience testing cars and loves to share his findings with the world. When he's not writing, Garry can be found spending time with his partner Kate McKenna. The two of them live an adventurous life together, often exploring the great outdoors. Garry is a well-rounded individual with a focus on cutting fallen trees or maintaining his backyard via tools. He has a great passion for home improvement and enjoys working on various projects around the house. Garry is always willing to help out others in need and offers his services to those who may require them.

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