Stress Awareness Month: Alarming stats show 40% feel stressed after poor sleep, 7% struggle daily

A new report* commissioned by Woolroom, the UK’s leading natural sleep specialist, has found that after just one night of disrupted sleep, 40% of Brits experience heightened stress levels, with 36% admitting they felt anxious the following day. When asked how often they felt like this after a poor night’s kip, 40% admitted to feeling these effects 1-2 times per week, while 19% reported experiencing these symptoms 3-4 times weekly. Furthermore, 5% said they experienced these effects 5-6 times a week, with an alarming 7% indicating that they felt this way consistently, every single day. This left 22% of individuals to seek help from a healthcare professional to deal with symptoms associated with lack of sleep.

This Stress Awareness Month, Woolroom, is helping the nation manage stress symptoms with a good night’s sleep. Chris Tattersall, Woolroom’s Sleep Expert provides practical advice to help break the cycle and ensure a restful night’s sleep with nature’s miracle fibre, wool.

1. INVEST IN THE RIGHT BEDDING

According to the Institute of Medicine**, the average person will spend roughly one-third of their life asleep or attempting to do so. Investing in the right bedding and mattress is essential to ensure you get the most out of the remaining two-thirds of your time.

To guarantee a better quality of sleep and reduce symptoms of stress, swap your bedding to wool. Wool has been scientifically proven to provide up to 25% more stage four regenerative sleep, due to its temperature-regulating properties, which cool you down when it’s hot and warm you up when it’s cold. Regulating your temperature is vital to sound sleep; from Woolroom’s Clean Sleep Report, one in five people reported that being too hot or cold was the number one factor that interrupted their sleep.

Feather, down and synthetic bedding fibers put sleepers at a higher risk of overheating, consequently waking repeatedly throughout the night. Waking intermittently throughout the night reduces sleep quality, leading to long restlessness, increasing stress symptoms and deregulating your nervous system. For those who co-sleep, waking through the night due to heat can also cause unnecessary disturbance to a partner. The temperature-regulating properties of wool are excellent for individuals, and it balances temperatures between two sleepers, avoiding further disruption.

2. PRACTISE GOOD SLEEP HYGIENE

To reduce stress and sleep well, it is important to establish solid sleep hygiene habits. In the hours before bed, be considerate of the food and drink you are consuming – avoid caffeine, heavy meals and alcoholic drinks and leave at least a two-hour gap between heavy exercise and bedtime. It is crucial to implement a routine with a set bedtime and wake-up time and ensure you understand the right amount of sleep your body needs. Throughout the day, also differentiate your sleep environment from any other setting. Although it may be tempting to relax by using your bedroom to watch television, exercise or even work, your brain won’t be able to separate the spaces, resulting in a restless night.

3. FOLLOW A BEDTIME ROUTINE

During sleep, the body works to repair and rejuvenate itself, crucially supporting cognitive function, emotional stability, the immune system, and a healthy metabolism. It’s essential to ensure leading up to bedtime, you’re creating a routine to guarantee a beneficial sleep.

For the best night’s sleep and to boost overall relaxation, ensure you have habits leading to bedtime that allow you to release some stress. Meditation, yoga, journaling and aromatherapy are great options. Still, it can be as simple as dimming the lights in the evening, avoiding blue light from phones and laptops up to two hours before bed, reading, and taking a hot bath or shower. Following a bedtime routine helps the brain acknowledge it’s time to wind down, and these simple activities can boost melatonin, the sleep hormone, and reduce cortisol, alleviating the symptoms of stress the next day.