Heidi Overman, LMT #MT-24997
Sleep is crucial for your health. Sleep impacts digestion, the nervous system, heart and circulatory system, hormones, metabolism, as well as the respiratory and immune systems. It can also lead to issues with thinking, memory and brain health.
Numerous factors, including health concerns, stress, anxiety, worry, trauma, and even the relentless news cycle, can disrupt one’s sleep. Insomnia or lack of sleep can feel like an endless cycle.
My clients are constantly talking to me about their sleep issues. Solutions such as drugs, apps, and health strategies can make sleep even more daunting. The stress of going to bed can compound the issue.
Let’s first dive into a few of these issues and how lack of sleep can affect your health. These are just a few ways that these issues are impacted.
Digestive System: Lack of sleep can increase inflammation. Many digestive disorders stem from inflammation in the gut, such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), Crohn’s disease, and ulcerative colitis.
Heart and Circulatory System: There are studies that show that people who do not sleep enough or wake up often during the night may have a higher risk of coronary heart disease, high blood pressure, obesity, and stroke.
Memory and Cognitive Support: Insomnia or lack of sleep can lead to numerous adverse cognitive effects. These include irritability, daytime drowsiness, delayed reaction times, dementia, diminished focus and concentration, memory and lack of focus or attention, as well as signs of anxiety and depression.
Sleep deprivation hampers reasoning, problem-solving abilities, and attention to detail. One frequent issue associated with sleep loss is trouble with memory.
So, What’s the Issue?
Your sympathetic nervous system. According to britannica.com: Under conditions of stress, the entire sympathetic nervous system is activated, producing an immediate widespread response called the fight-or-flight response. Chronic stress results in long-term stimulation of the fight-or-flight response, which leads to constant production and secretion of catecholamines and hormones such as cortisol. Long-term stress-induced secretion of these substances is associated with a variety of physiological consequences, which can lead to cardiovascular disease or even type 2 diabetes.
What Does This Mean to You?
Sleep is crucial to your quality of life. It’s essential to discover a healthy method to deactivate the sympathetic nervous system, which is responsible for the body’s ‘fight or flight’ response, and activate the parasympathetic nervous system, which promotes the body’s ‘rest and digest’ state and is indicative of the body’s natural equilibrium, known as homeostasis.
How Can I Help Myself?
Regular massage can help regulate your stress levels. When massaged, blood and lymph circulation is increased, which are essential for healthy mental functioning and decreasing depression and anxiety.
Sleep significantly enhances the quality of life by impacting health, wellness, and reducing stress and anxiety. Clients often report that they experience improved sleep on the nights following their massage sessions, and this benefit can extend for several nights. This is part of the process of training our bodies to rest, relax, and sleep.
If you are interested in a therapeutic massage, wellness retreats, or acupuncture, please call me for an appointment: 520-639-6987. My website is emptycupwellness.com and I’m located at 10132 N. Oracle Rd., Ste. 180, Tucson, AZ 85704 In the business park just behind the Fairfield Inn.