Senior Citizen: How to Sleep Like Baby

As life progresses, you grow into a more experienced and adult version of yourself. You start looking forward to spending more quality time with your loved ones and doing long-awaited things on your bucket list apart from all the stressful and burdensome events of life faced at a young age. However, despite all the enthusiasm for those golden days of retirement, a small border of darkness hovers on the horizon, bringing various health problems and, if not looked after correctly, can destroy the peace of mind.

The biggest thing that gets hampered due to old age is “Sleep.” Many reasons can cause sleeping issues during old age, which, if figured out, may help you ease the trouble.

Before you work out how to improve your sleep quality in old age, you must find out the causes that can cause you sleepless nights.

Here is a list of a few reasons that cause sleepless nights for senior citizens.

1. Retirement

Retirement is the first thing you may find as the beginning of old age. It brings lots of free time and a sudden lack of activities during the daytime, creating a void in our set routine of day and night, further escalating sleep issues. Making yourself busy becomes essential to keep your mental health upright.

2. Changes

As you become older, your life goes through some significant transitions. Such as the loss of loved ones, medical conditions, or financial issues increase stress levels and make it difficult to sleep at night. It helps to speak with family members or friends.

3. Illness and pain

With increasing age, you begin having various health issues and may develop different illnesses or chronic pain. Chronic diseases such as arthritis, sleep apnea, and restless legs syndrome can make sleeping difficult.

Taking medical help or using an orthopaedic mattress helps ease joint pains and other sleeping issues. The Sleep Company’s Smart Ortho Mattress, or Smart Ortho Hybrid Pocketed Spring Mattress are one of the best options available in the market if you want to buy orthopaedic mattress online.

4. Medication

Sleeplessness is one of the side effects that many senior citizens face due to medications they consume for various illnesses.

Informing a doctor about these issues helps as they might change the dosage or total medication according to your health condition.

5. Emotional struggle

As you grow old, the emotional struggle is inevitable. Many reasons like health conditions, lack of daily activities, and significant life changes result in emotional problems like depression, stress, and anxiety. This further leads to sleep disorders like insomnia or sleep apnea.

Sicking a doctor’s help is vital before these issues become worse.

Tips for senior citizens

Like any other age group, senior citizens can also improve their sleep quality with the help of some lifestyle changes and healthy sleep habits.

Here are a few suggestions to make those golden years of life more peaceful and less painful.

• Create a schedule and stick to it

The golden mantra to lead a healthy life is “Sticking to the schedule.” Our body clock follows a natural course of our life; thus, the brain sends signals to various body parts at a particular time to perform activities such as hunger, thirst, or sleep.

Make sure you set a sleep-wake time and follow it strictly on occasions like weekends, holidays, or family outings.

• Remain active

The biggest drawback of being a senior citizen is, having nothing to do most of the time due to retirement, grown-up kids, and having others to do daily chores. It increases immobility of the body and thus fails to induce sleep- hormones.

It is crucial to keep yourself active by exercising, doing yoga, a stroll in the park, or doing personal or family members’ house chores.

Also, socializing helps as a stress-buster, thus joining activity clubs specifically designed for senior citizens like laughter clubs and book reading clubs.

• Restrict nap times

Napping during the day is a good habit as it makes you fresh and awake. However, excessive naps during the day reduce sleeping time at night.

Ensure you avoid taking more than 2 to 3 naps during the day. Also, avoid taking naps around the evening to improve your night’s sleep quality.

• Change bed

As you age, your body begins losing its strength and weakening, increasing joint pains and other sleep disorders. Our bed plays a vital role in providing the required comfort and easing the pain. Changing your regular mattress with an orthopaedic mattress is a good idea as orthopaedic mattresses provide you with comfort to joints and support to the spine and maintain its natural alignment.

Another option you can try is adjustable beds that you can mold to different positions comfortable for your body type. The Sleep Company’s Elev8 Smart Adjustable Recliner Bed is a good option if you want to buy adjustable bed online.

• Control diet

Controlling your food habits is also very important as we grow old. Avoid eating oily and spicy food regularly, since in old age our metabolism becomes weak and it becomes difficult to digest. Also, avoid heavy meals before bed to avoid digestion issues.

• Relaxation options

Last but not least, try to wind up with some relaxing activities before going to bed, such as reading a book, breathing session, Yog Nidra, or listening to music. Avoid technology as much as possible such as watching television or using a mobile at least 30 minutes before bed.

Bottom Line :

As you grow old, facing sleep-related issues is inevitable one way or the other. Though you can’t stop these issues, you can work on getting relief from them and improve your sleep quality as much as possible.