Can not fall asleep? Waking up in the middle of the night? 40% of women suffer from sleep disorders, according to the National Institute of Sleep and Vigilance.
Sleeping well is essential for physical and mental health.
- Meditation to evacuate stress
This popular practice, inherited from Buddhist culture, is similar to a cognitive therapy whose impacts have been validated scientifically.
In 2014, American neurologists proved that mindfulness meditation decreases the secretion of cortisol, a stress hormone, which improves the quality of sleep.
It also regulates the activity of the tonsillar complex, a region of the brain involved in anxiety.
To meditate is not very complicated: it is enough to make the silence in oneself by taking a benevolent look on the present moment; Negative thoughts are allowed to slip without judgment until deep relaxation is achieved.
Find a coach on www.association-mindfulness.org.
- Homeopathy to correct the disturbances
The administration of active ingredients at infinitesimal doses can correct the ground to gradually return to sleep.
If you are too agitated to fall asleep, take two granules of Argentum nitricum 9 CH three times a day, advocates the pharmacist Albert-Claude Quemoun. (1) If you are not sleeping at night, go for Luesinum 9 CH ( If you wake up anxious between 1am and 3am, Arsenicum album 9 CH (two granules at bedtime) and if you always open your eyes between 2am and 4am, Kalium carbonicum 9 CH ( same dosage). "
- Menus adapted to solicit the sleep hormone
Food influences the quality of nights. To avoid, fatty dinners difficult to digest, which raise the temperature of the body.
During the day, "introduce in your menus tryptophan, amino acid essential for the production of melatonin, the sleep hormone, contained in dairy products, meats, soy, squash seeds, parsley ...", recommends Dr. Yann Rougier, founder of the Institute of Neuronutrition and Applied Neuroscience.
Also favored are slow sugars (rice, pasta ...) and vitamin B (wheat germ, yeast ...).
And banish alcohol which, if it increases drowsiness, fragments sleep.
- Sedative plants to dispel anxiety
"Studies have shown that valerian reduces sleep time by acting on cerebral receptors," says Dr. Franck Gigon, Phytotherapist (2).
Its richness in valerenic acid allows to prolong the phases of deep sleep, but it takes fourteen days before it exerts its effects.
To increase its action, it is associated with eschscholtzia, a root that is full of sedative alkaloids.
To be taken around 21 hours, in tablets or in complete suspension of fresh plant.
