YOU Docs Daily The online edition of their daily newspaper column
Nature’s Answer to Sleep Drugs
Whatever's been keeping you awake at night -- the neighbors, the price of gas, the thought that maybe pro wrestling is rigged -- you can get a good night's sleep. And you don't have to solve the world's problems. All you need to do is stretch. When a group of women did a simple stretching routine every day, they fell asleep more easily than nonstretchers. Why isn't clear, but who cares, if you're out like a light? A basic yoga routine's probably perfect, but just stretching out the day's knots slowly and soothingly should do the trick.
If stretching is too subtle for you -- or if you're going to do something physical, you want to torch some calories while you're at it -- consider moderately intense exercise. But do it in the morning. Women who did a.m. workouts for a total of at least 3 hours and 45 minutes a week (about half an hour a day) also joined the better-sleep club.
But shorter morning workouts didn't help much. And women who worked out that much at night didn't see sleep benefits, though that's no surprise: Exercising within 2 hours of bedtime can leave you wide-eyed.
Another candidate for natural Ambien: tai chi. People who did an hour of tai chi three times a week for 6 months fell asleep about 18 minutes faster and slept almost an hour longer than a control group.
There's a bonus to all this ZZZ time: Better sleep not only makes you feel good but also reduces overeating, arterial aging, and heart attack risk. So get moving and go to bed.
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