Doctor shares five common habits that are destroying your sleep

A doctor has revealed the 'five common habits' that are preventing you from getting a proper night's sleep.

As someone who gets frequent sleep paralysis and wakes up on average three-four times a night, there's no hope left for me. But go, save yourself.

Dr Karan Rajan - TikTok's 'favourite General Surgeon' - knows some potential reasons why you may not be getting the best night's sleep - and don't fret, for the doctor holds some solutions too.

Be warned, there's some you may struggle with, but for a solid, peaceful seven-to-eight hours a night? It's gotta be worth it.

The first habit which may be leaving you unable to drift off or unable to stay in a peaceful slumber is if you're having 'a big meal within two hours of bedtime'.

Dr Rajan explains: "It takes 90 minutes for 50 percent of your stomach to empty into the small intestines.

"So the more full your stomach is the higher chance of acid reflux which can obviously damage your sleep."

The doctor advises waiting 'two to three hours after a big meal before you go to bed'.

Second, is to avoid 'chugging water' just before you go to bed.

"When you're asleep, your body increases the production of the hormone ADH (vasopressin) so it retains water and suppresses your need to pee," Dr Rajan says.

However, if you do glug a lot of water down in the evening, this can reduce the amount of ADH which is produced and then you may end up needing to get up and go to the loo midway through the night, with your body forcing you awake and disrupting your sleep.

If you're sleeping in a hot room, that's a big no no too.

Using a graph, Dr Rajan demonstrates how our 'peak body temperature is around 7:00pm'.

After that time, the body's temperature drops which makes us feel more tired.

"Basically our body needs to become cooler to sleep faster," he summarises.

Fourth, alcohol. Look, we know it's about to be the weekend and it's hard to not let loose a bit after a long week at work, but it's not going to help you in the long run.

According to the doctor, alcohol disrupts your REM sleep.

And last but not least, caffeine - the drug we all find so hard to give up.

It's not a massive shocker that caffeine doesn't aid sleep when the reason we gulp it back every morning is to be able to open our eyes enough to manage to crawl into work, but as Dr Rajan says, it 'prevents the accumulation of the sleep molecule' so you should probably skip that afternoon coffee.

Featured Image Credit: Pexels/IvanOboleninov/Ron Lach

Topics: Sleep, Health, Science, Mental Health, TikTok, Social Media

Poppy Bilderbeck

Poppy Bilderbeck is a Senior Journalist at LADbible Group. She graduated from The University of Manchester in 2021 with a First in English Literature and Drama, where alongside her studies she was Editor-in-Chief of The Tab Manchester. Poppy is most comfortable when chatting about all things mental health, is proving a drama degree is far from useless by watching and reviewing as many TV shows and films as possible and is such a crisp fanatic the office has been forced to release them in batches.