Can using essential oils help with sleep?

Can using essential oils help with sleep?

Can using essential oils help with sleep?

Smell is a prehistoric sense and an essential one for humans and animals as we all navigate our world. It lets us know whether our food is safe to eat and alerts us to the smell of fire. We encounter innumerable scents in our daily life, and our sense of smell plays a vital role in the physiological effects of mood, stress, and working capacity. It also affects our sex lives: the area of the brain through which we experience smells is the olfactory lobe, part of the limbic system, the emotional brain, the area in which sexual thoughts and desires are processed. Throughout the pandemic, there has been a rapid rise in those reporting losses of smell. An article in Nature* reported that of 8,438 people with COVID-19 surveyed, 41% had reported experiencing loss of their sense of smell, with 8% experiencing a total loss (otherwise known as anosmia).

Each of us has many visual and emotional associations to certain smells and aromas. Certain fragrances evoke the memories of significant moments in time. Supermarkets channel the scent of the bakery throughout the store to trigger hunger, while certain food aromas can transport you back to a moment on holiday. Each of us will have our personal favourites, those scents which trigger memories and conjure images in our minds.

Due to the vital importance of smell, all sorts of folkloric tales speak of the remarkable medicinal properties of everyday herbs and flowers. As sleep is a sensory process, it follows that our sense of smell can have broad-ranging effects. The efficacy of using certain essential oils to improve sleep and well-being continues to be researched, and the beneficial effects of a few specific scents have already been validated by clinical research.

Lavender has a long history of medicinal use and has been proven to provide a sedative and calming effect. In a small hospital study in which lavender was used as aromatherapy, patients were shown to experience reduced daytime drowsiness and enjoyed more consistent sleep at night. It’s not just lavender; in another study, a mixture of essential oils including lavender, basil, juniper and sweet marjoram was shown to reduce sleep disturbance and improve a sense of overall well-being in older patients.

If you are not a fan of lavender but want to enjoy the same effects, try using bergamot or ylang-ylang. All three scents were shown to improve the quality of sleep for patients recovering from heart problems.

While research is needed into a wide range of other fragrances to determine their effectiveness in treating clinical conditions, aromatics have been used for mental, spiritual and physical healing since the beginning of recorded history. If a good night’s sleep is all about relaxation, soothing the senses with an aroma that evokes happiness and relaxation can only be good. Which particular scent you use is a personal choice.

References

Koulivand, P. H., Khaleghi Ghadiri, M., & Gorji, A., 2013. Lavender and the nervous system, Evidence-based complementary and alternative medicine, 2013, pp.1-10.

Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3612440/#:~:text=A%20mixture%20of%20essential%20oils,in%20older%20patients%20%5B78%5D [Accessed 11 March 2021]

McDonnell, B. and Newcomb, P., 2019. Trial of Essential Oils to Improve Sleep for Patients in Cardiac Rehabilitation. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 25(12), pp.1193-1199. Available at: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31556690/ [Accessed 11 March 2021]

Chang, S. and Chen, C., 2015. Effects of an intervention with drinking chamomile tea on sleep quality and depression in sleep disturbed postnatal women: a randomised controlled trial. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 72(2), pp.306-315. Available at: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26483209/ [Accessed 11 March 2021].

Marshall, M., 2021. COVID’s toll on smell and taste: what scientists do and don’t know. Nature, [online] Available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00055-6#:~:text=How%20many%20people%20with%20COVID,had%20reported%20experiencing%20smell%20loss [Accessed 11 March 2021].

Using neuroplasticity to change your brain

Using neuroplasticity to change your brain

Using neuroplasticity to change your brain

For those of us old enough to remember playing our favourite record over and over again until the track became a deep groove where the needle repeatedly stuck, the imagery is clear.

Returning to that record, it’s a catchy tune that seems to hang around. Thoughts are like that – both positive and negative. We can get caught in a cycle of rumination, repeatedly playing the thought over and over and over again. Who notices that they do that and what sort of memories come up? It is proven that the negative will outweigh the positive.

Neuropsychologist Rick Hanson (www.rickhanson.net) refers to this as “the brain’s negativity bias.” The human nervous system, he writes, “scans for, reacts to, stores, and recalls negative information about oneself and one’s world. The brain is like velcro for negative experiences and teflon for positive ones. The natural result is a growing – and unfair – the residue of emotional pain, pessimism, and numbing inhibition in implicit memory.”

Our primitive brain, see here: http://www.brainwaves.com/brain_basics.html, thinks this is a good idea. The term “reptilian” refers to our primitive, instinctive brain function shared by all reptiles and mammals, including humans. It is the most powerful and oldest of our coping brain functions since we would not be alive without it. It makes sure that we remember danger, so we don’t do it again was helpful when we were pre-modern humans, not quite so beneficial now that tigers are not lurking behind parked cars.

So returning to the record. We can repeatedly replay a memory or a thought until it becomes an indented groove in our brain’s neural pathways. Knowing this, it is logical that getting the needle out of the groove requires physical action. Keep playing the record, or stop playing the record? Change the groove.

This is where it gets exciting. We used to believe that the brain was a fixed entity but the discovery that active repetition changes the brain means that our thought patterns can and do change. Neuroplasticity, also known as neural plasticity, or brain plasticity, is the ability of neural networks in the brain to change through growth and reorganisation. These changes range from individual neuron pathways making new connections, to systematic adjustments like cortical remapping.

The key to overriding that negativity bias is to notice when a familiar thought arises and think about the following: Does it feel good? What is happening now? Does this thought matter? I am sure we all recognise these thoughts. They are often the ones that wake us up at 3 am and feel huge in the darkness. It might be the thought that replays as you walk into a room full of strangers – most of us will experience several thoughts at that moment; are they good or bad? When you look back on a typical day or survey your life, what experiences capture your attention – your successes and pleasant times, or the failures, hurts and disappointments?

Noticing that these thoughts are happening is so important. Think about it. If you think something is it real? (See the Matrix film series for what is real or not :-)) When you last had this thought or feeling, did the ceiling cave in? See if you can look at it differently. A new tune is a perfect distraction; find a tune to oppose the thought – upbeat songs work all-round. Do a little dance? An actual dance if you feel relaxed with that – on the tube, I wish you luck but do a dance in your head, visualise a character dancing and make it your internal friendly dancer. (If you remember records, you are likely to remember the dancing baby in Ally McBeal https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rx88NMh-YRs )

Overall have some compassion for yourself. Our thoughts come and go. Holding onto any of them, good or bad, are transient moments. Ruminating on them deepens their effect. When our son was little we had a before bed practice called ‘three good things in our house.’ Together we find three good things to talk about from each of our days regardless of how bad we think our day has been. There will ALWAYS be something somewhere.

Finally, rumination is a large part of depression. If you are experiencing ongoing negative thoughts that you cannot seem to shift, if you can, seek support through friends, family or a therapist when times become challenging.

Footnote

For an experts approach, I mentioned Rick Hanson. A favourite resource of mine is excellent TED talks, a great website, and great books. He offers excellent advice on how we might hardwire happiness. http://www.rickhanson.net/hardwiring-happiness/faq/

References

Law, B., 2021. Probing the depression-rumination cycle. [online] https://www.apa.org. Available at: https://www.apa.org/monitor/nov05/cycle [Accessed 11 March 2021].

Life Is Busy

Life is busy

Life is busy

Many of us know what it’s like to have the odd sleepless night. When it goes on, and on night after night, the wear and tear on our overall health is debilitating.

For some of us – new parents being the obvious example, there is a tangible reason for lack of sleep or those with chronic pain and illness for whom lack of sleep becomes a serious issue but for many people there doesn’t seem to be an obvious reason.

Wake up. And we’re off…

Life is very different for each of us and it’s important not to compare ourselves to others. We might think that everyone else has their lives sorted but it is often not the case.

Time to deal with your household universe, children our house share. Maybe you are a carer for someone else, or perhaps you are on your own. Off to work… everyone is trying to get to work/school/somewhere. Packed trains, too hot, too cold, leaves on the line. Breathe. At work, it’s all going on. Things to do, so little time, oppressive environment. Coffee. Fluorescent lights, screens, screens everywhere. Sometime. Repeat in reverse. Pub, gym, deadline to pick up kids. Go home, fix the universe. Go to sleep… wake up… feel the stress levels rise.

This sounds like an incredibly negative take on life, but I want to illustrate the cycle of time that many face. I feel it is essential to acknowledge that for some life is hectic.

3.5 million adults in the UK get less than 5 hours of sleep a night.

Lack of sleep can almost double the risk of a heart attack. We need 7-9 hours of sleep a night to complete a full sleep cycle. Regularly interrupting your sleep cycle is bad for your health. Shift workers are known to experience longterm issues due to the interrupted patterns in their sleep. These are some ok the reasons that sleep has become a science. The cost to the economy is increasing as a result, and many longterm health issues have a direct impact on sleep. Once any physical issues are ruled out, the biggest reason for sleep issues is stress.

The truth is that life is busy, which creates stress.

Work with what you can change and let go of what you can’t.

The reality is that there may be many reasons for poor sleep. I wish I had a magic wand to make your sleep better. I can offer that starting to Identify what you can change is the first step. Accept that you cannot change everything overnight and you may not be able to remove many of the things that cause you stress, so consider what is in your power to change.