How Massage Can Help You Sleep Better
Sleep is one of the most essential steps in maintaining your general health and wellbeing. In fact, a third of every person’s life is spent sleeping. However, developing healthy and consistent sleep habits is difficult for many Americans as a result of demanding careers and lifestyles. It is estimated that sleep-related problems affect 50 to 70 million Americans of all ages and socioeconomic classes.
Disruptions to your sleep cycle can affect many important cognitive skills, such as reaction times, alertness, mood, hand-eye coordination and even the accuracy of a person's short-term memory.
An effective solution for achieving better sleep is incorporating massage therapy into your schedule. Massage therapy is used in the management of various health conditions, as it is a non-invasive treatment designed to promote relaxation. Regular massages can also relieve stress and chronic pains that keep you from sleeping, as well as reset your sleep cycle by increasing serotonin levels, which will lead to a better night’s sleep overall.
RELIEVE STRESS TO HELP YOU SLEEP
Although it is not the only factor, stress is the number one reason most people report a lack of sleep. Stress can lead to trouble with falling and staying asleep, leading you to wake up during the night or feel like your sleep is less restful. According to the American Psychological Association, adults with lower reported stress levels on average report sleeping more hours during the night than adults with higher stress levels.
Receiving massage therapy can help lower stress, which in turn relieves stress and can lead to better sleep at night. During a massage, there are several physiological effects that most commonly occur to help reduce stress including, increased endorphins, serotonin, tissue elasticity and dopamine, as well as a decrease in cortisol levels. When the body lacks positive hormones like endorphins, serotonin and dopamine, a person can become more stressed and anxious. A massage stimulates the body's natural production of these hormones, and their release within the body reduces stress and anxiety and improves stress-related sleep problems.
HEAL PAINS THAT KEEP YOU AWAKE AT NIGHT
Chronic pain is another significant factor in preventing deep sleep and can lead to an increase in awakenings during the night. Chronic pain disrupts the sleep cycle and causes diminished energy, depressed mood, fatigue and worsened pain during the day. Recent studies have found that people who experience pain are eighteen times more likely to experience clinically diagnosed insomnia.
To help alleviate and relieve waking pains, massage therapy has been proven to be a way to ease some physical conditions, including relaxing painful muscles, tendons and joints. Some of the benefits of massage that targets chronic pain are reduced muscle tightness and increased range of movement. Massage can reduce muscle tightness by increasing blood flow, and with this decrease in tension, muscles can be worked to stretch to their full capacity, which improves tissue elasticity and increases the overall range of movement, and lead to less painful nights.
RESET YOUR SLEEP CYCLE
Another way massage therapy can help you get a better night’s sleep is by resetting your sleep schedule. Most people suffer from an irregular sleep schedule due to using electronic devices in bed and other lifestyle choices like excess consumption of caffeine. Massage therapy is known to promote the release of serotonin, which is an essential component the body needs to produce melatonin.
Melatonin is a naturally-occurring hormone that is associated with your sleep cycle or circadian rhythm.
Circadian rhythms are physical, mental and behavioral changes that follow a 24-hour cycle, which is crucial in helping us regain energy lost from daily activities. During this cycle, the body produces melatonin when it’s time to fall asleep and reduces it when it’s time to wake up. By increasing the production of serotonin and melatonin, this cycle has less of a chance of being disrupted by external forces. As a result, having regular massages, especially later in the day, can lead to more serotonin production that your body uses to produce the melatonin it needs to fall asleep.
START IMPROVING YOUR SLEEP
Getting a better night’s sleep can be made easy with regular, weekly appointments at Massage Studio. If you're looking for ideas on how to get better sleep, getting a regular massage can reset your sleep cycle by increasing serotonin levels, relieving chronic pains and decreasing stress that keeps you from sleeping. Let us assist you in establishing a simple and easy routine with massages from our trained, experienced professional massage therapists! Massage Studio is also open until 10 pm so you can catch a nighttime massage and go right to bed after.
For all massages offered at Massage Studio, you can also add on CBD oil to further promote deep relaxation and help you drift off to sleep! To schedule your next massage appointment, visit our website here, and learn more about the many massage types we offer on our Massage page now.