Five ways your bedroom is sabotaging your sleep
Do you suffer from insomnia? Find it hard to fall – and stay – asleep at night? Discover five ways your bedroom could be sabotaging your sleep.
In the busy pace of modern life, our sleep can be one of the first things to feel the strain. With technology making us constantly available, it can be hard to switch off from our jobs and responsibilities – especially as more of us start to work from home or in a hybrid capacity.
So it’s no surprise then that searches for sleep problems and ways to resolve them have increased 23% year on year (SEO monitor).
However, you may not have considered just how big of an impact your bedroom can have on your quality of sleep. Light levels, layout, the wrong bedding, and even the colours you decorate with can all play a role in getting a good night’s rest.
To help turn your bedroom into a cosy, welcoming oasis, Coast Road Furniture reveal five ways it may be sabotaging your sleep – and how to fix them.
1) You have too much clutter
The expression “tidy house, tidy mind” is arguably most applicable to your bedroom. As the place where you go to unwind, recharge, and reflect at the end of every day, if you have a cluttered bedroom this can add to your stress and inevitably disrupt a good night’s sleep.
If you struggle with space, investing in under-bed storage, quality wardrobes, and compact storage solutions like hanging cubbies or clothes organisers can help you keep things tidy and avoid the dreaded ‘floordrobe’.
Just like making your bed in the morning can set you up for a productive day ahead, tidying your bedroom and making a clean, calm environment can help you feel more relaxed and ready to sleep in the evenings.
2) There’s too much light
You may like the thought of waking up with natural daylight filtering through your curtains, and it is certainly a more enjoyable way to start the day than the beeping of an alarm clock! However, especially during summer when sunrise is at its earliest, this can often wake you up closer to the middle of the night than your morning commute.
Similarly, if you live in a city or have a streetlamp near your window, having insufficient blinds or curtains can let in lots of artificial light and prevent you from getting a deep, restful sleep.
Investing in a quality set of blackout blinds or thick curtains can therefore make a huge difference to your sleep routine, allowing you to shut out the outside world and recharge properly.
Removing any excess artificial light also helps to maintain our natural circadian rhythm, which relies heavily on light and dark to align our sleep with the night and our wakefulness with the day (Sleep Foundation).
3) You’ve got synthetic bedding
When it comes to bedding, you may not think it has much of a bearing on your quality of sleep. But often, when we wake up during the night, this is due to temperature changes and feeling overheated or cold.
Cheaper bedding tends to be made of synthetic fabrics, and your body can’t regulate its temperature as well under these kinds of materials. Natural fabrics such as cotton and wool are therefore a much better choice for your sheets and pillowcases, as not only do they feel softer and more luxurious, but they are also more breathable and cause less temperature fluctuation throughout the night.
Try not to go for style over substance and instead choose bedding that is high quality, durable, and well made.
The same applies for mattresses, which are arguably the most important part of any bedroom. While a good mattress may be quite an investment, they are worth their weight in gold for how impactful they are to your quality of sleep.
So choose your mattress carefully. Opt for a premium model that suits your needs in terms of firmness and size, and it will last you for years to come.
4) You’ve decorated with bright colours
It’s been suggested that opting for cool, natural colours like blue or green in your interiors can have a calming effect, meaning they may be more conducive to a good night’s sleep (CPM). Pairing these shades with light, neutral colours and plenty of houseplants can help turn your bedroom into a relaxing oasis that you always feel at ease in.
For the same reason, it’s best to keep vibrant colours like red, orange, or cyan to other rooms throughout your house, such as the living room or any other spaces where you like to socialise and be active. A
lternatively, you could use these more energetic colours in your bedroom in the form of small accents rather than painting your walls, so it still feels like a calming sanctuary dedicated to unwinding after a long day.
5) Your layout is overstimulating
If you work from home, then keeping your bedroom a designated space for relaxation is even more important. Wherever possible, try to keep your desk and computer in another room of the house, as having your work and leisure spaces so close together can make it much harder to switch off at the end of the day.
If you don’t have a spare room or office, you may want to invest in a set of dividers or a screen that can still give you some sense of separation.
In terms of layout, try to make your bedroom as user-friendly as possible by clearing places you use regularly, such as decluttering your dressing table or making a clear path from your bed to the bathroom.
You may also want to move your bed away from a window if there is any noise or light you can’t control that disrupts your sleep. Making everyday routines simple and stress-free means you’ll keep seeing your bedroom as a place of calm that always suits your needs.
Make sure your bedroom HELPS you to sleep – not sabotages it
We all know how important sleep is to our health and wellbeing, but you may you not realise just how much your interior design can impact this.
From choosing natural bedding that keeps you cool to considering colour psychology when you paint your walls, there are plenty of ways you can make your bedroom a more relaxing, calm environment that’s conducive to a good night’s sleep.
As well as configuring the best layout and light sources in your bedroom, it’s also worth investing in quality, well-made interior items that are built to last. Mattresses, for example, are such a worthwhile investment for how much use they get and how much they impact your sleep every single night.
Making these changes can turn your bedroom into a comfortable, welcoming oasis that will soon become your favourite room in the house. And somewhere you can look forward to getting a good night’s sleep!
Photo by MR WONG
