Not unlike the way all our modern electronic, communication, and traffic systems rely on a “master clock” for precise time and synchronization, your body also counts on its own internal master timekeeper. Deep within our brain, within something called the hypothalamus, there is an area tasked with being your central “body clock.” It sets the pace for millions of activities called circadian rhythms, which rule our cells. When it’s confused, it can put countless other cellular clocks out of sync.
The difference between smooth or snarled traffic within your body all starts with maintaining a healthy, 24-hour rhythm called your sleep-wake cycle. The sleep-wake cycle is thought to be at its best quality when synchronized regular daytime-nighttime cycle, meaning that you sleep when the sun goes down and are active and awake when the sun is up.
Having a hard time doing that? Working swing shifts? Traveling through multiple time zones? Feeling tired all the time as a result? The reason has to do with a substance produced in your brain called melatonin. This hormone’s production is extremely sensitive to light and darkness. Even the light of a television set or computer screen in your bedroom can interfere with the production of this important hormone.
A disrupted melatonin rhythm can throw off many of your cellular circadian rhythms.
Recently, two unrelated studies found that after only a week of getting less than six hours of sleep daily, the body can suffer drastic changes:
- UK’s Surrey Sleep Research Centre led a research study that evaluated the consequences of one week of insufficient sleep on 26 men in which they found that the men had altered activity of some 700 genes (1). A number of the genes affected by sleep deprivation included several “clock genes” such as those that regulate the circadian rhythms involved in metabolism, immune system response, and stress response.
- Mayo Clinic researchers found that insufficient sleep could lead to changes in eating habits and appetite that could increase the likelihood that people will consume more calories, without increasing activity, causing weight gain.
How to not lose sleep over these facts? There are three ways, backed by science, which have shown to considerably improve the sleep cycle:
- Going to bed and waking up around the same time daily
- Getting regular exercise
- Supplementing with melatonin nightly
The first two of these strategies just make sense. The last, melatonin supplementation daily, is perhaps controversial—Don’t we make enough in our own bodies? Shouldn’t melatonin be used only for situations like jet lag to correct sleep-wake cycle? The science says the answer is “no” (an answer that is stronger with each year of age after age 35).
Dropping melatonin levels already affects sleep cycles for millions upon millions reaching ages 65 and older. Restless nights are increasingly becoming the norm for these aging Baby Boomers and the elderly.
The simple solution is melatonin as a supplement taken nightly. The alternative, to borrow the traffic metaphor again, is an unsettled “body clock” which, over the long term is sure to cause gridlock and an untold pile-up of cellular damage.
If you’d like to see the source of the studies I cited, call or email our office, or schedule a consultation to discuss your nutritional needs!
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