Can Lack Of Sleep Affect Your Health And Family Life? Top Tips For Better Sleep

I made an awful mistake last Sunday. My son Joe had gone off swimming with his dad, and because I had a restless night's sleep that left me feeling tired, I decided to go back to bed for a lovely nap.

BIG mistake! Not only did I wake up two hours later not feeling any better for the extra sleep, but I actually felt worse for it. I had a cracking headache that wouldn't completely go away even with headache tablets, so that made me incredibly grumpy for the rest of the day. But it also prevented me from going to sleep that night as I felt wide-awake, and even more grumpy! This just goes to prove that a proper sleep routine is one of the most important elements of good health and family life.

So I had a little shuffle through my huge shelf stuffed full of health related books, (seriously, I could open a library with the amount of books stored in my house!) and I pulled out some expert tips for a better night's sleep that I will share with you now.

Get better sleep the easy way for your family health needs

Develop better sleeping habits. Good sleeping habits might include daytime routines such as eating healthy foods not loaded with sugar.

Take some gentle exercise but not too late in the day that it wakes you up and becomes stimulating.

Experts say that eating foods rich in calcium would help a person be lulled into sleep without too much difficulty. Avoid eating foods that contain caffeine too late in the evening that can stimulate the nerves and senses, such chocolate.

A warm milk drink before bed can help, but keep away from cocoa as it contains caffeine.

A relaxing bath can work wonders on tense muscles, but make sure the bath is not too hot as this can prevent you from dropping off to sleep.

And no napping in the afternoon! Napping in the daytime can affect your sleep at night.

Create a good sleeping environment for yourself. You need a comfortable and cozy sleeping environment. Try re-arranging your bedroom. If there are some things that catch your attention and makes it hard for you to sleep, try removing them for a while until you are able to sleep better.

So if you want to improve your health and family life, get plenty of shut-eye.

Terri James emailed us this top first aid tip.

If you child should suffer a minor burn, we all know the best remedy is to hold the burn under running cold water until the pain subsided.

But did you know that our grandmother's day they used to treat burns with raw potato skins! Yes that's right, if you child has burnt their finger, once you have cooled the burn with cold water, wrap a piece of raw potato skin around the burn and secure with a small bandage. Leave of for a few hours and you will find that there will be far less blistering, if any at all! You can also try using used tea bags (cold of course) in the same way. Apparently the tannic acid contained in the tea leaves have strong healing properties that can also prevent blistering from occurring.

Don't forget that we are collecting your favourite family recipes to include in our new cook-book, so email us your favourite recipes for inclusion and we will credit your for the recipe and give you a free copy of the completed book as a thank you!
Visit our website below to submit your favourite recipe.

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Stuck for something to do? Don't forget you can download your free copy of our Mini-Messy Tots Craft Book, full of our favourite crafts that you can do at home with the little ones!

Wishing you the best of Family Life.

Michelle and Nicky
Joint Editors, Cotswold Family Life