This year has been a hard year.
I started to feel ill between Christmas and New Year and by New Years Eve, I was on the phone to the Doctors because I was so poorly with a chest infection. They gave me some tablets and I started to feel a little better by the middle of January with just a niggling cough that wouldn’t go away. Fast forward a month and I started to feel worse again with the cough getting so severe that the Doctor I saw described it in his notes as being ‘severe and violent’.
I got worse and the cough was making me sick several times a day and definitely stopping me from sleeping on a night. I was constantly exhausted and super emotional thanks to the lack of sleep and the fact I’d been been unwell for what felt like forever. If you’re experiencing similar then there are some great tips here about how to sleep with a cough – the one that worked best for me was to prop myself up so much with pillows that I was practically sitting upright. 😊
This continued to the end of March with no easing of the symptoms that I was experiencing and when there was a little blood when the coughing made me sick, the Doctor sent me for a priority chest x-ray which didn’t help with the cough but did show that there was a problem with my heart that had me back at the doctors getting poked, prodded and bloods taken.
I then got a phone call from the Doctors saying I needed to go in urgently. I mentioned that I couldn’t go in that day as I didn’t have the car and they said I needed to get there as this wouldn’t wait. That set me off on a panic and my other half came home from work to take me.
Turned out, I had dangerously high blood sugar levels and they were worried that I was potentially going to experience some complications because the levels were so high. They said I was diabetic and they were considering admitting me to the hospital but my blood pressure was OK so they said I could go home and start on medication straight away. I went away from my appointment that day feeling shell shocked, clutching a whole load of info leaflets and some medication that they told me was highly likely to make me feel sick.
I was still feeling unwell and exhausted from my chest infection so it took a few days everything to sink in but thankfully, at the same time that the Diabetes medication started kicking in, my cough also started to get better so I managed to get back to work, get my head around the changes I needed to make and and start to get back to actual life which had been pretty much on pause since the start of the year.
I’ll share more about my Diabetes journey soon but safe to say that it’s been a bit of a rollercoaster and even now, after some changes, my blood sugar level is still at a super high level but it’s come down from where it was which is a win.
The Doctors are pleased with me so far but have said that I need to keep going and do more!
They also said that I need to take care of myself and try and get more sleep as I was on around four or five hours of broken sleep when I was first diagnosed and even when the cough started to get better, that didn’t improve much thanks to the delightful symptoms of Diabetes.
So, sleep has definitely been hard this last couple of months and I’ve had to make a few changes to my night time routine to help me get ready to sleep when I go to bed! I’ve been working on improving my overall sleep routine and also trying to get a better quality of sleep – that elusive deep sleep is something I’m chasing right now.
I thought I’d share my sleep top tips with you today because if they help someone like me to sleep then I’m pretty sure that they’ll help you all too…
Homemade Lavender Sleep Spray
I used to make a homemade sleep spray which helped me to relax a bit before bed but I stopped making it when I moved in here as I left all my essential oils in my old house and they ‘accidentally’ got thrown out. 😊
I ordered some essential oils off Amazon and made myself a batch of sleep spray which I spray gently in the bedroom when I go up to bed. It encourages me to focus on some deep breathing which in turn helps me to relax and calm my brain, putting me in the best space to be ready to sleep. Here’s some ideas on the best essential oils to use for sleep.
Write a to do list for the following day
Every day I’m at work, I have 15 minutes blocked out of my diary to spend planning the following day – I prioritise my tasks and plan them into my diary which means I’m ending the day feeling like the next day is organised and not worrying about the things I need to do as it feels better when it’s down in writing.
This is something I translate into my home life now too with time at the end of the night to just quickly list what I need to achieve the following day and add it to my calendar if necessary. I have a shared calendar with my partner so I can set reminders for him if I need to which helps massively.
I also keep my phone, upside down and on silent on my bedside cabinet and if I wake up and think of something I don’t want to forget then I get it out of my brain by sending myself a super quick email – just a word or two that will job my memory. This takes seconds to do but gives me the peace of mind to let it go from my brain and get back to sleep.
No TV in the bedroom
We’ve taken the TV out of our bedroom so we’re never tempted to go snuggle in bed and just watch TV. It’s so easy to get sucked into binge watching the latest box set and to suddenly end up three episodes in and have the chances of a good night sleep fly out of the window.
The best mattress
I know I’ve said this before but the mattress that we have is genuinely superb!
It’s one that the Simba team sent us just after I was told I had Diabetes and that I needed to improve the quality of my sleep so it was amazing timing and it’s been a game changer for me even though I didn’t think there was a problem with our old mattress until the first night I slept on this one – the difference was noticeable for both of us from the very first night.
I could list all of the science-y reasons why it’s made a difference for us but you’re probably better off looking at the Simba site for that so all I will say is that I genuinely feel more supported and comfortable when I’m in bed and that’s worth a lot to me.
It really is true that you spend so much of your life in bed that you should absolutely have the best mattress you can afford.
Making the bedroom into a relaxing sanctuary
This one is a work in progress as the bedroom was a bit of a dumping ground before I moved in and it’s definitely in need of a full on makeover but it’s not at the top of our list of priorities right now as we have so much other stuff that we want to do before that. So instead of the full makeover that we want to do, we’re doing a few little things that will make a difference.
We’ve done a de-clutter, added some more storage and added an amazing new pretty bed with storage that the lovely people at Simba sent us last week but we still have lots to do.
This is the bed we got in the colour we went for but you’re getting the picture from the website as my partner is at work and I’ve ran out of energy to put the fresh bedding back on the bed.
Seriously, this is an issue right now and as much as my Doctor says it’s normal to be this tired at the moment, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t frustrated. I am literally going to sleep with no bedding on tonight as I’m too tired to put it back on.
The bed though, when it has bedding on looks beautiful in the room and has really motivated me to make the rest of the room into the sanctuary that I want it to be. It has four drawers in it so has given us so much more storage than we had before which is brilliant.
So, there’s my top tips for a good night’s sleep which is important for all of our wellbeing!
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Thanks Simba for working with me this year!
