Thought drinking alcohol would make you sleep better, turns out you were wrong!

While alcohol can make you fall asleep faster, the trade-off is that you'll end up with a bad night's sleep.

In fact, alcohol can never improve sleep. Alcohol can make it easier for some people to fall asleep, but three to four hours after falling asleep, people wake up and can't fall back asleep.

If you have trouble falling asleep, consider relaxation techniques other than a sip of alcohol.

Alcohol is a central nervous system depressant, which is why it gives you a temporary sense of well-being and relaxation, and a lot of people fall asleep after drinking. Understanding how alcohol affects sleep is not easy. Not only drinking a lot or being in a drunken state, just 1 glass of alcohol near bedtime also has a big impact on sleep.

Alcohol reduces the quality of sleep.

1. Alcohol Disrupts REM . Sleep

Its "relaxing" properties make alcohol seem to be the drink of choice for some people to ease into a good night's sleep. However, it reduces the quality of sleep. Many studies have shown that drinking alcohol disrupts your sleep cycle, especially REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Remember, the REM sleep stage is where dreams occur.

Evidence suggests that deeper sleep with alcohol consumption is also associated with an increase in forehead alpha waves, a marker of wakefulness and sleep. So while you may fall asleep faster at first, you won't get a good quality REM sleep. When you don't get enough REM sleep, you won't feel rested and that affects your performance at work and other activities the next day.

2. Waking up often in the middle of the night

When you drink alcohol, the excitatory neurons in your brain are inhibited, so you fall asleep. But this sleep won't last for most people. As your body metabolizes alcohol, the nerves that stimulate recovery wake you up and make it difficult to fall back asleep.

This side effect happens to me almost whenever I drink alcohol in the evening. Imagine you had a drink before going to bed, you woke up at 2 a.m. and just stared into the dark, you can wish you hadn't been drinking.

When you drink alcohol, you're essentially messing with your sleep-wake cycle.

3. Alcohol inhibits melatonin production in the body

The human body produces melatonin to help control our sleep-wake cycle, which coincides with the cycle of sunlight. The pineal gland secretes melatonin when the sun goes down and we start to feel tired. When you drink alcohol, you're essentially messing with your sleep-wake cycle.

That's why drinking alcohol is how you reduce melatonin production - regardless of whether the sun has set. One study found that drinking alcohol an hour before bed can suppress melatonin production by up to 20%. Many people wonder if it is possible to supplement with melatonin and combat the side effects. The fact is that alcohol should not be mixed with melatonin because it causes potential side effects such as anxiety, high blood pressure, dizziness or breathing problems, and can even affect your ability to produce a hormone. liver enzymes.

4. Amplify the effects of sleep disorders

If you're living with obstructive sleep apnea, where the muscles of your throat and tongue have obstructed your airway, alcohol makes the condition worse. When you drink alcohol before bed and have sleep apnea, your throat muscles relax and collapse more often, leading to frequent breathing interruptions that last longer than usual.

Many studies also show that drinking alcohol increases the risk of sleep apnea by 25%, as it may contribute to the lowest levels of oxygen saturation in patients with obstructive sleep apnea.

Alcohol also worsens insomnia, the most common sleep disorder, characterized by difficulty falling asleep, staying up all night, or getting up too early in the morning.

Experts estimate between 35% and 70% of drinkers live with insomnia. This situation is likened to the case of a chicken with an egg. Troubles with insomnia can be made worse by drinking, and insomnia can also contribute to someone's alcoholism.

Alcohol also aggravates insomnia, the most common sleep disorder.

If you want to enjoy your favorite drink and still want to sleep well, try these tips.

1. Pay attention to how alcohol affects sleep

This highlights that you should know how alcohol affects you and your sleep schedule. Try keeping a sleep diary to measure duration and quality, and add the amount and duration of alcohol consumption to your diary to see a change in sleep quality.

Often alcohol will have different effects, specific to each person. If you understand this difference, you can set limits for your body and needs.

2. Stop drinking at least four hours before you go to bed

You can still drink 1 glass of wine, but be careful to drink it about 4 hours before you go to bed, and drink a moderate amount of alcohol. Four hours is a good standard because it gives your body time to metabolize the alcohol to make sure it doesn't interfere with your sleep.