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There’s a reason experts recommend adults get 7-9 hours of sleep every night. From preventing forgetfulness to impacting your life expectancy, there’s a laundry list of health reasons why you should get a good night’s sleep every night. But achieving that goal isn’t always easy. Finding the right code of hacks to unlock your sleep potential and get the rest your body needs can be tricky.
Shelby Harrisa clinical sleep psychologist, aims to crack that code by partnering with the popular meditation app and mental health brand Calm. Harris and Calm have published a working interpretation of the “five sleep languages” — breaking down a number of different sleep patterns (or lack thereof) to give people more actionable steps to sleep better.
Harris said she came up with the five different sleep languages after studying the differences among her patients during her 20 years of practice and found that there are a handful of categories they fall into.
“We can give people a whole list of sleep hygiene goals to follow or when to see a sleep doctor, but sometimes that’s a little overwhelming for people,” Harris said. The goal of the different sleep languages is to meet people where they are in their sleep health journey.
“It helps to determine where they want to go, what they can start with.”
Read on to learn more about your sleep language and how you can use this knowledge to improve your sleep. For more advice on how to improve the quality of your sleep, here are eight ways to promote sleepiness and how your diet relates to your sleep.
The 5 Sleep Languages and Tips for Speaking Yours
Harris has chosen five sleep languages, but it’s important to know that you can switch between these languages throughout your life, she says.
Below are the five sleep languagesas described in Calm’s blog.
1. The ‘gifted’ sleeper
If you are a gifted sleeper, you probably appear that way to those around you — gifted, in the name of sleep. Maybe you can fall asleep anywhere, regardless of noise or background light, or you have no problem with naps. Either way, the gifted sleeper generally has no problem falling asleep or staying asleep.
Tips for the gifted sleeper
While this may seem like the “best” sleep language category to belong to, objectively talented sleepers may be better off consulting a sleep doctor if they are sleeping too much, as it can be a sign of a health conditionIt may be especially important to see a doctor if you are getting plenty of sleep but still don’t feel well rested.
But if there’s no other cause, consider whether you’re actually trying to catch up on sleep and whether you might benefit from a stricter sleep schedule, the Calm message says.
2. The ‘Words of Concern’ Sleeper
If you are a “words of worry” sleeper, you may know who you are. Your brain is noisy at night, clouded by the what ifs of the day, and what you have to do tomorrow. Whether it is the past or the present, a word of worry sleeper is focused on a time other than the present and the physical focus at hand: sleep.
Tips for people concerned about their sleep
“I have a lot of patients who come to me and their brain just won’t shut off,” Harris said. If this sounds like you, be clear about your sleep boundaries and limit things like screen time or cross-contaminating activities in the bedroom that don’t involve your sleep, like work. You might also benefit from adding a few minutes of mindfulness or meditation to your day, or try this CNET to-do list hack for a better night’s sleep.
Working or scrolling in bed is a no-go if you want to improve your sleep.
3. The ‘routine perfectionist’ sleeper
If you’re a perfectionist sleeper, you may have taken our sleep advice a little too hard, to the detriment of your happiness and sometimes your sleep. You may be a perfectionist sleeper if you find yourself missing fun events or other special occasions that may be important to you out of fear of a bad night’s sleep. Or if something or someone disrupts your sleep, you get irritated.
“I often see these people because they used to be very anxious or had a sleep problem, but now they’ve become hyper-obsessed with it,” Harris said.
Tips for those who are a little too perfect when it comes to sleeping
As outlined in the Calm blog, perfectionist sleepers will benefit from a little more flexibility and variety — things that create “less attachment” to your sleep routine. For starters, change up the order of your sleep routine a little (maybe brush your teeth for (for example, you put on your pajamas today).
As with other sleep languages, someone who sleeps well can benefit from practicing mindfulness, which can help them deal with anxiety-provoking thoughts in a less stressful way.
4. The ‘too hot to touch’ sleeper
It’s in the name, but if you’re too hot to handle, you’re too hot to sleep. Menopause, perimenopause, other health conditions, or even an incompatible bed partner with a different body temperature can make you too hot to handle.
Tips for sleep hotties
If you wake up drenched in sweat, or if you often feel uncomfortable at night, see your doctor to see what underlying health condition might be at play. Medication side effects or hormonal changes can also affect how warm you feel at night, as the Calm post points out.
But if your bed partner is the culprit, follow this CNET tip and consider getting two separate blankets or comforters. That can also reduce the tension between the covers.
5. The ‘light as a feather’ sleeper
Light sleepers are easily woken up by noise, light or even a strong smell. If you are light as a feather, you may wake up in the morning after a solid seven or eight hours on the pillow still feeling unrested or sleepy.
Tips for those who are light as a feather
If you’re restless and not getting the quality sleep you want, consider tightening up your bedtime routine and adding some structure. For example, consider setting boundaries in your bed, like no scrolling through social media and no eating in bed. (Lazy crumbs on your bare legs might be the last thing a light sleeper needs.)
Calm and Harris also recommend contacting a sleep expert if you are concerned about the quality of your sleep. You can get screened for sleep problems such as sleep talking, teeth grinding, and sleep apnea.
The Connection Between Mental Health and Sleep
Harris says she decided to partner with Calm in response to the current mental health crisis. The pandemic has exacerbated symptoms of anxiety, eating disorders, and other mental health issues. Mental health can be improved or damaged by a person’s sleep patterns.
Lack of sleep in particular can affect your ability to manage your emotions or find solutions to seemingly trivial problems that can feel like the end of the world when you’re sleep deprived. (I asked Harris if there was any truth to my feeling that I regress to a child’s ability to manage emotions when I’m sleep deprived, and she explained that sleep deprivation disrupts the part of our minds responsible for reasoning and judgment, and our ability to switch between states, or our cognitive flexibility.)
“With sleep deprivation in general, we find higher rates of anxiety, higher rates of depression, higher rates of stress,” she said. “And we find that their stress tolerance and ability to cope with daily stressors becomes much more difficult.”
The critical part is REM sleep, which you may be lacking if you are regularly sleep deprived. This can lead to problems in your relationship or at work.
“REM sleep is really important for emotion processing, memory,” Harris said. “If you wake up early or don’t get enough REM sleep on a regular basis, you’re going to have irritability, depression, anxiety, all that jazz.”
Another conclusion about a good night’s sleep
Despite how much we preach the health benefits of sleep, there’s a strand in society that might resist the idea that healthy sleep trumps everything. But according to Harris, “no pun intended, you’re kind of living in a dream world,” if you’re trying to check off everything on your wellness list before prioritizing sleep. Centering sleep will help you stabilize and prioritize all the other tasks you have to do during the day.
“We have to put an end to the hamster wheel somewhere. If we do that by prioritizing sleep, the day will go more smoothly.”
