You know you want to get good, deep, restful sleep, but somehow you can’t and that’s taking a big toll on your body - probably even more than you realize. The impact is huge. So today, I’m going to tackle a big reason why you’re probably not sleeping well and give you a clear solution.

About a month ago, I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t get back to sleep.

I laid awake in bed for several hours, actually, and by the time I finally fell back to sleep, my alarm went off only 30 minutes later. The entire next day, I was groggy, I was cranky, I had a short fuse, my motivation to do anything productive was gone, my desire to make healthy food decisions was gone, I didn’t want to exercise… it was almost a waste of a day. And it was incredible to me how just one night of disrupted sleep dramatically impacted my life. My entire day was messed up.

And I know for a fact, that so many listeners of this show struggle to get good sleep, so you can probably really relate to my experience.

I remember back when I had my first newborn, Calvin… it was my first real exposure to being truly sleep deprived. And then for several years after, I battled bouts of insomnia. So I know what it feels like to feel like you’re going crazy and literally losing your mind.

The toll lack of sleep takes on your body, your mind and your emotions is unprecedented.

I know that whenever I read through the Psalms in the Bible, I can tell that David really struggled with sleep, he mentions it several times, and it’s probably one of the reasons that those passages are so heart-wrenching and emotional and raw. When you don’t sleep, you feel emotionally stripped to the bone.

If you remember, a few episodes ago, I had Esther Blum on the show with me… she’s the menopause expert… and one thing she said, over and over again, was that a lack of adequate, restful sleep was the source of the majority of our health struggles that we experience as we age. It’s why we might be experiencing that menopause belly fat, because our stress hormones - that cortisol - is going crazy. It’s one of the reasons why our metabolism slows down, why we might struggle to build muscle mass and recover well from exercise, and like in my story, it’s one of the biggest reasons why we can’t get motivated to be a healthy person… we’re just exhausted.

So, if we can solve even one of the reasons why you don’t sleep well, it’s going to make a MASSIVE impact on your life.

Uncomfortable

Now, when I woke up in the middle of the night about a month ago, the thing that woke me up was that I was physically uncomfortable. And for me, my back hurt. And I couldn’t get into a position that eliminated the pain, and because it was the middle of the night, I was starting to catastrophize and thinking I had kidney issues.

But the next day, when I was thinking a little more clear, I realized it wasn’t kidney issues, it was just simply my back hurt. And I could trace the root cause of it back to the fact that I hadn’t intentionally recovered well from snowboarding two days prior.

So Discouraging

I have been hearing from so many women lately that have mentioned to me that they’re being woken up in the middle of the night because they can’t get comfortable. Your body feels stiff and achy and it body just hurts. And I know that makes you feel so discouraged - and when you feel that way in the middle of the night, those emotions can be amped up.

And the last thing I want is for you to be burdened with this anymore. It’s just plain wrong that you can’t sleep because you’re simply uncomfortable, and have to suffer all the miserable consequences of that!

You’ve probably been told it’s your pillow, or you need a different mattress, and I’m sure you’ve tried all those things and still feel at a loss.

I want you to know that very soon, I’m going to have a sleep medicine doctor on the show with us. I literally just interviewed him this week, and he’s going go into far more detail about sleep hygiene, sleep therapy, and tactics that really work when you can’t turn your brain off. But today, I think it’s important that we address the physical side of things - when your back or your hips hurt, or your entire body just feels uncomfortable and THAT’S why you can’t sleep.

Here’s the Better Sleep Plan

Feeling physically comfortable at any given point - whether waking or sleeping - comes back to the “PSF framework”.

• Posture while you sleep - This is where the pillows and the mattresses can help. (But remember, it’s only one part of the equation, which is why you’re still uncomfortable if you thought changing your mattress would solve your problems.) If you know you have a decent pillow and mattress, then while you’re sleeping
• Side sleeper - pillow between your knees
• Front sleeper - pillow under your hips
• Back sleeper - pillow under your knees
• Strength - This will need to be done during the day or right before bed. I do NOT want you to be doing sit-ups right before you hop into bed. The stronger your CORE muscles are, the more they’ll adequately support your low back and your hips while you’re sleeping.
• As your muscles gain appropriate strength, they also maintain tone even when you’re not specifically flexing them. This tone through your core muscles (especially your deep core muscles) is going to help hold your pelvis and hips in position and your spine in position while you’re resting.
• The easiest way to get guidance with training your core in the very best ways is my 5 Day Core Tune Up program. I made it super easy so you can follow along with me as we target the right core muscles to get your midsection engaging properly again.
• Flexibility - Tension and tightness in the wrong areas is going to make you feel super uncomfortable when you’re trying to fall asleep.
• The best places to stretch during the day and then also right before bed are:
• Hip flexors, which can become extremely tight throughout the day, especially if you sit a lot
• Your piriformis and deep hip rotators
• Hamstrings
• Mid/upper spine (don’t forget this part!)
• I have a bedtime stretching routine over on YouTube that finishes with a “full body scan” that helps you go segment by segment through your body to identify the tense areas and get them to release right before bed.

Proof this Works

And yes, these things really do work if you’re sleep is being disrupted because your body is tight and achy and you just can’t get comfortable. I have already heard back from a number of women that have simply done my 5 day core tune up program and are already sleeping better at night. Yes, they have a stronger core - which is always awesome! - but the added benefit is that it’s reducing some of that discomfort and so they can actually sleep through the night. And then of course that has a snowball effect on all the other areas of your health. I just love hearing that.

Your big takeaway.

Ok, to wrap up I always like to leave you with one simple action step that you can put into place, and for today I want to just encourage you to be PROACTIVE about your sleep and do something that might seem a little outside the box as a solution. And it could be as simple as getting your core working better and signing up for my free 5 day core tune up. I think you’ll be surprised on how big of an impact it has on so many areas of your life!

More Resources & Links

EP 226: The Hidden Cause of Menopause Belly Fat with Esther Blum

FREE 5-Day Core Tune Up - A free mini-course to dramatically improve your functional core strength, create better alignment, and relieve back and hip pain for good!

YouTube video: Bedtime Stretches to Improve Your Sleep

Megan’s revolutionary Back & Hip Fix 30-day program

Follow Megan on Instagram

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