Sleep is of the upmost importance for skin health. Sleep allows the body to renew and rejuvenate itself afresh for the morning. If the body is lacking in ample amounts of sleep each night, it doesn’t have enough time to rejuvenate overnight and therefore, parts of the body, especially skin cells, can remain damaged from previous days. Damaged skin cells appear dry, tired, wrinkled and grey. Skin luminosity and health is lost. One of the best ways to revive skin is through sleep.
How a Lack of Sleep Can Affect Skin Health
A lack of sleep can increase stress levels. Stress causes the body to produce the stress hormone cortisol, which then causes the oil glands in the skin to overproduce sebum. This can result in acne breakouts. Not getting an ample amount of sleep every night also triggers an inflammatory response within the body. This causes skin to become inflamed reducing skin cell function, leaving skin red and exacerbating breakouts.
Inadequate time to renew cells through sleep can also weaken the immune system making skin susceptible to infection. What’s worse, a lack of sleep can also lead to an increase in the amount of sugar and glucose in the body, making skin cells divide rapidly which increases the amount of dead skin cells, blocking pores.
So What Does All This Mean for Skin Health?
In essence, a lack of sleep is detrimental to skin’s health. It isn’t enough to eat fresh royal jelly, take a fresh royal jelly capsule or drink a fresh royal jelly elixir – you must take care of your body as a whole for improved skin health! Supplements play a part in it, but it takes more than just a supplement for lifelong improved skin heath.
Sleep provides the body with a way of healing itself – depriving yourself of it with continual late nights is not ideal for achieving a radiant, healthy complexion.
Some Ideas on Ways to get a Good Night’s Sleep
- Have a routine. No screen time of any kind after 9pm – including phones, tablets, laptops, computers or even TV! These stimulate the brain when you need to promote a calm ambience.
- Consider reading a book, perform some relaxation techniques, bedtime stretches etc. Do not eat after 8pm either so that the body has time to digest before sleep.
- Ideally you want to fall asleep between 10-11pm for your body to fully recharge overnight. During the night, many functions can begin to renew themselves including the liver. Detoxification of the liver removes toxins from the body, so enabling optimal liver function which in turn helps detoxify skin too.
- During this time period, growth hormone is also released which plays a major part in the body’s natural healing process. Better sleep will also help decrease cortisol levels and inflammation in the body. In conclusion – fall asleep between 10-11pm to get the most out of your body’s own natural restorative abilities.