If your home is cold during the night and you find your sleep disrupted by being cold, it's possible that your room is too cold. While it is best to sleep in a room with a temperature around 60ºF or 15.5ºC, your own psychological and bodily needs must also be taken into account when defining what is too cold. In this article, you'll learn a number of ways to improve your sleep by warming your sleeping space up enough to allow you to sleep comfortably.
Steps
- 1Adjust the thermostat. If you have central heating, check that it is at a suitable temperature for the night. The ideal bedroom temperature for night is around 60ºF or 15.5ºC but you might need to make it a little higher. Naturally, this needs to be balanced with the preferences of everyone else in the house, so it might not be the best solution.
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www.SleepThroughNight.com - 2Warm up before getting into bed. There are several things you can do to make sure that you and your bed are warm before settling down to sleep. Often, just doing these can be enough to hurdle the initial cold air and to sleep well for the remaining night. Here are some suggestions;
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- Have a warm shower or bath prior to getting into bed. This will warm you up considerably and you'll keep this warmth as you get to bed. Be sure to dry your hair completely if you wash it.
- Wear adequate clothing. Naked sleeping on a cold night isn't such a great idea if you're one to feel the cold. Try wearing socks with warm pajamas. They should be loose: if they are tight they can aggravate coldness by cutting off circulation. If your head feels cold (especially if you're bald), wear a cozy night hat such as a beanie or set a pillow over or against the top of your head. Try covering your head even if it isn't especially cold, because your body can lose a lot of its total heat production through the head. Cold feet can prevent sleep, so socks, or an extra blanket over the feet, are essential for people who feel the cold a lot.
- Put your clothes in the dryer before putting them back on. If your dryer has a temperature adjustment, set it to medium or high. Have someone else bring the warmed up clothes to you if you're getting out of the shower!
- Drink something warm like hot milk, a hot cocoa, or an herbal tea. Only do this if you're not prone to getting up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom though. Try to avoid eating a few hours before sleeping, as digesting food can prevent you from falling asleep easily.
- 3Pre-warm the bed. There are several ways to do this, depending on your preference. You could use an electric blanket or electric mattress pad and turn it off before sleeping if you like. Or, add a hot water bottle or microwaved wheat pack to the bed to warm up parts of the bed.
- In the old days, people used to heat up a brick and wrap it in cloth, place it in the bed and allow the warmth to disseminate in the vicinity!
- If using a hot water bottle, wrap it in a towel unless it comes with an appointed cover and place it a few inches (centimeters) away from your body in bed because direct contact to skin might result in burns (even if the bottle can be held briefly while you're awake and alert to push it aside when too hot).
- Warm the room with a heat blast. If you don't have central heating, you can use a radiant or blow heater to distribute heat to snap warm up the room. Be sure that nothing is on or touching the heater and remember to turn it off before getting into bed, especially if it is a less-safe type such as an old glowing radiant heater (which should be replaced anyway, good safer ones are cheap).
- Hand warmers used for keeping warm outdoors can help in the bed. Look for them in dollar (bargain) stores, camping, or sporting stores.
- 4Use blankets and other covers to keep the bed warm through the night. A series of blankets and other covers is ideal for increasing bed warmth. Layers work better than a single thick blanket or cover because you can adjust the temperature if it gets too warm by removing a layer or two rather than removing your only layer and ending up cold again. And for those who feel the cold while their partner doesn't, there are blankets that are specially made to keep one side of the bed warmer than the other!
- If you have multiple kinds of blankets, put the fluffy ones underneath (to prevent conduction through the blanket) and the thinner dense ones above (to prevent slower convection to the outside) for maximum warmth.
- Keep your arms under the covers during the night.
- Beware that some mattresses will steal the heat out of your body from underneath. To combat this, place one or more thick blankets underneath your fitted sheet when you make the bed. This keeps the blankets from sliding, keeps them clean, and insulates you all around.
- Consider an electric blanket or electric mattress pad. Not everyone likes using an electric heating pad and with the safety and health concerns also surrounding their use (see "Warnings") prefer not to. However, when used properly according to the directions and not left on while you sleep, electric blankets can warm a bed sufficiently to make it warm enough for you to drop off to sleep quickly. Using them is an issue of personal preference and if a child or householder doesn't like them, don't force them to use one.
- An electric blanket generally should not go under other blankets, because an excessive and dangerous amount of its heat could be retained.
- Some electric blankets have thermostats to warm more powerfully as it gets colder.
- A "space blanket" (reflective plastic blanket) can help to increase the warmth of other blankets. These can be found in camping, outdoor, and sports stores. Don't use one around a child; it would be a suffocation hazard.
- 5Know your materials. The material of your bed-clothes, bedding, and blankets matter. In general, animal fibers (wool, silk, or furs) are the best at keeping heat while also absorbing moisture well. They will leave you feeling warm and dry while you sleep, even if you should sweat a little. Two other fibers that are good are modal and cotton.
- Most synthetic fibers, such as polyester, nylon, and spandex do not insulate well, nor do they absorb moisture. They will thus leave you feeling cold and clammy. Especially be aware of "silk" pajamas that are actually nylon.
- Some natural or cellulose-based fibers, such as linen and rayon, are also good for absorbing moisture, but draw heat away from the body, and are best used on warm summer nights.
- 6Keep your bed off the floor and away from any exterior wall. A bed that is sitting directly on the floor and is flush with the wall will conduct the cold from the ground and wall areas. This can also encourage the growth of mildew and increases the chances of condensation forming around you, making it both colder and increasing health problems, especially in poorly insulated homes. Ensure that your bed is off the ground, and that there is a barrier or space between your bed and any external wall.
- Add a layer of warmth over the mattress. Sleeping on sheep pelts or a woolen mattress pad can improve the feeling of warmth as well as comfort.
- 7Sleep with another being. If you've ever heard of the saying "It's a three dog night", this is a reference to an old tradition where cowboys used to share the night with one to three dogs depending on how cold the night felt, with three dogs being an extremely cold night![1] Whether it's your spouse, lover, sibling, or a pet, sharing body heat is a great way to warm up. Snuggle up together and conserve your combined body heat. The downside to this method is that pets move, people get too hot and push you away, and it can get a little too warm – and crowded!
- A cat is likely to leave from time to time or nip toes. A dog may smell bad and not move on its own even if gently nudged to direct it. A big dog may cause discomfort to what it sleeps on or occupy space that prevents comfortable positioning and be very difficult to dislodge. A human may snore.
- Make sure that pets are flea free before sharing your sleeping space with them.
- While not exactly a being, using your laptop in bed prior to sleeping can really warm you up. The downside is that it can also keep you alert and you might find it harder to fall asleep.
- Do not block the vents, or prevent circulation of air around most of the bottom if the laptop doesn't have vents.
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Tips
- A steam bath can warm you up wonderfully.
- Using a Swedish built-in bed might help. These beds look like old-fashioned train berths and have been designed to hold in body heat. Search online for manufacturers or for patterns if you're handy with woodwork.
- Similarly, you could make a bed canopy. (Girls may like them because they are old-fashioned and ornate, but don't make one for anyone prone to play unsafely with it such as a little kid.)
- Some people find that it helps to sleep curled up as a way to retain warmth. This can place a lot of pressure on your spine, especially as you age, so it isn't for everyone.
- If you have a multi-story home, sleep upstairs because warm air rises.
- Consider going to sleep earlier. Most likely the temperature won't be as cold at 9:00 as it is around 11:00, and you might not feel so cold earlier because you're still active.
- It's important to get at least 7 hours of sleep; inadequate sleep can increase your chances of getting a cold.[2] Thus, if you're experiencing sleeping difficulties during colder seasons, see your doctor or health professional for advice.
- Flannel sheets feel warmer than regular sheets, but if the "drag" of the sheets bothers you or your partner, you can just spread a flannel pillow case under your feet. It will stay in place and you will feel much warmer.
- Do ten sit-ups and ten push-ups or a few other mild exercises to warm your body. Too much exercise might keep you up, but a little bit helps.
- Stack the throw pillows or laundry on top of the blanket next to you for you to snuggle against or under as needed.
- When sleeping in cold room you might have trouble getting up in the morning because you feel too warm and cozy under your blankets. Make getting out of bed more bearable with:
- A programmable thermostat set to start warming the house a little while before wakeup time.
- A programmable coffeemaker set to make coffee, preferably into a warmed or insulated carafe, a little before wakeup time. (Like electric blankets these have more potential for danger than many appliances because they are meant to create heat while not being attended to.)
- Having your warm clothes, or a warm robe and pair of slippers next to your bed.
- There are now such things as microwavable furry slippers or slippers that warm up plugged into your computer or laptop. Extremely comfortable and not very expensive, they will stop the heat escaping from your feet.
- A waterbed is typically heated not directly but from underneath with a special waterbed heater for perfectly even, steady warmth. They do support the body differently from other mattresses in a way that is not necessarily better for everyone so don't buy one just for the heating method.
- You should also be aware that your blood sugar affects how warm or cold you will feel. By eating some type of carbohydrate with protien it sometimes will help you warm up after all we are furnaces and need fuel.
Warnings
- Some advise not to go to sleep with an electric blanket left on, for various reasons, as follows. You should always unplug it and turn it off, even if the manufacturer says it is okay to sleep with it on a lower setting. The constant heat will drain your energy during the night (and can actually cause you to wake up), and the risk of an electrical fault as you sleep makes this too dangerous a practice as fires and/or electric shocks have been known to result. Moreover, some people are concerned about the proximity of electricity next to a sleeping body because of the potentially dangerous health effects of being around an electro-magnetic field.[3]
- If you do choose to use an electric blanket, and even more so if you choose to sleep with one, be sure that it is in good condition and approved by Underwriters Laboratories or otherwise checked for safety to your satisfaction. Don't hesitate to replace it if it is appears to be worn, damaged, or many years old (flexible plastics deteriorate over time): the monetary and environmental benefits from not heating an entire house, or even a room, unnecessarily far outweigh the cost of an occasional replacement.
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