Snuggling up under a cozy duvet and blankets brings a delightful warmth during the chilly months. However, sleeping through winter presents its challenges.
As the days grow shorter and mornings darken, our circadian rhythms can fall out of step, making restful sleep elusive. But fear not, for assistance is at hand. In this winter sleep guide, we’ll unveil the secrets to creating the ultimate cozy bedding for a restful slumber. We’ll also delve into crafting the perfect bedtime routine tailored for winter nights, alongside offering exercise and nutrition tips aimed at ensuring you sleep as soundly as possible.
Why Is Sleep Important?
Sleep is often undervalued in our fast-paced society, yet its importance cannot be overstated. Beyond merely providing a break from the hustle and bustle of daily life, sleep plays a crucial role in maintaining overall health and well-being. Here are several reasons why sleep is important:
- Restoration and Repair: During sleep, the body undergoes essential processes of repair and restoration. Cells regenerate, tissues grow, and muscles repair themselves. Sleep is particularly vital for the immune system, as it helps to strengthen immune function, making the body more resilient to infections and illnesses.
- Cognitive Function: Adequate sleep is essential for optimal cognitive function. It enhances concentration, focus, and productivity, allowing us to perform better at work, school, or daily tasks. Sleep also plays a crucial role in memory consolidation, helping us retain information and learn new skills more effectively.
- Mood Regulation: Lack of sleep can significantly impact mood and emotional well-being. Sleep deprivation is closely linked to increased irritability, mood swings, and feelings of stress and anxiety. Conversely, getting enough sleep can help regulate emotions and promote a more positive outlook on life.
- Metabolic Health: Sleep plays a vital role in regulating metabolism and weight management. Lack of sleep disrupts hormone levels, particularly those that control appetite and hunger, leading to increased cravings for unhealthy foods and weight gain. Chronic sleep deprivation is associated with an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, and other metabolic disorders.
- Heart Health: Adequate sleep is crucial for maintaining a healthy heart and reducing the risk of cardiovascular diseases. During sleep, the body works to regulate blood pressure and reduce inflammation, both of which are important factors in heart health. Chronic sleep deprivation has been linked to an increased risk of hypertension, heart attack, and stroke.
- Emotional Well-being: Sleep plays a significant role in regulating emotions and coping with stress. It provides an opportunity for the brain to process and consolidate emotional experiences, helping us to better manage challenging situations and maintain emotional resilience.
Choosing The Right Winter Bedding
Without a comfortable and cosy sleeping space, drifting off becomes much more difficult. Here are our suggestions for creating the perfect winter bed to snooze in.
Winter Duvet
Cocooning yourself in a fluffy duvet is a perfect way to stay warm this winter. But how do you pick out the perfect winter duvet? Below, you’ll discover a few important elements to consider.
How To Choose The Right Tog
When it comes to duvet terminology, the tog refers to the overall thermal grade of your duvet, indicating its level of warmth.
Our 13.5 tog duvets are ideal for enveloping you in warmth all night long, no matter how cold it is outside. And for a warmer winter night, or for those who run hotter, try a 9 tog duvet instead.
For a duvet that you can curl up under all year round, an all-season’s duvet is perfect. Combining a 9 tog duvet and a light 4.5 tog duvet that’s perfect for summer, simply button the two together to mimic the same cosiness of our 13.5 tog duvet during the winter months.
How To Choose The Right Material
When choosing a material for your winter duvet, we have an array of fabulous options on offer at DUSK.
Duck or goose down duvets are wonderfully warm and breathable, as this material naturally expands to create pockets of air, which add thermal insulation, keeping you extra toasty on chilly evenings. However, for those with allergies, our Feels Like Down duvet is a marvellous alternative.
Winter Bed Sheets
When choosing winter bed linen, an insulating material, such as cotton, is ideal. The natural fibres of this sublimely soft fabric trap air to create a barrier to the winter chill whilst also being temperature-regulating and breathable. In the colder months, it’s also a good idea to opt for sheets with a higher thread count, as these are often thicker and, thus, cosier.
Another smart bedding option in wintertime is Egyptian cotton, as the long fibres of this luxurious material add to its insulating properties. In our blog, you can discover more about Egyptian cotton bedding as well as the fantastic benefits of cotton.
Layer Up
Blankets and throws are ideal for adding extra layers of warmth to your bed throughout the colder months.
For winter, we recommend fluffy faux fur throws for supreme cosiness. Or try a chunky knitted wool blanket, as the natural fibre structure of wool makes it incredible for insulation.
Throws are also excellent for adding seasonal winter tones into your bedroom decor, try a festive sage green or warming chocolate brown to evoke wintry vibes.
However, you don’t just have to add extra layers on top of you. By placing a mattress topper beneath you, you not only add more comfort and softness but also an extra layer to trap heat.
Lighting and Temperature
Lighting and temperature have a significant impact on our quality of sleep. Yet, with fewer daylight hours and colder temperatures, both of these elements become contributing factors when it comes to getting our recommended zzz’s.
Light
Darkness signals to our brains that it is time to sleep. However, in winter, it’s dark a lot of the time, meaning we often wake up in darkness and finish our working day in darkness, too. This confuses our circadian rhythm, which is the daily cycle our body follows. You can discover the best cycle for your body with our clever chronotype quiz.
One way to counteract winter’s potential sleep disruption is to maximise our daylight hours. This can be done through:
- Morning walks.
- Sitting by a window when working or eating lunch.
- Lunchtime or afternoon strolls.
During the evening, limit artificial light by turning lights down as you approach bedtime and limiting screen time right before bed as part of your bedtime routine. Then, when it’s time for sleep, darken the room to signal to your body that it’s time to rest. For those who are particularly sensitive to light, a pitch-black room is best.
Heavyweight Curtains
Avoid pesky rays of artificial light from the outside world by drawing your heavyweight curtains tight across your window.
As well as helping to keep your bedroom blissfully dark for sleep, thick curtains also give an extra layer of insulation to your room, blocking out winter window draughts. Plus, they provide an additional barrier to outside sounds that might disturb your sleep.
Temperature
In winter, it can be tempting to turn the thermostat up as high as possible to keep your home toasty. However, this isn’t what’s best for sleep.
The body naturally drops in temperature when it’s time to sleep, at the same time as it releases melatonin. You can, therefore, signal to your body that bedtime is approaching by turning the thermostat down a little, cooling your skin and surroundings.
The best temperature for sleep is usually around 18.3 degrees Celsius. However, as everyone is different, the general advice is between 15.6 and 20 degrees Celsius.
Another way to create a before-bed temperature drop is by taking a bath or shower. The immediate temperature decrease after you hop out of a lovely hot bath or steamy shower immediately relaxes the body for bed.
How can I keep my bed warm without raising the thermostat?
A chilly bed isn’t ideal to curl up in after a long winter’s day, but turning the heating up isn’t always the most cost-effective choice either.
Once you’ve got your warm winter bedding on, including a high tog duvet, cosy throw and mattress topper for that extra layer of warmth, there are plenty of ways to give your bed an additional boost of toastiness.
A hot water bottle can heat up your winter bedding quickly, creating a perfect nest to snuggle up in. Or try an electric blanket underneath your winter duvet.
Aromatherapy
Soothing scents are another way to help promote relaxation before bed, primarily through essential oils or herbal teas.
One bedtime favourite is lavender. This scent is a natural remedy for calming anxiety, making it the perfect companion for evening slumber.
Enjoy the fragrant aroma of lavender by spraying it onto your pillow, rubbing diluted lavender oil onto your temples or using a lavender oil diffuser.
Exercise and Nutrition
Exercising and eating well truly make everything better, including your winter sleep.
Exercise
While the cold weather and darkness may urge you to stay in and nap, being active throughout the day is a healthy contributor to an improved quality of sleep. This helps your body to distinguish between active time and rest time, allowing those sleepy hormones to take over when it’s time to wind down in the evening. Just be sure to avoid working out too close to bedtime, as raising your body temperature and heart rate will make it more difficult for you to fall into a restful sleep.
Nutrition
In winter, we tend to eat hearty meals that make us feel warm and nourished. However, try not to eat too heavily in the evening. If your body is still digesting food at bedtime, this can disturb your sleep cycle.
If you do want a light snack before bed, however, there are a number of options, like warm milk, nuts and yoghurt. These foods contain calcium and magnesium, nutrients that are wonderful for sleep. Calcium helps your brain create melatonin, while magnesium relaxes your central nervous system.
Together, these ingredients make a powerful combination for a blissful night of rest.
If you prefer something to drink before bed, chamomile tea is ideal. It contains natural ingredients that help to induce sleepiness, helping you to sip your way to slumber.
For further advice on how to enjoy the sweetest of sleep, discover our blog on sleep expert tips. Or browse our inspiration page for further ideas on creating bedtime bliss, including even more winter sleep tips.