Certainly one of my main targets as we began the New 12 months was to enhance the general high quality and size of my sleep.
I do know full-well the advantages of high quality sleep in terms of my coaching, restoration and my general well-being.
However, like a lot of you, getting sufficient high quality sleep isn’t at all times straightforward.
One thing at all times appears to get in the best way of fine sleep; attending to mattress late due to household or work, needing to rise up tremendous early to slot in coaching, or typically simply tossing and turning all occur on a far-too-consistent foundation.
So I wished to look at getting higher sleep from all angles; pre-bed routines, dietary supplements, greatest practices, and methods to enhance sleep high quality.
Over the subsequent few weeks you’ll see plenty of content material on our finish about methods to get higher sleep, from podcasts to movies and articles. I’ve already began implementing plenty of what I’ve discovered from analysis research in addition to our skilled podcast friends and it’s made an enormous distinction.
At the moment, we’re going to start out by trying on the analysis research on pillow choice and dig into the information on how little issues like pillow fill, contour, and top can have a big impact in your high quality of sleep.
How A lot Does a Pillow Influence Your Sleep?
I knew for me, that one of many first issues I wanted to work on was sleep high quality.
Not solely have I felt at occasions that even after 8 hours of sleep I didn’t get up well-rested, I do know that attending to mattress earlier, and many others gained’t matter a lot if I’m not getting restful, deep sleep.
One factor that stored popping up as I started my analysis on sleep high quality was how a lot of an influence your pillow makes on restful sleep.
In actual fact, one elite runner, Caitlin Eager, posted the information from her Whoop that confirmed her deep, restorative sleep elevated by 52 minutes after she switched her pillow to 1 matched to her sleep profile.
So, I began digging into the analysis about what features of a pillow are most essential and the way a lot influence they will have on sleep high quality.
Briefly, the analysis constantly confirmed 4 “traits” of pillows take advantage of influence on sleep high quality: (1) the kind of filling used; (2) temperature regulation; (3) sleep place; and (4) pillow top.
That can assist you dive in additional, let’s check out the analysis on every of those traits.
What’s Your Pillow Made Of?
Pillows are typically made out of three supplies: feather, microfiber/polyethylene, or reminiscence foam.
Fortunately, there have been just a few research carried out on which sort of filling is greatest.
Most research have discovered that pillows with a feather filling are the worst in terms of sleep high quality and luxury. For instance, this 2011 paper concluded that “feather pillow customers offered constantly low studies of pillow consolation and sleep high quality.”
This was attributed to lack of cervical (neck) help and the lack to control temperature (extra on this under).
Alternatively, most research agree that reminiscence foam filling affords the most effective and most constant neck help and temperature regulation, thus resulting in essentially the most optimum sleep high quality.
Thus, when selecting your subsequent pillow, search for one thing with reminiscence foam to extend your consolation.
Pillow Temperature
Associated to filling, your pillow’s capacity to control your physique temperature performs a crucial function throughout sleep.
It’s because your sympathetic nervous system is much less excited and calmer in cooler situations, particularly throughout sleep. This results in deeper sleep.
As talked about above, the filling of your pillow can have an effect on head temperature when sleeping.
Feather pillows carried out the worst and reminiscence foam pillows carried out the most effective when in comparison with the commonest varieties of pillow filling.
One other consideration to pillow temperature I discovered within the analysis was “head to pillow contact space”. Principally, air flow and cooling are slowed when extra of your head is touching the pillow.
Researchers posit that pillows that mildew across the head and neck space could really feel extra comfy initially, however result in impaired sleep as a result of they “lower the air circulation and prevents thermal dissipation to the environment, finally growing the temperature of the pillow.”
To fight this, researchers suggest pillow filling that’s breathable and likewise one which contours to your sleeping place.
Sleep Place and Pillow Top
One factor I undoubtedly didn’t notice earlier than embarking on my pillow-research rabbit gap is that facet sleepers and again sleepers want totally different pillows.
This has to do with how the pillow must help the neck whereas sleeping.
Individuals who sleep on their sides typically want a thicker pillow to fill the house between their heads and shoulders.
Again sleepers don’t want as a lot loft (pillow thickness) as facet sleepers, however the pillow ought to be thick sufficient to maintain the top elevated. In any other case, chances are you’ll be extra prone to snore or develop neck ache.
Most analysis factors to facet sleepers discovering a pillow loft of 5 inches or extra to be optimum whereas again sleepers often discover optimum consolation with a pillow loft of three to five inches.
Closing Suggestions
I used to be completely shocked once I started actually digging into the analysis on pillows.
I clearly knew a top quality pillow might make an enormous distinction in sleep high quality (as does anybody who has ever slept on a poor high quality pillow in a lodge), however I didn’t notice how individualized a pillow might be to totally different sleep positions and preferences.
After reviewing the analysis, it appears the most suitable choice is to decide on a pillow constituted of greater high quality supplies and one you may alter to your sleep place, particularly the choice so as to add and take away fill.
The most effective choices I discovered available on the market is from Lagoon.
Lagoon focuses on making pillows designed particularly for runners and athletes to assist them optimize their sleep and restoration.
What I favored most is that they have you ever take a sleep quiz that helps pair you with the right pillow for you based mostly on sleep place, physique dimension and extra.
Being the information nerd I’m, I additionally wished to check to see how a lot of a distinction a high quality pillow might make on my sleep high quality. So, I obtained to testing with my apple watch.
Utilizing my outdated pillow, my apple watch knowledge confirmed that I wakened a median of 6 occasions every night time and spent 2 hours in deep sleep.
Once I switched to the Lagoon pillow matched for me my common variety of occasions waking dropped to 2 per night time and my deep sleep elevated by 45 minutes.
Each “experiments” have been carried out in two week blocks so I might guarantee any outlier knowledge didn’t throw off the numbers. For my part, this can be a big outcome contemplating an additional 45 minutes of deep sleep per night time provides up, particularly over the course of weeks and months.
I for one am undoubtedly glad I dig into the analysis. I hope this deep dive additionally has you inspecting your pillow alternative and ensuring you’ve the optimum filling, firmness and top on your sleeping preferences.
