What Are The Foods That Help Sleep?

Foods That Help Sleep


There are people with sleep problems that will try most anything in order to get to sleep. The long nights of tossing and turning can be agonizing, so why not try a natural sleep medicine to get some of that needed rest? The next time that you just don’t seem to be able to sleep, try opening the refrigerator for relief instead of the medicine cabinet.

Although we seem to overlook it a lot, most of us know that food can make us sleepy. After sitting down and eating a fairly large turkey dinner, it’s hard to do anything but lie down and take a nap.

This is mainly due to a chemical you may have heard a lot about in recent years contained in foods that help sleep, called: tryptophan. Ok so what exactly is tryptophan? It is a substance that can allow your body to produce an amino acid called L-Tryptophan. This amino acid is essential in the making of the neurotransmitters serotonin and melatonin. Serotonin and Melatonin help slow down the nerve traffic that is in your brain, relax you, and let you to think less and sleep more.

What Are The Foods That Help Sleep?
 

Although you have already felt the relaxing powers turkey has, you probably are not too happy about the thought of eating turkey before bed every single night.  Well, the good news is that turkey isn’t the only source of tryptophan that is around.  This chemical is found in dairy products, soy, meat (especially poultry), nuts, fish, beans, eggs, hummus and most other high-protein foods.  Eating a small amount of these foods shortly before you go to bed can help you sleep soundly.

A problem caused by some of the foods that contain tryptophan is that they also contain an amino acid called tyrosine.  This produces chemicals that perk you up and make you more energized.  Eaten alone, these acids will counteract each other produce no significant effects in either direction.  The main factor to getting your needed rest is to eat other foods that will allow you to utilize the tryptophan and not the tyrosine.  Good foods for accomplishing this effect are carbohydrates.  They encourage your body to produce insulin, which “ties up” the tyrosine and allows the tryptophan to reach the brain without competition.  But make sure you do not eat too many large amounts of carbs and simple sugars.  You can produce too much insulin; causing you to wake up within a short time after you’ve fallen asleep.

There is another way to get the full benefit of tryptophan is to eat foods that will increase your brain’s absorption of this amino acid. The best way to do this is with calcium. And we already learned that dairy products are a great source of tryptophan. This is why our mother’s always gave us a warm glass of milk at night to help us rest, because it works.
So, if you are having a problem settling down to get to sleep, and you have tried many other methods, try a late night meal containing nature’s foods that help sleep: tryptophan. Just remember not too eat too much at night or you’ll likely wake up a few hours later.

The most effective plan is to have a moderately sized dinner and a small snack an hour or two before bed. If you eat the correct balance of foods before you go to bed, you can find yourself having that great nights sleep after all.

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