Sleep and Mental Health: This Mind-Body Connection

As the new year approach­es, you might be brain­storm­ing goals to improve your men­tal well­ness, like prac­tic­ing mindfulness or lim­it­ing your screen time each day. Anoth­er sim­ple but effec­tive way to improve your men­tal health may come as a sur­prise — get bet­ter sleep. 

Sleep and men­tal health are close­ly inter­twined. By get­ting enough qual­i­ty sleep (between 7 and 9 hours), you’ll improve your cog­ni­tive skills, emo­tion­al reg­u­la­tion, and abil­i­ty to cope with stress. On the oth­er hand, lack of sleep can lead to irri­tabil­i­ty, fatigue, trou­ble focus­ing, dif­fi­cul­ty mak­ing deci­sions, depres­sion, and anx­i­ety (not to men­tion phys­i­cal prob­lems, like heart dis­ease and dia­betes).

Source: How is Your Sleep Health Linked to Your Men­tal Health?

The con­nec­tion between sleep and men­tal health goes both ways. Not get­ting enough sleep can neg­a­tive­ly impact your men­tal health. At the same time, men­tal health con­di­tions, like depres­sion and anx­i­ety, may make it hard­er to sleep. 

Here’s how sleep impacts your men­tal health and vice ver­sa — and how to improve both. 

How a Lack of Sleep Impacts Your Men­tal Health 

In addi­tion to let­ting your body rest and recov­er from the day, sleep helps keep your brain work­ing as it should and sup­ports your men­tal health. 

When you sleep, your brain repairs itself, con­sol­i­dates mem­o­ries, and process­es emo­tions. It also pre­pares for the next day, cre­at­ing new path­ways to sup­port your learn­ing and mem­o­ry. Sleep also helps you nav­i­gate your emo­tions and cope with change. 

Not get­ting enough qual­i­ty sleep can lead to depres­sion, risky behav­ior, impul­sive­ness, mood swings, lack of moti­va­tion, and sui­ci­dal thoughts. 

Too lit­tle sleep might also make stress­ful sit­u­a­tions feel even more over­whelm­ing. Minor frus­tra­tions might become major, and it might be hard­er to focus on the pos­i­tive parts of your day. 

Final­ly, if you’re already expe­ri­enc­ing men­tal health chal­lenges, poor sleep can make them worse. What’s more, a severe lack of sleep can reduce the effec­tive­ness of some treatments. 

Is your lack of sleep lead­ing to men­tal health con­cerns? Talk to a Duly behav­ioral and men­tal health spe­cial­ist to get the sup­port you need. 

How Men­tal Health Con­di­tions Impact Your Sleep 

Just as not enough sleep can dam­age your men­tal health, exist­ing men­tal health con­di­tions can make it hard­er to sleep. 

Some exam­ples of men­tal health con­di­tions and their impact on sleep include: 

• Depres­sion, which may make you more like­ly to be less phys­i­cal­ly active and get less sun­light expo­sure — both of which can lead to sleep problems
• Post-trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der (PTSD), which can cause night­mares that neg­a­tive­ly affect sleep
• Sub­stance use dis­or­ders, which can dis­turb sleep pat­terns while using or with­draw­ing from substances 

Oth­er men­tal health con­di­tions that are linked to trou­ble sleep­ing include anx­i­ety, atten­tion deficit hyper­ac­tiv­i­ty dis­or­der (ADHD), bipo­lar dis­or­der, obses­sive-com­pul­sive dis­or­der (OCD), and pan­ic disorders. 

Tak­ing Care of Your Mind and Body With Qual­i­ty Sleep 

The sleep and men­tal health con­nec­tion is a strong one. It can also be frus­trat­ing, as prob­lems with one can lead to prob­lems with the oth­er, mak­ing it dif­fi­cult to break the cycle. 

The bot­tom line is that get­ting enough qual­i­ty sleep is key to pre­vent­ing and man­ag­ing men­tal health con­di­tions. Set your­self up for sleep suc­cess by: 

• Get­ting expo­sure to nat­ur­al light (or an equiv­a­lent) dur­ing the day
• Exer­cis­ing reg­u­lar­ly (at least 30 min­utes a day, 5 days a week) 
• Avoid­ing alco­hol, caf­feine, nico­tine, heavy meals, and elec­tron­ic devices before bedtime
• Keep­ing your sleep rou­tines consistent
• Sleep­ing in a cool, qui­et, and dark environment

If you’re still find­ing it dif­fi­cult to sleep, talk to your health­care provider. They will help you adjust your sleep sched­ule and envi­ron­ment to pro­mote bet­ter sleep. They can also refer you to a behav­ioral health expert or sleep spe­cial­ist if needed. 

Sleep is a crit­i­cal part of your men­tal and phys­i­cal health. By pri­or­i­tiz­ing enough shut-eye each night, every day can look a lit­tle brighter.