Whenever you see a health practitioner for your sleeplessness, you are almost always advised to eat certain foods and avoid others. The reason is simple. It’s because our food already contains natural sleep aids that some sleep medications are designed to mimic similar pathways to get us to sleep.
So here are the top 4 food sources and why they are natural sleep aids for your body.
1. Chlorophyll-rich foods
Vegetables rich with chlorophyll, the green pigment of plants, is said to contain an opium-related substance, a natural sleep aid, along with traces of the anti-cramping agent hyoscyarnin.
Lettuce is a chlorophyll-rich food that has a long-standing reputation for promoting healthy sleep. Mixed with a little lemon juice for flavor, lettuce juice is an effective sleep-inducing drink highly preferable to the synthetic chemical agents in sleeping pills.
2. Tryptophan rich foods
Your mother was right after all to give you a cup of warm milk before sending you off to bed. Dairy products in general are rich in tryptophan. Tryptophan is an amino acid that your body converts to melatonin and serotonin- both of which are thought to induce sleep. Hence, tryptophan is popularly regarded as a very strong natural sleep aid. Although it’s not available in supplements (it’s in hospital injections instead), doctors usually advice you to get it from food.
Other tryptophan foods apart from dairy foods like milk and cheese are:
1. Banana
2. Turkey- didn’t they say that eating turkey makes you sleepy? However, you need to take it with an empty stomach or with carbohydrate rich foods to get enough tryptophan. This is because protein rich foods have other amino acids that compete with tryptophan.
Eat these foods during the day to aid restful sleep and to encourage the release of sleep hormones.
3. Carbohydrate rich foods
If you have trouble getting to sleep when you first go to bed, eat a high-carbohydrate meal two to four hours before bedtime. Carbohydrate consumption, acting via insulin secretion and the “plasma tryptophan ratio”, increases serotonin release. You can also include a little food high in fat in the meal as well. This will increase the immediate release of serotonin before going to bed.
Of course, you would have no problems finding common carbohydrate rich foods:
1.Bread and pasta
2.Cereal and rice
3. Potatoes
We said before that you must eat turkey combined with carbohydrate rich foods. This is because carbohydrates act as natural sleep aids by stimulating the pancreas to secrete insulin. When this occurs, some amino acids that compete with tryptophan leave the bloodstream and enter muscle cells. This causes an increase in the relative concentration of tryptophan in the bloodstream. Serotonin is produced and you feel that familiar sleepy feeling.
4. Vitamin and Mineral rich foods
Magnesium
Magnesium is important for muscle relaxation. It becomes a natural sleep aid by topping up low levels to fight the muscle cramps and involuntary twitches that may be keeping you awake.
Magnesium rich foods – sesame and sunflower seeds, wheat bran, almonds, cashews
Specific vitamins are regarded as natural sleep aids because they are involved in the production of serotonin in our body.
Vitamin B6 (pyridoxine)
Vitamin B6 can help prevent sleeplessness. Your body needs adequate B6 in order to produce serotonin. An excellent source of vitamin B6 is a tablespoon or two of nutritional yeast which can be stirred into a glass of fruit juice.
Vitamin B3 (Niacin) is involved in serotonin synthesis
Vitamin B3 Foods – fish, legumes, poultry, or peanuts