How to Boost Your Energy When You Are Feeling Tired All the Time

After having my son, I started feeling tired all the time. I know labor is exhausting and I needed sleep, but this continued on for 6 months. 6 months!

I couldn’t focus. Not to mention, I had a hard time remembering things. I wanted to take naps all throughout the day.

I had things to do, so this tiredness all the time had to go…

Want to know the first thing I did? I worked on my sleeping habits.

I don’t think we realize how important sleep is or that good sleep habits are essential for feeling refreshed.

So I want to walk through some healthy sleep habits that could be the culprit behind you feeling tired all the time.

Sleep Habit #1: Go to Bed on Time

This was a MAJOR obstacle for me. Having an infant, often I used time after my little one (LO) was down for the night to get extra work in. I mean, it was too quiet to not try to get stuff done.

The bad part was LO didn’t go down until midnight the first few months of his life. This means I was up until 2 am or 3 am some nights. Yeah, bad idea.

I believe this to be a major reason why I still felt tired after sleeping.

When the sun goes down, your body says, “Hey! It’s night time, time for bed.” So, when you hold off until the early morning hours, your body gets thrown off.

For those who work at night and sleep during the day, you can train your body to get used to the flip. Though it’s unnatural, your body has an amazing ability to adjust to routines. (More on that later.)

So, if possible, try to go to bed before midnight. That’s right, before midnight.

Sleep Habit #2: Wake Up at a Consistent Time

Getting to bed before midnight is just one healthy sleeping habit that helps you have more energy throughout the day. Another one is waking up around a certain time most days.

Notice I said around – meaning you do not necessarily have to set your alarm for 6:30 am every day. Unless you enjoy waking up at the same time or need the structure.

By around I mean wake up within 1 hour. So anywhere between 6-7 am or 7-8 am. Of course, make sure the range you set allows for you to still be at work on time.

But the reason I say a range is to encourage you to be flexible with your time. Sometimes you just need that extra 30-45 minutes of sleep because you had a tough day yesterday. Or you had a hard time falling asleep, so an extra hour would help you make up that lost time.

This way you won’t get too frustrated with yourself for hitting the snooze 20 times before actually getting up.

Notice I also said most days.

Sometimes it’s just nice to sleep in. And sometimes it would do you good to let yourself sleep in.

Don’t worry, sleeping an hour or two (or three) past your typical wake-up time is not going to kill you. You’ll get less done during the day, but you’ll survive. Scout’s honor.

Also, most days makes room for those days you have to wake up earlier for an out-of-the-ordinary event. Like for an early morning 5k or a competition on the weekend.

This is why we don’t have a schedule in our house. We have a routine.

It works really well for us because it helps us not get frustrated when unexpected things happen. Which happens a lot with a baby!

So, I definitely recommend having a sleep routine, having grace with yourself and flexibility with your schedule if something comes up.

Sleep Habit #3: Have a Bedtime Routine

Have you ever noticed that once you have a routine, your body begins to anticipate what’s coming next? I guess Pavlov and his dogs had something going here.

It turns out that once you get your body into a routine, your body starts to follow it on its own. For example, if you eat dinner every day at a certain time, your stomach will start to let you know when it’s dinner time.

The same goes for your body and sleep. If you start having a routine for bed – take a shower/bath, read a little, journal, do some breathing exercises – then your body will start to expect bedtime.

So, pick a few things that you can do right before bed that will relax your body, and just start doing them every night for the next month. If by the end of the month, you’re still not having good sleep, then there may be something else going on. (If this is you, leave a comment below!)

Sleep Habit #4: Say Goodnight to Those Electronics Early

Ok, so I would be a hypocrite if I said (or implied) that I avoid screen time 3 hours before sleep. But it is recommended to turn off TVs, laptops, computers, game consoles, tablets, and phones at least 3 hours before bed.

The reason why is because screens put off a blue light that blocks melatonin from being released. Melatonin is what helps us sleep through the night.

So, if you’re feeling tired all the time, try cutting back on screen time 3 hours before you go to sleep. Yes, that includes scrolling through social media on your phone right before bed. I’m definitely guilty on this one.

The irony here is that you could be reading this right now before going to bed… If so, go ahead and bookmark me here and pick it back up tomorrow. I won’t be offended, don’t worry.

Sidenote: If you have to look use an electronic before bed, dim the screen to the lowest brightness setting, lower the color temperature to more of an orange tint, or turn on the night mode. If your electronics don’t have a night mode, you may be able to download an app that has it.

Sleep Habit #5: Separate Work and Sleep

This goes with cutting back on screen time. It’s important to separate work and sleep.

If you’re doing work up until bed, it may be stressing you out. And as we talked about last week, stress does a whole lot of things to your body that would make it hard to sleep.

And then you got the whole anti-melatonin thing going on by looking at screens.

So, just put away the work well before bedtime. It will be there tomorrow (and the next day, and the next day), I promise.

If you find yourself stressing over events from the day or that ever-growing to-do list, then write it all down before bed. That way you can rest easy that you won’t forget something.

Plus, I’ve found that if my mind is running wild when I’m trying to sleep, I’ll focus on relaxing my muscles from my toes to my head. A lot of times I don’t even make it to my head before I’m already fast asleep.

As for those of you who have a major work deadline coming up, sometimes it’s best to get sleep and wake up early to work on it. Not getting sleep puts physical and mental stress on the body, which is not helping you to do your best work. Stress also causes health problems.

But if you really, really have to work on something, then be sure to follow the sidenote above when using a screen. And take breaks for your brain every hour or so to refresh and get a new perspective.

Sleep Habit #6: Cut Back on Caffeine

If you have done the past 5 recommendations and are still feeling tired all the time, you may need to cut back on caffeine during the day.

I apologize to all the coffee lovers out there. But, sometimes our bodies just can’t get rid of the caffeine in our bodies before bedtime.

That being the case, try not drinking caffeine afternoon and see if it helps.

You may need to do this consistently for a few nights to see if it helps with your sleep. Some have to stop drinking caffeine after 10 am to be able to sleep at night. I know, sounds awful, right?

And by caffeine, I’m talking about sodas, caffeinated coffee, black tea, green tea, energy drinks, and any other caffeinated drinks.

Feeling Tired All the Time is So Not Fun

All those who can’t seem to feel refreshed after sleep, I completely get your frustration.

So, what I want you to do first is to try to set a range for the time you go to bed and the time you want/need to wake up.

After a week of going to bed and waking up on time, how are you feeling? Still feeling tired all the time?

If the answer is yes, then move on to sleep habit #3. Have a bedtime routine and practice it for a week.

Still feeling tired all the time? Move on to #4, then #5, etc. until you start feeling better.

If you are still feeling tired all the time after trying all of these changes, then comment below. There may be something else going on.

Sidenote: you don’t have to go in this order. If you feel caffeine may be causing you problems, then skip to #6. If you think doing work up until bedtime is stressing you out, then skip to #5. There are no rules here, only suggestions.

 

 

Now it’s your turn! Do you have a sleep habit that has really helped you have more energy throughout the day? I would love to hear about it in the comments below!