What hormones are involved in sleep?
The body runs on hormones. These chemicals in our bodies signal all sorts of processes to kick off, or stop, including one of the most important processes of all: sleep. There’s several chemicals we’ll look at specifically involved in sleep patterns and duration. In this article we’ll look at how they impact sleep, and if we can increase their production.
Melatonin & Cortisol
This is by no means an exhaustive list of sleep chemicals, but perhaps the two most famous chemicals in sleep regulation are melatonin and cortisol. Melatonin isn’t in fact just a drug taken to produce sleep onset. It’s also produced by your body naturally from the pineal gland and the retina. This production begins when light begins to dwindle. Melatonin plays an important role in regulating the circadian rhythm by feeding back on a small group of cells in the hypothalamus called the suprachiasmatic nucleus, where essentially the ‘clock’ of our body resides.
Cortisol, on the other hand plays a role in wakefulness and alertness. Cortisol peaks at about 9AM and declines throughout the day, until it reaches it’s lowest point, 2-3 hours after sleep onset. Cortisol is also known as a stress hormone, and higher levels of cortisol during the night are associated with increased nighttime awakenings and slower sleep onset. Unfortunately, these awakenings and sleep onset delays can produce a vicious cycle in which bad sleep can effectively produce more bad sleep!
What can we do to increase sleep hormones?
Melatonin & Light Control
Listen, we both know you aren’t controlling the lights you’re exposed to enough. It’s ok. It’s hard. Screens produce tons of light, and they’re everywhere. A bit of TV before bed? Doom scrolling on the iPhone? Melatonin production is directly connected to the lack of light. For sleep onset to occur, you have to be in darkness! It’s not just how we prefer to sleep, it’s a chemical requirement. Turn off the screens, dim the lights as much as possible at least a few hours before bed, and melatonin production will increase. Conversely, getting enough regular light during the daytime makes sure that this rhythm is behaving properly. Light during the day, dark at night. Easy!
Cortisol & Exercise
Cortisol can be reduced by, you guessed it, the end-all-be-all of healthy living. Exercise. But not too hard. In this study it was found that low intensity exercise reduced cortisol levels, while high intensity exercise can increase it for a short period! Lowering cortisol will reduce wakefulness and help prevent awakenings until natural cortisol levels pick back up after you’ve been asleep for a few hours. How else can we reduce cortisol? Well, basically any healthy way that we typically reduce stress. This means things like Yoga, or meditation before bed have a great chance of helping to lower cortisol and improve sleep quantity and quality.
There’s way more hormones involved in sleep then are on this list. Too much or too little of any of these can produce bad side effects. Unfortunately our bodies operate on a fine balance of hormones that if disturbed seems to cause chaos. Being able to influence or regulate this balance naturally is an excellent option to try to reach peak performance levels! Be your best self! Get some sleep!
