How I Fixed My Sleep in 2 NIGHTS!

motherhood and health. I'm your host, Steph Pace, and I'm the woman behind Just Another Mummy blog and also the founder of Steph Pace Planners. But I can assure you this is not just another podcast online. I'm known for my organization tips and tricks and the occasional banter, but it definitely wasn't always this way. I used to be a hot mess and occasionally still am. And I'm here as your honest and real friend each week to show you how I turn my life of chaos into clarity.

Between the house, health, kids, work, and wanting to be the best version of yourself, it can be overwhelming, and I'm here to give you the tools and tips to stop you feeling like a slave to your daily tasks, home life, and especially the expectations you have on yourself. Join me as I share my journey and insights into the art of balancing at all and speak to guests

who can help us all live a better life. Whether you're looking to streamline your daily routines, bosh your wellbeing, achieve your fitness goals, dive into personal development, or find inspiration to step up into the best version of yourself, We've got you. So are you ready to step up your game? Let's go. Hello guys, and welcome back to stepping up. I am recording this on a really, really rainy day, and I swear to God, every time I go to record, the dog next door to starts barking.

Can you hear it? Or now he stops? Honestly every time. I'll be up in my office all day and he doesn't buck once, and then as soon as I go to record anything, he starts barking. I love dogs, obviously. I have my little Lily. If you guys don't know, she's actually sixteen. We bought her when Roy and I literally got together when we're eighteen years old. So sad, and she's getting so old now, which I hate. I hate it. It's not fair dogs should live as long

as adults. Honestly. I mean dogs should live as long as humans honestly. Anyways, today I'm talking about the most important topic and something that at some stage in our life, except if you're Ryan pace, you have struggled with, which is sleep. Sleep is the most important thing. And I think especially now with technology and always being switched on and having a moon things to do every day, sleep is one thing that most people suffer with. It is really really hard to switch off and just get to

sleep or not. Actually, it's not always about getting to sleep, it's about, you know, getting enough sleep. That's the biggest problem. Like there's a lot of people out there that can just put their head on a pillow. They're buggered from the day they can fall asleep. But I bet you there are so many and there's science that even says there stats to show the average adult is just not getting enough sleep, and we know that's the most important thing that literally sleep is the most important for a

human besides food and water. So, before I get into it, a little bit of a life update. I did a post on Instagram a couple weeks ago and it's been no lie that your girl has had a really rough few months. And I know I've been saying this so many times, but I just feel like it's so important for me to be honest, especially when it comes to mental health. I don't remember the last time my mental health was that bad. It got to a really scary place,

very like just incredibly dark. And I said in the post a few weeks ago that I just feel like, unfortunately for humans, for us to change, there needs to be pain. That's the only thing that makes us change. Because when you think about it, why would we change and make uncomfortable decisions and shifts in our lives unless there's pain, Because it's either you change or you remain the same. And eventually that pain can get so unbearable that you're like, I'm not doing this anymore. Things have

got to change. And that kind of happened with me, you know, probly the end of last year, and I realized I just was trying to be too much to everyone, do too much for everything. And yes, some was definitely self inflicted, and then some is my responsibility as a business owner, mum, all the things. And then you throw that in with, you know, all the grief that I've had to endure over the last couple of years of losing literally my whole family except my brother in under

two years. It's brutal, Like it's fucking brutal what I've been through. We're losing so many people, and I haven't dealt with that, and I haven't had the time to deal with that, and I think that's what was getting bad. Anyways, what I'm trying to say is, for the first time the other week, I realized I went a whole day without having a panic attack. A whole day. And I know that sounds pretty crazy, but I got to the point where, guys, I was having full blown panic attacks

every afternoon, every single day for months. I wasn't sleeping, wasn't eating. It was horrific. And I realized the other week that it got to the end of the day and I was like, oh my god, I didn't have a panic attack, and it was like, you know, the world just started looking a little brighter. My shoulders started feeling a bit lighter, and I was like, oh my god, I'm starting to see the light at the end of

the tunnel. All this work I put in, and the processes and hiring all these people and really trying to just focus on what I need to do so I can take the space to heal and then be with my family. Like I'm starting to see the light and I've started sleeping again. Whooh my sleep. I was probably getting four to five hours a night, no joke, for months. So my focus last month was my sleep. Because when

you're having bad sleep, your mental health suffers. Everything suffless, your memory, life, brain fog, everything is linked to sleep. And it's like, it's like my last night, when I was putting the kids to bed, I noticed the girls they tend and all kids, the kids tend to get quite emotional and sad when they're tired, and it's because it's like your body needs to recharge. Because then it's like think about when you're so tired, you can't think clearly,

you can't make rational decisions. And that's why I like, if you are not concentrating on the most important part of your life, which is sleep, everything else is going to turn to shit, no matter how hard you're trying. Do you know how many times I've tried to hit my fitness goals, and because I was not focusing on my sleep enough, I wasn't getting the results I wanted. I wasn't lifting heavy, and I felt like shit. So there's no point trying to do all these other things

when you're not focusing on your sleep. Your sleep should be step one for everything. Anyways, I've always been a terrible sleeper, horrific ever since I was little. I've got an overactive mind. I've just been a like terrible sleep in my whole life. I've actually been on sleep medication as an adult, like my whole adult hoood adulthood, because I have trouble falling asleep and I have trouble staying asleep.

Last night actually was one of those nights. I was up till like twelve thirty, and I realized it's because I broke one of my rules, which is my clock off time for work, and I didn't follow that. And now I'm recording this podcast for that reason, because as soon as I stop doing one of these hacks and steps that I'm going to be telling you in this episode, my sleep suffers straight away. I'm very sensitive. I'm a

very sensitive soul. Unfortunately, now, as I said, I was having rubbish sleep for months, and I managed to fix my sleep cycle in two nights because I know what works and I go back to it soon as I'm desperate, I'm like, Steph, go back to what you know, go back to what works. And I want to be telling you what that is in this episode that is going to change your life and sleep forever. Now, firstly, I want to touch on why is sleep so important? Which you know a lot of us know, but do you

actually know what it affects. So I've got some science. I've got the receipts. As always, Now, sleep deprivation can impair cognitive function by as much as forty percent, and that can be just from one night. So if you have one night pretty shitty sleep, you'll notice you're you know, you're just day to day operations of your body, and your mind is going to be I don't know why I was. I don't know why I was doing the robot then, but anyway, everything will be reduced by forty percent.

You may also have a forty to fifty percent reduction in the ability to form new memories and consolidate learning. Think about even when your kids. You've had had children when they were newborn, Like, there's so many things when they were little that I can't remember. And it's got to do with the sleep because we have no sleep. You're too busy, you know, breastfeeding or bottle feeding twenty four seven. It is a time and you just remember

like feeling like you're going a bit crazy. I just remember, you know, waking up a million times during the night and then waking up in the morning. My eyes are just red raw, I'm so tired, and you just feel like a bit nuts. Yeah, that's what sleep does to you. You also have an increased emotional reactivity by sixty to seventy percent, so you are literally sixty to seventy percent more reactive than you normally would be emotionally, so little

like small things will upset you that much more. Just like as I was saying to the kids last night when they were just going, I don't want to go to school tomorrow and everything like it was the end of the world. And it's like, honey, it's because you're tired. You need to go to sleep. And this also makes people more prone to mood swings, irritability, and emotional instability, which was indicated by research published in the journal Sleep.

And also this was quite interesting, but chronic sleep deprivation increases obesity by fifty five percent because sleep impacts so many of our hormones, and it also includes the levels of hunger we feel. So just think about, like I know for me, when we were younger, we'd go have a night out. Just think about, like if I didn't sleep, I was just so much hungrier the next day, Like you just want to constantly eat, And it actually affects

these hormones by fifteen percent. Now, those are the effects of sleep deprivation. I want you to think about right now. How many times have you fallen asleep scrolling on your phone. It's the one thing that I myself, even I grew so reliant on to make me fall asleep. I would scroll until I physically would pass out, which always ended up being like past midnight. There's just so many habits that is so common these days that is really working

against us with our sleep. And I don't want you to feel too bad about this, because honestly, the majority of people do this. We scroll until we fall asleep. We are watching huge screens late at night. We are just overstimulated. There's a million notifications and a million things to do every day, so when it gets to bedtime, a lot of us end up doing this thing called

revenge bedtime procrastination. Now to go into what revenge bedtime procrastination is, but it's something I came across on TikTok and I didn't know it even had a name. But a majority of us do struggle with this because when you think about it, you know, when you're a parent, or even if you're not, by the time you get to bed at the end of the day, you just feel like you've been just giving and giving and giving yourself to everything for the whole day. You don't feel

in control of your own life. And for those of you who feel like this, I know you will resonate with you go into bed and you know, okay, it's late, I really need to get some sleep. Like we know we need sleep, but we just feel like I need a minute for myself. And this is very, very common for parents, but also for those who just feel like in their jobs or in life, or if you've got poor time management skills, you don't feel in control of

your day. So then at night, that's the one time during the day that you feel like you can do something for yourself, whether that is always scrolling, getting some entertainment, and doing something for you. So even though we know it's bad for us to not be getting sleep, we tend to do revenge bedtime procrastination, and that is literally what it is. It is us not feeling in control and then sacrificing our sleep for personal time because our day is taken up by everyone and everything and we

don't feel in control. I'm exhibit A like today, I am so behind and I know tonight I will probably fight with myself to not do this. And if we continue to do this, we end up with something called

a sleep deficit, and this is not good. So basically, as you could imagine, we're meant to be getting seven to nine hours of sleep every night, and majority of us, you know, by the time we get the kids to bed, we've cleaned up after dinner, We've you know, cleaned the house, We've talked to our partner, we've set our butts on the couch, watched some TV together, whatever you do. Then

you get into bed, it's usually pretty late. And even if you get your kids to bed early, you tend to really drag out this process as long as possible, and a majority of us are going to sleep at around eleven o'clock at night now during the night, many of us are going to be woken up by a multiple range of things, usually children or a partner that

wriggles around too much. But if you go to bed at twelve or even at eleven, but you get woken up by kids and then you're getting up about six o'clock for when they wake up, you're literally going to be only getting about five hours of good quality sleep that night, and you're meant to be getting eight to nine. Now, if you do the math, getting five hours of sleep a night, even five and a half, it's only about thirty five hours of sleep a week when you should

be getting fifty six hours. And now that's a sleep deficit of twenty one hours of sleep a week. That's like nearly a whole day of sleep you're missing out of. It adds up so quickly. And when I looked into have a Google or sleep deficit after this episode, because it is pretty interesting and it is kind of hard to catch up with. It's very hard to catch up with. You can imagine how are you supposed to get back twenty one hours of sleep when you continue to do

the same cycle. You stay up late, you want time for yourself, You're reclaiming your time. You're scrolling, you're getting to sleep at about eleven o'clock at night, your kids wake you up, or you're getting up at six o'clock to get ready for work or whatever. You're not getting enough sleep and it's going to fuck you up. Now you're probably sitting there going, okay, steph, Well this is great, but how do we actually fix it? How did I

fix my sleep in two nights? Well, I'm going to be giving you the six steps you need to do to fix your sleep, and every single one of these is gold. And I promise you if you do all of them, you are going to start sleeping like Ryan Pace very soon. All right, So Step one, reflect on your day. The biggest thing that keeps me up at night personally is if I've had a very stressful day

and I'm just carrying a lot of things mentally. I actually wear a garment watch, and my watch will tell me my sleep score, and it also will tell me a lot of the time if I've had a stressful day, I will have a low sleep score and it will literally tell me it's because I had a stressful day. So the biggest thing you need to be mindful of during the day. Yes, we can't eradicate stress from our lives unfortunately, but we can decide how we want to

deal with it. So for me personally, one thing I love to do is do a bit of a midday reset. If I'm feeling really overwhelmed and stressed that day, I like just to like change my environment, taking little rest throughout the day, listening to some music, and just literally just stepping away from whatever stressing me out. We can't get rid of it, but if you can just try to take some time to regulate yourself, that is going

to change your life. So at the end of the day, when you're about to get into bed, and if you've got a very busy mind, I want you just to literally do a PM perche And I've talked about this before, but a PM purge is something I do when I get out all of my thoughts onto paper, anything that's stressing me out, and I look at it and I just feel lighter. You will just feel the mental load shift because you've gotten it out. It is honestly incredible.

And again I will talk day and night about journaling, but doing a PM purge when you've had a stressful day honestly, I would recommend you do this every day. It is It's amazing. Okay. Step two, which is stemming off the first step talking about stressing your day, I want you to do a midday reset. So one thing I do is I love to go for a walk in the middle of the day outside And if you

can't go for a walk, just get outside. Just reset yourself because the moment you get outside for a fresh air it could literally be ten or fifteen minutes your stress levels You're going to be so more regulated. And this is going to help you with your sleep that night, I promise you. Also, just actual movement and exercise is going to make you sleep. Now. I know you guys have heard all these things, but when you actually put them into practice, you know why you need to stick

with them. Now. Step three is being aware of light in the evening. I'm basically like a toddler. We are all like toddlers. We are all over stimulated, and when there is light, especially the overhead lights, blue light from our phone, which I'll get into next, it makes our brain think it is daytime. So if you want your brain to start producing melatonin and telling your body okay, this is nighttime, we need to start winding down. It needs to be done hours before you actually get into bed.

So when it hits five or six o'clock, I actually want you to turn off the overhead lights. When Ryan turns these on, I'm like a vampire. I'm like, get the light away from me, because I wake up so easily with that. And you will notice the biggest shift not only in yourself and being able to actually relax and wind down when you turn off the overhead lights and just put lamps on, but also your children because when you think about it, like Ryan loves roughing the

kids up before bed. He rubs them up, and then he wonders why they can't sleep. I'm like, dude, number one, you got the law the lights on. Number two, you let you roughen them up. You're being loud, which is super cute. But I'm also like, dude, it's seven o'clock at night, and then you want them to just switch off and go to sleep. It doesn't work like that. So I did this thing, and I talked about it before,

but I did this thing called fairy time. So when it hits six o'clock, all the overhead lights go off. The girls can do coloring in and stuff and even iron. It really helps me. But it will get your kids to fall asleep so much faster and easier if you do this. Step four is being aware of blue light. Now, blue light makes your brain think again that it's the middle of the day, and it is actually a thing.

And I know some people think that this is all bullshit to sell some blue light glasses, but it is. Actually it's scien It's like it's true. And I actually put a setting on my phone to put on the warm light by six o'clock every night, so my phone automatically will switch from blue light to the warmest setting

straight away so I won't even notice. And another thing I do is I actually, if I am on my phone at night, which I have a clock off, which I'll tell you about in the next step, I will put my brightness all the way down because it's not going to be as enticing to your brain to stay on it, which is also going to help you kick being addicted to your phone, but you need to set it up so helping your settings, Like I've done a whole episode on your phone and being addicted to your

phone and have to stop that. I will link the episode below because it did as a game changer, and doing this and setting up the settings on your phone will just automatically ensure that you're not getting all that extra blue light. It comes off the TV as well, so you can also go on your TV and put the brightness down and change the settings. And then there's obviously the alternative of having blue light glasses, which does really really help. I'm someone I don't watch TV at all.

I actually only just started watching it the other week with Ryan, and we watched Baby Reindeer that was messed up, that was messed up, and even watching that, we did the whole brightness thing. But I still struggle to sleep afterwards. And it's because I'm watching this big bright box in my face. So just be aware of it. Just be aware of it. Go in your settings, make sure you set everything up for yourself so you're giving yourself the best possible chance of falling asleep, and your poor brain

can know what time it is now. Step five is getting off your phone and you knew it was coming. Guys, this is the biggest culprit think about it. When I'm on my phone, I will literally just be like, oh, I'm going to check something and then next minute it's one o'clock in the morning. And I'm someone like I love going to bed early. I love it, but it just keeps you awake. Is It's like you know when you go to the casino and there's the poking machines.

It's just feeding your brain on this entertainment and these lights and these notifications, and it's just like candy for our brain to stay awake and have the adrenaline running. Like, there's so many reasons why you're not falling asleep when you're on it. Get off your phone at least an

hour and a half before you want to be asleep. No. I know a lot of people say an hour, but I like to say an hour and a half because it gives you that buffer time to actually wind down and then you're more likely to fall asleep quicker than that, because I'm telling you now, it takes me a lot longer than an hour to wind down and then fall asleep. So for me, I actually got off my phone at

eight thirty every night. My phone is an Apple and it has a downtime setting it's called and it will lock me out, so everything's it just locks me out. Completely and it just it is amazing. And I actually bought a separate alarm clock. It's the Sunrise one and it's so nice to wake up to you. But it's also got like write music to help me fall asleep. And if you're someone who has bad self control and you charge your phone next to your bed, I'm telling you charge it on the other side of the room,

charge it in a different room. And if you get a different alarm clock, you do not need it. Because the amount of times I wanted to tell myself, okay, I want to get off my phone at eight thirty, and then I kept it next to my bed and I will still go on it. I'll be like, oh, I'm just going to check something, and then two hours later I'm like, fuck, I'm still on my phone. So

just get it out of your room. And the bonus point is too, if you do need your phone alarm and you do have it in you know, the next room or across the bedroom, when it goes off, it will force you to get your butt out of bed and actually turn it off, so then you can actually make sure you're waking up. Now Step six, you're probably wondering, okay, I'm off my phone. So what do I do? Steph Like, you know, I'm not a caveman. What am I meant

to do with my time? Read? Listen to podcasts like this one, listen to an audiobook, even doing things like I love coloring in. And I didn't think i'd ever say that because until Dad passed, I didn't do any hobby type of thing like that. I was someone again that I only did tasks to get a certain outcome, which was you know, cleaning, make more money, things that adults do. We don't do things for fun anymore, and

it's really sad. So if you can make that time before bed to journal or read or promise you you're actually going to create a whole new hobby that you actually enjoy, and it's gonna give you an actual break, because when you're always switched on in your phone all the time, you're not actually giving yourself a break. So that's what you can do instead. Now, if you are, you know, coloring in, make sure that if you have a bedside lamp or you know, a book light, make sure it

is the warm one. I have things linked to my Amazon store front, which I'll make sure I give you guys the link below in the show notes. But you can get warm, you know, light bulbs and book lights and things like that. This is why I love my kindle because I love to read. But I was getting annoyed having a book lamp. So got my kindle and it's a game changer and I put it on dark mode and I'm good to go. And it's not like an iPad at all. It's literally like looks kind of

like paper. It's hard to explain, but kindles are life changing, kindlegirly for life over here. Now, I want to do a quick recap so you guys remember what you're going to be doing tonight, because your stepping stone this week is to get off your phone an hour and a half before bed. And I want you to like tick it off in your habit tracker, in your planner and

see how much it's going to help you. Because if you have to do just one of these things, and I'm being honest, if you have to only do one of these steps, it would be to get off your phone an hour and a half before bed. That's the one that counts, honestly. Now, quick recap. Step one is to reflect on your day, do a bit of a pm purge and get all that mental load your head. Step two break up your day with a mid day reset and go for a walk and get outside and

that's going to help you with your stress levels. Step three is be aware of light. Turn off those overhead lights by six pm. Game changer. Step four is blue light from your TV and phone, changing the settings and getting that sorted. Step five is get off your phone an hour and a half before bed, and step six is read journal or coloring before you go to sleep. Anyways, guys, I hope this episode helped. I know this is just

such an important topic and something that everyone struggles with. Again, unless you're Ryan Pace, please let me know if this helps. And I'd love for you guys to tag us on Instagram and show us your new bedtime routines. I just want to see it so a baud. I love a good bedtime routine honestly, and I'd love to know what episode you would love to have coming up next. Please don't forget to subscribe and I'll see you guys next week. Bye. Thank you guys so much for tuning in today's episode

of Stepping Up. I don't want this to be just another podcast that you listen to you get inspiration and then you don't take action. If there's been something in this episode that will help you step up into the best version of yourself, open up your trusted planner and make a plan. And if you've loved listening to today's episode, take a screenshot and show me where you've been listening from. I love seeing it. Make sure you tag us at Stepping Up and steph Pace Underscore on Instagram so we

can see it. And make sure you subscribe because you won't want to miss what's coming up next week.