Day 24--Melatonin---The Miracle Hormone
While drinking my banana tea each night (Day 23) to increase my magnesium levels, I started researching melatonin.As a side note, someone asked about why boil the whole banana--peel and all--- why not just eat the banana. Because the peel contains the most magnesium. Just wash it carefully in a vinegar/water solution to remove any pesticides. Now back to melatonin. I actually had a partial bottle in my health cabinet (not medicine cabinet) that I had taken when I was trying to solve my GERD issue. I heard on a Dr. Oz show that taking melatonin along with a licorice tablet would help with my nighttime episodes of GERD. It may have helped some but it was not the cure, and that is what I wanted--- not a quick fix. The cure did happen later (see Day 10). This time the melatonin was strictly about the sleep, so I got serious and upped the dosage thinking that would help. This was before I had the whole story. You know this is a journey to cooperate with God to correct my problems, but sometimes I get a little anxious about finding an answer before I get the whole picture. Impatience is not my strong suit, it is something I work on all the time!! But the more I read, and listened to the sleep doctor, the less I thought it was
beneficial. He said it does work on some people, but he is very cautious about recommending it to the general public who is not under the care of a health specialist. He warned adamantly
about buying it at a local drug or health food store for two reasons. #1 It is
a hormone and easily manufactured and standards are not regulated and #2 The
dosages recommended by manufacturer are way to high, and should therefore be
regulated by a health care provider who looks after the individual needs of patients. He said on the rare occasions that he prescribes it, he starts with very small doses of .5mg to 1mg. I was taking 10 to 20 times this much from the bottle I had ordered off the internet. I had no health care provider that I trusted at this time, so I decided to research this HORMONE that is manufactured naturally in your body. Ah Ha!!!! Natural----that meant God made it!!! So here ya go!! This lead me to the fact that if you provide artificial melatonin in the form of a pill, your body would slow down its own production
of melatonin. I knew not to mess with God's production of melatonin, so I moved
on. So what is melatonin and how does my body produce it?
Melatonin is a hormone secreted by the pineal gland in the brain. It regulates other hormones and maintains the body's circadian rhythm. The circadian rhythm is an internal 24 hour clock that plays a critical role in when we fall asleep and when we wake up and we have the power to determine our circadian rhythm.(more later) When it is nighttime your body produces melatonin. Now here is the tricky part. When God created us, nighttime meant dark. In Genesis 1:4 it says that God saw the light and it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. Makes sense right? He wanted our bodies to make melatonin in the dark. The problem is that we do not sleep in the dark. Well maybe 1% of the people do. Larry and I were in the 1% when we lived at Penton, Alabama. We lived way out in the country where there were no street lights, stores or houses in sight. I'll never forget the first night we spent there. We got in bed and turned off our lamp. It was pitch black. We literally reached over with our hands to find each other. We laughed as we placed our hands in front of our faces and realized we could not see our hands. So what did I do? I went immediately and turned on the light in the bathroom and cracked the door. I had never seen dark like that before. So you see, we never experience true darkness. So it does not mean "when the sun goes down", it means when we experience true darkness, and I did not.
You might reason, "Well, if your eyes are closed, wouldn't it be dark"? As it turns out, no, that is not enough darkness because your eyes do not stay completely shut all night. I knew then that I had an uphill battle to sleep in total darkness. I have neighbors who must be afraid of the dark or they may think light deters vandals, because it is almost like Las Vegas at the lake. There is a security light at the front and one at the back of my house, but on the neighbors land. Even with the blinds closed I can see perfectly in my house to walk to the bathroom in the "dark" with no night light. Now it is truly like Las Vegas in the back of the house along the lake and that is fine with me. We all have white lights on our piers and it looks lovely. But my bedroom is in the front of the house, so that is my concern. My video sleep doctor said that it is imperative that your room be in total darkness to make the maximum melatonin, and to do whatever it took to accomplish that goal. He suggested buying blackout curtains. Now you know the trend today is blinds, not curtains, or the very simple "no curtain" look and that was the case at my house. So off I go to Walmart to see if I can find anything at all that will match my comforter, cover the windows at night and yet be simple enough in the daytime not to look too heavy. Sure enough Walmart came to the rescue so Larry is putting up curtains. I thought my problem was solved with the blinds closed and then the curtains, but NO-- the security lights were so bright that the light seeped in around the edges and over the top---any little crack!!! There was no way to cover up all the cracks. His next suggestion was to wear blinders while I slept---back to Walmart!! I didn't know if I could sleep with something over my eyes but as it turned out the $2.50 blinders are pretty comfortable. Now it is totally dark and it is definitely helping, and I had a lot to learn about this circadian rhythm thing, because my sleep was not what I would call perfect, as I learned from researching. It is not good enough to sleep well MOST nights. So on the journey I wanted to learn how to perfect or refine it. So my first step was to see how else the body produced melatonin. And I am sure at this point that you are not shocked at the kind of food this trail leads to---foods God makes.
The God made foods play a definite role. It is the food that causes the human brain to secrete melatonin. The first foods I found said to eat them right before bed because they are full of nutrients that promote sleep. This is a real problem for me because I try not to eat 3 hours before I go to bed. This is all part of the intermittent fasting that I do for at least 16 hours a day. Along the journey if I find this to be the total package of perfect 100% sleep at night, I will adjust my hours of eating and make sure I get the 16 hours of total healing for my body which is working wonders for me right now. And I will begin to snack at bedtime. So here are the foods that I found listed that are beneficial for creating good sleep and why each one is good. I eat most all of these foods throughout my eating window every day, because it is just good nutritional choices. Try to get raw and organic as much as possible.
1. Walnuts---they cause the brain to secrete melatonin and they also contain melatonin
2. Almonds--contain tryptophan which is sleep enhancing by producing serotonin and magnesium
3. Cheese---( in moderation) also contains tryptophan
4. Lettuce--contains lactucarium which had sedative powers
5.Tuna--contains vitamin B6 which is crucial in the production of melatonin
6.Cherry juice (tart) excellent source of melatonin
7.Chamomile tea---a mild tranquilizer
8.Honey--- provides glycogen that promotes restful sleep
9. Bananas--- (magnesium)
Now I know some of you are seriously trying to lose weight with the keto or paleo diet, and some of these foods are not on your list of allowed foods, so you will have to regulate that. Some of these foods I do not eat at all for various reasons, but they are all good foods and if I need to add them for the perfect sleep that I am looking for I will not hesitate one second. It is not about working to lose weight for me because that is happening with no effort----might I add FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE!!! But the fun part has just begun---the circadian rhythm---next blog!!
Melatonin is a hormone secreted by the pineal gland in the brain. It regulates other hormones and maintains the body's circadian rhythm. The circadian rhythm is an internal 24 hour clock that plays a critical role in when we fall asleep and when we wake up and we have the power to determine our circadian rhythm.(more later) When it is nighttime your body produces melatonin. Now here is the tricky part. When God created us, nighttime meant dark. In Genesis 1:4 it says that God saw the light and it was good, and God divided the light from the darkness. Makes sense right? He wanted our bodies to make melatonin in the dark. The problem is that we do not sleep in the dark. Well maybe 1% of the people do. Larry and I were in the 1% when we lived at Penton, Alabama. We lived way out in the country where there were no street lights, stores or houses in sight. I'll never forget the first night we spent there. We got in bed and turned off our lamp. It was pitch black. We literally reached over with our hands to find each other. We laughed as we placed our hands in front of our faces and realized we could not see our hands. So what did I do? I went immediately and turned on the light in the bathroom and cracked the door. I had never seen dark like that before. So you see, we never experience true darkness. So it does not mean "when the sun goes down", it means when we experience true darkness, and I did not.
You might reason, "Well, if your eyes are closed, wouldn't it be dark"? As it turns out, no, that is not enough darkness because your eyes do not stay completely shut all night. I knew then that I had an uphill battle to sleep in total darkness. I have neighbors who must be afraid of the dark or they may think light deters vandals, because it is almost like Las Vegas at the lake. There is a security light at the front and one at the back of my house, but on the neighbors land. Even with the blinds closed I can see perfectly in my house to walk to the bathroom in the "dark" with no night light. Now it is truly like Las Vegas in the back of the house along the lake and that is fine with me. We all have white lights on our piers and it looks lovely. But my bedroom is in the front of the house, so that is my concern. My video sleep doctor said that it is imperative that your room be in total darkness to make the maximum melatonin, and to do whatever it took to accomplish that goal. He suggested buying blackout curtains. Now you know the trend today is blinds, not curtains, or the very simple "no curtain" look and that was the case at my house. So off I go to Walmart to see if I can find anything at all that will match my comforter, cover the windows at night and yet be simple enough in the daytime not to look too heavy. Sure enough Walmart came to the rescue so Larry is putting up curtains. I thought my problem was solved with the blinds closed and then the curtains, but NO-- the security lights were so bright that the light seeped in around the edges and over the top---any little crack!!! There was no way to cover up all the cracks. His next suggestion was to wear blinders while I slept---back to Walmart!! I didn't know if I could sleep with something over my eyes but as it turned out the $2.50 blinders are pretty comfortable. Now it is totally dark and it is definitely helping, and I had a lot to learn about this circadian rhythm thing, because my sleep was not what I would call perfect, as I learned from researching. It is not good enough to sleep well MOST nights. So on the journey I wanted to learn how to perfect or refine it. So my first step was to see how else the body produced melatonin. And I am sure at this point that you are not shocked at the kind of food this trail leads to---foods God makes.
The God made foods play a definite role. It is the food that causes the human brain to secrete melatonin. The first foods I found said to eat them right before bed because they are full of nutrients that promote sleep. This is a real problem for me because I try not to eat 3 hours before I go to bed. This is all part of the intermittent fasting that I do for at least 16 hours a day. Along the journey if I find this to be the total package of perfect 100% sleep at night, I will adjust my hours of eating and make sure I get the 16 hours of total healing for my body which is working wonders for me right now. And I will begin to snack at bedtime. So here are the foods that I found listed that are beneficial for creating good sleep and why each one is good. I eat most all of these foods throughout my eating window every day, because it is just good nutritional choices. Try to get raw and organic as much as possible.
1. Walnuts---they cause the brain to secrete melatonin and they also contain melatonin
2. Almonds--contain tryptophan which is sleep enhancing by producing serotonin and magnesium
3. Cheese---( in moderation) also contains tryptophan
4. Lettuce--contains lactucarium which had sedative powers
5.Tuna--contains vitamin B6 which is crucial in the production of melatonin
6.Cherry juice (tart) excellent source of melatonin
7.Chamomile tea---a mild tranquilizer
8.Honey--- provides glycogen that promotes restful sleep
9. Bananas--- (magnesium)
Now I know some of you are seriously trying to lose weight with the keto or paleo diet, and some of these foods are not on your list of allowed foods, so you will have to regulate that. Some of these foods I do not eat at all for various reasons, but they are all good foods and if I need to add them for the perfect sleep that I am looking for I will not hesitate one second. It is not about working to lose weight for me because that is happening with no effort----might I add FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE!!! But the fun part has just begun---the circadian rhythm---next blog!!
Comments
Post a Comment