Depression and sleep are deeply connected, each one affecting the other. If you battle depression, you’re very aware of how common sleep disturbances are, whether you have trouble falling asleep, awake repeatedly during the night, sleep long stretches during the day, or wake up too early. According to research, 90% of people with depression also struggle with sleep issues.
The mental health benefits of sleep are undeniable. Sleep plays a vital role in regulating mood, emotions, and your cognitive functioning. When you don’t get enough sleep, you can get irritable, feel low, and have trouble concentrating, thus exacerbating your already troubling depression symptoms.
This is where things get tricky with depression and sleep.
You need sleep to avoid worsening your depression and to be at your best to fight it. But when you have depression, your sleep patterns often get disrupted, making your depression more challenging to fight.
So what can you do?
Well, the best thing you can do is to partner with a mental health professional for depression treatment in San Diego. And the next best thing you can do is to understand why sleep is so essential to everyone, especially if you struggle with depression.
How Sleep Affects Your Mental Health
When you sleep, your brain undergoes essential processes to help you regulate your emotions and consolidate memories. Not getting enough sleep can disrupt these processes, making it difficult to manage your emotions effectively.
Not being able to manage your emotions due to sleep deprivation leads to increased stress, anxiety, and, you guessed it, depression.
On top of that, because sleep deprivation negatively impacts your cognitive abilities, making it harder to think clearly, make decisions, and solve problems, you can feel frustrated and hopeless. Once again, this can make your depression symptoms even worse.
The mental health benefits of sleep and how not getting enough of it are clear. And they’re clear for everyone on the planet. But if you have depression, prioritizing getting your sleeping patterns under control is vital to your healing.
The Impact of Poor Sleep on Your Depression Symptoms
Even before you struggled with depression, you’re likely aware of how awful you feel when you are sleep-deprived. You’re grumpy, lethargic, stressed out, and overall exhausted.
The same goes for when you deal with depression, except those feelings of fatigue and lethargy are magnified. Lack of sleep can significantly impact your depression symptoms and make it more challenging to overcome them or even get out of bed to do anything at all.
Depression and sleep also affect one another by sleep deprivation amplifying negative thinking patterns and distorting your perceptions, making you more prone to negative thoughts and emotions. It’s an exhausting vicious cycle where poor sleep leads to worsening depressive systems, which, in turn, disrupt your sleep.
Not getting proper sleep can also impact your ability to regulate emotions, leading to heightened sensitivity to stress and an increased likelihood of experiencing intense emotional reactions. In other words, when you’re sleep-deprived or have poor sleeping patterns, you’ll find it more challenging to cope with daily stressors and quickly become overwhelmed by your emotions.
Lifestyle Changes to Promote Better Sleep and Mental Health
Now that you understand the connection between depression and sleep, it’s important to understand what you can do in your everyday life to promote healthier sleep patterns. Here are some helpful strategies to consider.
- Establish a Consistent Sleep Schedule: Going to bed and waking up at the same time each day can profoundly help regulate your body’s internal clock. Having a regular sleep-wake cycle improves your sleep quality and mood stability.
- Create a Sleep-Friendly Environment: Make your bedroom a sanctuary conducive to sleeping. Keep it cool, dark, and quiet. Consider using earplugs, an eye mask, and a white noise machine to block distractions.
- Practice Relaxation Techniques Before Bed: Relaxation techniques like deep breathing and meditation before bed can help calm your mind and prepare your body for sleep. Incorporating these practices into your bedtime routine can signal your body that it’s time to wind down and sleep.
- Limit Stimulants and Electronic Devices: Avoid consuming caffeine or nicotine close to bedtime, as they can interfere with your ability to fall asleep. Also, try to stay away from screens at least an hour before bedtime, as the blue light they emit can disrupt melatonin, the sleep hormone responsible for helping you sleep.
- Engage in Regular Exercise: Physical activity has been shown to improve sleep quality and reduce symptoms of depression. Include 30 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise at least five days per week. Try completing your workout at least a few hours before bedtime to allow your body to wind down and fall asleep.
Partner With a Mental Health Professional: While making healthy lifestyle changes can help improve your depression symptoms, it’s best to partner with a mental health professional like our team at BOLD Health. We can offer you guidance and support through therapy along with potential medication management.
Choose Depression Therapy in San Diego to Overcome Depression
The mental health benefits of sleep are numerous. Maintaining healthy sleep patterns can go a long way in the battle against depression, but partnering with a mental health professional is your best bet to overcome the challenges of depression.
At BOLD Health, we take a holistic approach to depression therapy in San Diego. That means we don’t simply treat your symptoms, including poor sleep habits, but we treat all of you. We take the time to get to know and understand you and what makes you who you are. By truly getting to know you and understanding your structural, biological, and historical underpinnings, we can curate the ideal depression treatment plan specifically to suit your needs.
Your evidence-based, highly effective depression treatment in San Diego at BOLD Health may include any of the following treatment options:
- individual therapy
- group therapy
- medication management
- intensive outpatient program (IOP in San Diego)
- ketamine treatment
Don’t wait another exhausted, sleep-deprived day to get the help you genuinely need. When you choose to enroll in depression treatment in San Diego at BOLD Health, you’re guaranteed to gain a compassionate, understanding, nonjudgmental team of allies who can help you overcome depression and finally live the life you want.