The reason sleep hygiene, random supplements and CBTi haven’t solved your sleep problems is because there are imbalances in your body that are keeping you awake.


However, you can address some of these imbalances now before committing to the functional lab testing.


There are 3 essential things to look at first if you aren’t sleeping well. I start here with all of my clients, even though we’re doing lab testing, and 100% of them need to address at least 1 of these essentials. These things are so important because they will continue to affect your sleep and keep your body out of balance. 


In this episode, I’m going to explain 3 unconventional first steps that you can start doing today to improve your sleep. This is an episode from a year ago that I want to share with you again because it can help you sleep better immediately.


The Sleep Essentials program covers everything you need to know to optimize your diet, stabilize your blood sugar and have smart sleep habits so you can sleep well. Sign up here for only $37.


Schedule a consultation to get started with the Complete Sleep Solution program so you can consistently sleep 7+ hours uninterrupted, naturally and permanently.


00:00 Introduction to Better Sleep

00:41 Meet Martha Lewis, The Sleep Detective

01:15 Personal Sleep Struggles and Solutions

02:12 Client Success Story: Cindy's Sleep Transformation

03:20 Six Tips for Falling Back Asleep

03:23 Tip 1: Find Your Happy Place

04:04 Tip 2: Use a Sleep Mantra

06:06 Tip 3: Breathing Exercises

06:58 Tip 4: Try L-Theanine

08:53 Tip 5: Get Out of Bed

11:18 Tip 6: Accept That You're Awake

13:24 Three Things to Avoid When You Can't Sleep

15:25 The Complete Sleep Solution Program

16:10 Conclusion and Next Steps


Episode Transcript


The sleep advice you read everywhere doesn't work for chronic insomnia. You know this, right? That's why you're here listening to this podcast. The reason sleep hygiene, random supplements, and CBTI haven't helped your sleep problems is because there are imbalances in your body that are keeping you awake.


However, you can address some of these imbalances now before committing to the functional lab testing that I do in my programs. There are three essential things to look at first, if you aren't sleeping well. I start with these three things with all of my clients, even though we're doing the lab testing, because all of them need to address at least one of these essentials.


These things are so important because they will continue to affect your sleep and keep your body out of balance if you don't address them. In this episode, I'm going to explain three unconventional first steps that you can start doing today to improve your sleep. This is an episode from a year ago that I want to share with you again, because it can help you sleep better immediately.


I'm Martha Lewis, AKA the sleep detective as a functional health coach for the past five years. I've helped myself and over 200 clients find and fix the root causes of their sleep issues. Starting with these first three steps. This is the sleep detective podcast, where you will finally understand why you can't sleep and how to fix it so you can consistently sleep seven or more hours a night uninterrupted without drugs.


I know that the sleep advice you read everywhere is so frustrating. I remember when I couldn't sleep and I kept looking up and researching about sleep all the time and I would read the same things over and over.


Make sure you exercise every day. Have a bedtime routine. Don't watch screens before bed. Dim the lights before bed. All of the things. So I was doing all of this and I still couldn't sleep. I'd still be awake in the middle of the night for one to two hours trying to figure out why the heck I couldn't sleep.


So we all know that this basic sleep advice doesn't work for people who have struggled to sleep for a long time. So let's get into what will actually help.


And I'd still be awake in the middle of the night for one to two hours trying to figure out why the heck I couldn't sleep. So, this basic sleep advice, it doesn't work for chronic insomnia. And I know that you know this, that's why you're listening to this podcast, right? Because I'm sure you've tried a lot of those things and they haven't worked.


However, there are three essential things to look at. So we start here with all of our clients, even though we're also doing lab testing, because a hundred percent of them need to address at least one of these essentials. So in this episode, I'm going to explain these three key pieces and how to address them.


The first one is habits. So this is why I brought up that sleep advice because a lot of that has to do with habits. And it's actually true that everything you do during the day determines how you sleep at night. So you do want to make sure that you aren't sabotaging your sleep with bad habits. And so some of these habits that I talk about in my programs are based on cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, but I don't agree with everything that CBTI recommends.


I definitely don't agree with sleep restriction. I think that sounds absolutely awful. And it's not getting to the root of why you aren't sleeping. And I also believe that you can nap. And I talk about how to nap without sabotaging your sleep at night in my programs. So looking at habits, like I'm talking about, it's not the answer to sleep issues, even though that's what CBTI promises.


It's not going to help if you have a parasite, for example. However, I have found that following these habits, the right ones for them help people get more sleep in the short term while we work on the longterm. So really my intention is to cut through all the noise that you're hearing out there, all the different things and give you only the information that's going to work for you and that you actually need to improve your sleep habits and get better.


So my client Andrea wrote, the major changes were with my diet and lifestyle, but those were hard at first. But I think working together the last six months, I finally reached a place where I feel really good about my diet and lifestyle. I feel like a brand new woman. So habits lifestyle is really important now.


The second essential piece is looking at diet. And the truth is there is a difference between eating healthy and eating right for your body. So Nutrition information out there is so confusing, right? We should eat low carb or high carb or low fat or high fat or I mean it's been contradictory over the years and decades and The reason I believe that's true is because there's actually no one diet that's right for everyone.


So we're all different. We all have different genetics. We all have different metabolism. We're all in different phases of life, have different activity levels. So there's no way that everyone on the planet should eat a low carb diet. Some people don't do well with that. And so finding the ideal diet for your body is really important.


So you can sleep well. So finding your ideal diet involves keeping your blood sugar levels steady, which I'll talk about next. It involves balancing your macro nutrients for your metabolism. So that is your ideal ratio of fat protein and carbohydrates. It involves. an anti inflammatory diet, which can be somewhat different for everyone.


Gluten causes inflammation in a lot of people, but not for everyone. So it can also involve avoiding foods that your body sensitive to and avoiding certain special diets that can actually be more stressful on the body than helpful, especially if you aren't sleeping. So looking at your diet really involves lowering inflammation, identifying food sensitivities, and finding your right balance of protein, fat, and carbs.


And this is so important because your diet is going to affect your hormones, your cortisol, and your sex hormones, your energy, and therefore your sleep. So part of what I do in my programs is give you the tools you need to learn how to eat well for your specific metabolism. So that you can optimize your digestion, your health and sleep.


And I also really believe in keeping it simple. So I'm not asking people to count grams or calories or anything like that. Maybe for protein, when I talk about starting your day with 25 grams of protein, but Most of us get overwhelmed by thinking about keeping track of things. So it's more, we teach you how to do this more about looking at your plate and what your plate looks like and then refining eating a certain meal and then seeing how you feel and then refining the next meal to where you find what's going to work for your body.


So my client Wes wrote, The big thing that really made the difference was the dietary change. I really focused on increasing protein intake, and also did some things in terms of the order of food to try to address minimizing glucose spikes. And I think ultimately, surprisingly, my root cause was a blood sugar imbalance.


So this is the third essential thing that you want to be looking at. And when I'm talking about these essential things, what I mean is you can do this before you even do any lab testing with me. Again, like when clients sign up for the full programs that include lab testing, we're still starting with these three key pieces.


So you can start here, see if these things help. If they don't help, it means that there's more going on. We need to dive a little deeper, but this is definitely the place to start. So, when it comes to blood sugar, this is so important for our sleep and our health in general. Because low and high blood sugar can sabotage sleep at night.


And why this is so important is because if you are on this blood sugar rollercoaster, And let's say you start your day with a pastry and a cup of coffee, your blood sugar is going to spike really high. Your body's going to release insulin to lower it. So it's going to lower it really low. Then your body releases cortisol to give you energy because cortisol puts glucose into your cells.


It literally raises your blood sugar. And when your blood sugar drops low, you're also going to crave quick energy foods like carbohydrates, processed foods, sugary drinks. If you have those, or if you don't, your blood sugar is going to spike really high again, and you're on that extreme roller coaster.


And if you're on that roller coaster all day, that's going to continue into the night. And so we really want to stabilize blood sugar all day long so that it doesn't drop too low at night and cause your body to release cortisol, which is going to make you wake up. So this is so important. I will tell you.


Many of my clients are a healthy weight. They're eating healthy, right? And they still have blood sugar issues. So don't think that just because you're thin you exercise, you eat well, that blood sugar might not be an issue for you. It likely is. And this can happen, especially when we aren't sleeping, because glucose regulation happens while we are sleeping.


And so even people who are eating really well and paying attention not eating processed foods can still have blood sugar issues. So there are hacks that I talk about to help stabilize blood sugar and sometimes people need supplements temporarily while we're figuring out their sleep as well, so that they can get to be sleeping better and then blood sugar can start regulating by itself.


So in my programs, I really teach you how to learn how to test for and balance your blood sugar so then you can sleep peacefully and I use different ranges. I use what are called optimal ranges. So these are, recommended by functional medicine. So they're different than the average ranges.


So for example, glucose is called normal if fasting glucose is below 100 on a blood test. Well, I like to see it between 75 and 90. That's actually what is optimal. So, I teach you what these levels are and how to test for them. And so these are different than even what a continuous glucose monitor is showing as normal.


A continuous glucose monitor says up to 180 blood sugar levels are normal. Well, I don't like to see it. Rise more than 30 points after eating. So that would mean if fasting is at 90, ideally, I don't want to see a go more than one 20. So again, I can teach you what, how to test and what to look for, and then how to regulate your blood sugar so it is more balanced and then you can sleep better.


So my client Susan wrote, one major thing is getting my blood sugar under control and not having me wake up at 3 a. m every night because I'm hungry. So many of our clients are realizing how important this was for them. Now, if you're ready to take the first steps to better sleep, then I created the Sleep Essentials Program to go over these three different essentials.


So as I talked about, your habits, your diet, your, and blood sugar balance are crucial to a good night's sleep. And so the Sleep Essentials Program covers everything you need to know to optimize your diet, to find out the right diet for you, to stabilize your blood sugar. And to have smart sleep habits, but only the ones that really matter so that you can sleep well.


And this is meant to be a buffet too, of a take what you need. Maybe you don't need to work on your habits. Although I highly suggest listening to my take about these. Maybe you don't need certain parts of it, but you can use other parts of it. But it's really looking at these three key things is so critical to sleeping well.


And again, it's the first steps. So this program, the sleep essentials program is meant to empower you to take control of your sleep habits through education so that you can sleep well on your own. So it has four modules. Module one is what really causes sleep issues. So you have an understanding of that.


Module two is how to optimize your diet for your body for quality sleep. Module three, how to balance blood sugar for your best sleep. And module four is in understanding your testing options to find what's causing your sleep issues. So if these three essentials don't work, then you'll understand what It doesn't mean that you can't sleep well ever.


It doesn't mean that you have to live in with insomnia. It just means there's something more going on, but we can find out what that is and fix it. Now this sleep essentials program also includes five bonuses. So the first one is what you need to know about sleep and sleeping pills. So you understand how sleep works and how to get off sleep aids.


Bonus number two is bedroom and bedtime routine recommendations, so your habits don't sabotage your sleep. Bonus three, how to calm your nervous system so you can relax for better sleep. This is so important. Bonus four, what to do when you can't sleep at bedtime or the middle of the night so that you fall asleep fast.


And bonus five, how to nap without ruining your sleep at night. Because like I've already said, I do believe that you can nap. When I wasn't sleeping well, I took a short nap in the early afternoon every day, and I felt so much better after. And I actually think that it helped me sleep better at night. But you want to do it the right way so that it doesn't sabotage your sleep at night.


Now, the total value for everything in this program is 423. However, I have prices super low. I want to help as many people as I can sleep better. And this is the place to start. Some people are going to do these. I hope it's you and you don't need anything else. So I made the cost 37. So that's saving almost 400 and you can sign up for the Sleep Essentials program at the link in the show notes.


But my goal is to give you as many resources as I can for the least amount of money so that you can do some things on your own to start sleeping better. So sign up now and I can't wait to see you in the program. I will talk to you next week.

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