Sleep Like a Boss with Christine Hansen

Emily Thompson 0:00
Hello and welcome to being boss episode number 80. This episode is brought to you by fresh books cloud accounting. Being boss and work and life is being in it.

Kathleen Shannon 0:16
It's being who we are doing the work, breaking some rules. And even though we each have to do it on our own,

Emily Thompson 0:23
being boss is knowing we're in it together.

Kathleen Shannon 0:27
Today, we are so excited to be talking to Christine Hanson. Christine is a sleep boss. So after leaving her career in education in 2015, Christine is now all about teaching you how to get a solid night of sleep which will allow you to wake up refreshed with more energy and ready to tackle your day and rock your business like a boss. Christine is an international certified pediatric sleep consultant with her company sleep like a baby and international adult sleep coach with her company sleep like a boss. So her approach involves no pharmaceuticals, and it addresses the whole picture of sleep, not just one piece of the puzzle. Hey, bosses, I wanted to take a second and tell you that earlier today, Emily and I were talking about passion projects to our being boss, clubhouse members. And we were talking about how once you get paid doing what you love, and once you turn a passion project into a business, one of the big energy dreams on that is having to do all the administrative work around building a business around the thing that you love, right? So it's really about the administrative work, like keeping your books and doing all the accounting. And that's why we love fresh books, cloud accounting, fresh books is intuitive. It's easy. You don't have to be an accounting major. In fact, it was designed specifically for creative entrepreneurs. And you can try your free trial today by going to freshbooks comm slash being boss and enter being boss in the How did you hear about us section, you don't even need to enter a credit card. I really want you guys to make money doing what you love. And so I think freshbooks is a great way to get started with that. Alright, back to our show. So Christine, thank you so much for joining us. We are so excited to be talking to you.

Christine Hansen 2:21
Well, thank you for having me. I'm really happy to be

Kathleen Shannon 2:25
here. Okay, so we have a love hate relationship with sleep over here at being boss. Right.

Emily Thompson 2:33
Love it. Kathleen, we're going to fix your sleep one day I'm going to start sending you so many good sleep vibes every night when it goes actually not even for you. I'm saying them reflux. But love hate. Yes, I love sleep. Kathleen has the love hate relationship.

Kathleen Shannon 2:46
I mean, I love it too. I just don't get enough of it. Which is why we have Christine on the show.

Unknown Speaker 2:50
Christine. No pressure.

Christine Hansen 2:55
Yeah, so I'm really excited to to be here and to help you hopefully give you some tips that you didn't know about and see what we can do.

Kathleen Shannon 3:03
We actually Skyped probably a couple months ago and I you know, I'm just getting so frustrated with my kiddo waking up all the time. Lately, the big struggle has been just getting him to go to bed in the first place. And I feel like I read all the books and I know all the things and nothing is working. So whenever we chatted a couple months ago, I remember essentially He told me to bribe him. And it totally worked.

Christine Hansen 3:33
And it worked but it has been first right I remember that I had to laugh

Kathleen Shannon 3:38
way what I don't remember that part.

Christine Hansen 3:40
You were on holiday. You know you were you were away. Oh yeah, it first went with with your husband, right? Yeah,

Kathleen Shannon 3:47
I mean, like my kid in general is a lot better with my husband than he is with me which brings us a whole other issue of like mom guilt but he typically sleeps for my husband whenever I'm around he's waking up all the time. So it's all my fault I get it

Emily Thompson 4:06
misses you he just misses you. But even very even apart from like Kathleen's not sleeping I know that like one of the common boss issues is this idea that you have to like stay up and hustle out all the things and not getting enough sleep I feel like college like high school and college teaches us to like cram and to like not sleep very much. And like I was never one of those in high school college. I was the girl who was asleep at nine o'clock regardless of what they had coming the next

Kathleen Shannon 4:37
day to me too. I never sacrifice sleep ever I think which is why it's been such a hard transition going from being a sleeper to a non sleeper.

Christine Hansen 4:45
Absolutely

Emily Thompson 4:46
right but but sacrificing sleep is like a it's a real issue for for people who are starting their own business or like side hustling or whatever. And so I'm excited to dive into all the reasons why that should be the last thing that you ever Want to do?

Christine Hansen 5:01
Yeah, I think you're absolutely hit the nail on the head, it's like, you know, especially when you are working, if you have your own business even more, so you have so much on your plate that you know you some Your time is limited. So the first thing that people start to sacrifice is their sleep, you know, just a couple of hours here, just a couple of hours there. And then you know, even if you have a nice thing in the morning, oh, it will work out somehow. And suddenly, you have accumulated all of that sleep debt, like literally sleep debt, and you just don't function as well anymore. So there are really a lot of repercussion that have that are happening. And the bottom line is that if you really want to rock your business, and really want to be at the top of your game, you cannot allow yourself to sacrifice the because it's you're not going to perform the way that you should. It's as simple as that. So I'm really glad that at the moment, we have a little bit of a movement going on with Arianna Huffington who's having this whole sleep revolution movement, you know, and I really hope that that's starting to change things a little bit. But actually, when you talk to really successful business people, most of them are very aware that they need their sleep and are actually very, very protective about it. Like people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Ellen DeGeneres are some examples who are all like big, not protectors, but like supporters of getting the sleep that you your body and brain where the needs so it's, it's I'm really glad to be here and to get that message out. Because I think you just send to trivialize it so quickly. And it's it's important that you take care of yourself and your body really.

Kathleen Shannon 6:47
So I've experienced the personal ramifications of not getting enough sleep, which include things like depression, foggy brain, and achy body. Like I almost feel like I have the flu. Have you guys ever had a summer party where you stay up all night, and the next day, you almost feel like the flu, like even if you didn't drink or do anything, you know, you still just feel gross in your body. So what are some of the very real ramifications of not getting enough sleep?

Christine Hansen 7:16
Well, basically, just to put in very simple terms, your brain and your body is is like an engine. So during the day, you are damaging yourself, like slightly not in a in a horrible way. But you know, it's just because you're working. So when you're sleeping, your brain and your whole body is basically being rejuvenated, which is really the essence of the word. So you're really having all of that damage repaired, and you get your energy back. And so it's really physically and mentally that everything is healing and basically getting all of the energy back. So when you feel physically, like a horrible just experience just happened and it gets worse with with age, unfortunately, it's because your body is actually not completely healed. You know, it's it's literally that so everything that you're describing is really a ramification of or consequence of your brain not getting enough chance to catch up on sleep and to catch up on all the energy and healing that it needs. That's just an in very simple terms.

Unknown Speaker 8:24
Yeah, that is kind of

Emily Thompson 8:27
on one hand and mind blowing in that there are so many people who don't sleep and do the thing that they have to do to keep their body consistently going. But on the other hand, so obvious, like please just get some sleep so that your body can do what it's supposed to be doing. So I want to talk about like what sleep actually does for you while you're doing so if you don't get enough sleep, you are your body's not healing, but what are the what are the good things that come from getting a really good restful night's sleep.

Christine Hansen 8:57
So what is really happening is that the main events basically taking place in your sleep is that your brain is incredibly active. And the main thing that it does is, first of all, consolidating memories. So if you want to be someone who's not constantly forgetting stuff like important stuff, you should really be aware of obviously habits. So that's the first thing that it does. And the second thing is that it's really flushing out any toxins that are there during the day. So it helps you to be more alert, more creative as well. And also emotionally, it helps you not just to be a nicer person because you are not as grumpy, but it also helps you to read people better. So it's going to help you to have all of your senses really sharp and alert. So especially if you're someone who is a team leader, for example, it's crucial that you know how to read people and to read their reactions. If you don't get enough sleep, all of your senses are basically dulled. So, you know, there are things that you missed that you would never have missed otherwise. And it also happened and how it helps your whole physical body to regenerate and things like that. So for example, babies and kids, they are making most of their growth while they are sleeping, you know. So that's just showing, like how incredibly important that is. So if you have a child who has a sleep disorder, you will notice one of the things are that they aren't growing as quickly. And that can be very worrisome. And when you know where to look, that can change everything, basically. So it's incredibly important.

Emily Thompson 10:43
Kathleen, are you sleeping over there? Did you finally get a little bit of Shaddai

Kathleen Shannon 10:49
I am crying into my pillow. Just so funny, because I think that anyone who's been listening to the podcast for a while is familiar with my sleep issue, which is basically that I had a baby who didn't sleep for all of 2014, we were up every 45 minutes to an hour every single night for a full year. And it was really devastating. And I still feel like I'm not quite caught up, he's still waking up an hour night. But something that happened to me is I'm sorry, he's not still waking up an hour every night, he's still waking up in the middle of the night, at least once a night every night, which is a big, you know, shift. And it's a lot better than the nine to 10 times the night that we were waking up before. But it's still a struggle and what I'm struggling with right now whenever it comes to sleep, and probably this isn't the case for every single boss. But maybe there are ways that we can tweak it to make it relatable is that I'm starting to become afraid of nighttime now. And I I get to wear right before I go to bed. I get really scared of having to wake up in the middle of the night. And I've also found that even since we're sleeping a little bit more, I'm waking up with insomnia. And I don't know if that's because of what I had been through or if it's because of getting older or because the stress in my business is really starting to add up. But I wake up and I start thinking about work or I wake up and I'm so excited that my baby hasn't woken up first that like I get so excited. I can't get back to sleep. So I mean, I have so many questions about sleep. But let me start with this. How much sleep should we really be getting? Okay,

Christine Hansen 12:30
so I have a lot of things that I want to tell you. But let's start with the question first. So the generic answer is eight hours. That's a generic answer. Now, obviously, we are all different. So what I usually suggest is that if you're someone who wakes up in the morning and has to hit the snooze button like 10 gazillion times, or work with, I don't know, 10 different alarm clocks hidden all over the room, then that's a pretty sure sign that you're not getting enough sleep. If you're someone who is really alert in the morning, like it's easy for you to wake up or it's like maybe not your favorite thing to do. But you know, you have a stretch and things are fine, then you're good. So for me, that's the easiest way to see if you're getting enough sleep, and also whether you managed to get through the day, without craving to have to go to see during the day all the time, that's usually a sign that even if you sleep a lot, and you still tired that there's something going on that shouldn't. Okay, so next question.

Emily Thompson 13:39
I have I have a fault. So not getting enough sleep is one side of it. Sometimes I worry that I sleep too much.

Kathleen Shannon 13:49
I don't want to hear it.

Emily Thompson 13:51
I know, which is why I kind of don't want to ask this question. But what happens when you do sleep too much? Like I'm one of those people I learned a long time ago. If I don't get my eight hours of sleep, you do not want to know me. But there are there are certainly times when I feel like I need more and like I'll sleep a solid 1112 hours and then feel a little guilty about it and wonder if I'm sleeping too much or if there's something up so is there like a possibility that you can sleep too much? And what does that look like?

Christine Hansen 14:25
You can in a way, like as long as it's not like chronic that you you know you you always you're afraid that you're going to fall asleep on the wheel every day, you know, then you're fine. However, if you are constantly taking naps and then are having insomnia, it's something that I wouldn't recommend. And although the healthiest thing that you can do is really to kind of stick to the same rhythm every day. So even on weekends, that's like the healthiest thing that you can do and someone who has a real issue with sleep and sleep Being all over the place and not in in that way, but you know, in a chronological way, kind of, then I say you really have to stick to certain times. But if you have a really nice lion from time to time, then that's absolutely fine. You're probably catching up on sleep dead. And that's okay. You know, I do it to

Emily Thompson 15:21
perfect, and I'm good.

Kathleen Shannon 15:24
Okay, so here's, here's a question and a real thing as a boss. And something that's been I'm almost ashamed to admit it, because we preach so much over here about having kind of that work life balance. And lately I've been finding, especially as fox is going in my sleep issues are hand in hand with my kids sleep issues, but he's been kind of on a going to bed strike lately, I think that he started to get the fear of missing out. And so he's going to bed later and later, which I just can't, maybe we can talk about this. But as much as I like to hold him down on his cot at 7pm, like, he will not go to bed until 10pm. So I'm either holding them down in the bed, and we're screaming and fighting and crying for three hours, or we're all just hanging out until 10pm and having a good time. But after he goes to bed, I see it as an opportunity to either catch up on TV, which is a real thing. I mean, I love my TV, or to catch up on conversations with my husband, or to catch up on a little bit of work. So I find myself not getting into bed until maybe midnight, even though I know sleep is so so important. So what are ways that we can look at sleep as a way that like maybe we can prioritize it a little bit more in our lives.

Christine Hansen 16:40
So for me, like one thing as, especially as a mama or daddy boss, you need to be able to also cut yourself some slack. You know, it's it's a lot, especially if you have working parents and who can't be at home. And you know, if you have a kid who's a daycare, you need to be able to forgive yourself on that a little bit, you know, it's not going to be perfect. And even if you think, okay, my kid should really be in bed earlier, which I advocate but if it's not working for you, then it's not working for you. So that's like one of the main things that one thing you always need to start with is that you need to be in the clear with yourself first before listening to books or to forums or to your mom and dad or even your best friend, you know, it's it's really has to start with yourself, everything. Also your sleep yourself, if you are ready to prioritize that you will, it will be so much easier for you. So as an entrepreneur, or anybody who likes to, to work and who loves their job, it's difficult to switch off and believe me, I'm, I really have a tough time to close my laptop in the evening and to put my iPhone away and not chat or look or Google or check out the latest webinars, but they're out there to have me become a victim of another sale. It's it's it has a lot to do with self discipline. And it also has a lot to do with teaching yourself to really switch off ready at the evening. And the other thing that I wanted to tell you is that so many have the K the author and the same scenario of waking up at night and not being able to go back to sleep. And it's very simple. It's because you don't have any distractions around you, you're quiet, you know, you have a quiet environment and your brain is suddenly starting to gather all of those ideas, then you start to stress out because you know, you have to get up soon, but you also know that you have to sleep and so you're lying there and you're just freaking basically out. And the easiest thing that you can do is to really get up and you know, one thing that you have to remember, you will survive the next day, even if you are tired, so stop stressing out about it, you've done worse, and the world is still spinning. So stop stressing yourself out about it. If you're not getting enough sleep, then you're not getting enough sleep. So get up and do something completely different. Get out of the bedroom and do something that's boring, which means no screen, no TV, but something that you don't necessarily like doing like ironing, or folding laundry or doing crossword puzzles, something that will help you to stay focused on something but that will not allow your thoughts to come and circle and haunt you. And I really like that option because a lot of times you people suggest medic meditation, and it works for some people but I also know that most people who I who I would if I was going to tell them like okay if you're in that situation you you need to clear your mind and think of nothing Yeah, that's not going to work. So I think that this is an option that is much more efficient for busy minds. Because it gives you something to do, you have to focus or your favorite shirt will be ruined. But it won't allow you to think too much. And then as soon as you feel fatigue coming back, like the first time you yawn, or the first time your eyes start to becomes stinging again, you go back to bed, and you try again, if it doesn't work, you get up again. So but don't stay there and freak out about not being able to sleep, because that's not going to help.

Kathleen Shannon 20:37
So those are not things that I do whenever I wake up in the middle of the night.

Unknown Speaker 20:43
To get back to sleep.

Emily Thompson 20:46
I'm a meditator. So like, I almost really hate like even speaking during this episode, because I'm like the most badass sleeper I've ever met, especially with Kathleen, who's had such like, literally has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from knowing being able to sleep. But I'm a meditator.

Kathleen Shannon 21:03
I know you're saying that like a joke, but I really know

Emily Thompson 21:05
I'm not talking about

Kathleen Shannon 21:06
even talking about this episode, you guys. I'm having a really hard time not crying about this like it is. It's such a really hard topic. Okay, so Emily, you meditate,

Emily Thompson 21:21
yeah, I meditate to go. So I'm one of those people who can literally lay down in my bed and be asleep in like 45 seconds. Like, it's amazing. And meditating is like how I started that that habit like just laying down and literally counting to 100 silently in my head. And I've gotten to where like at night, if I ever wake up in the middle, and I do that as well, like, I'll just start counting and backwards if it's a really bad night, because then like even more focus has to go into counting. And then usually by the time I get to the bottom, I'm done. But even then sometimes sometimes I do have a harder time going back to sleep than that, but never tried ironing, I might have to try that someday.

Christine Hansen 22:00
It really depends on your personality type.

Emily Thompson 22:03
I reading for me is also one of those things like I keep a couple of books by bed, and I usually pick up the most boring and get me like halfway through. And I'm like falling asleep. So I think and obviously Kathleen's not the best like subject for this. But in most cases, it's just trying like trying lots of things and figuring out what's going to work for you. And not getting over like not getting not beating yourself up over the fact that you can go to sleep. And granted, I've never had to deal with insomnia. So you can tell me to go to hell if you want. But I mean, it took me a while to get to a place where I was sleeping as basally as I am now for sure. Yeah,

Christine Hansen 22:46
it's definitely it depends on your personality, for sure. You know, it's like, it's so individual. That's why I'm really careful by handing out like just 10 tips that will work for everyone. Because you have to look at different options. And even meditation is very different for different people. Like you have very different ways of meditating that work differently. It's just sometimes it's just about the language. And talking about books, books can be great. If you are not someone who's completely encaptured in something like if you someone who's completely into Game of Thrones, and you pick that up at the night, well, you probably will be reading for a couple of hours, you know. So you are right, that you should take something boring, like I don't know, I don't have an idea at the top of my head, but something that's not going to whisk you away into adventure land.

Kathleen Shannon 23:37
Okay, let's say you're sleeping eight hours a night, and you wake up and you're still tired. Like how do you know if you're actually getting good sleep? Is there such thing as if you close your eyes? You fall asleep and you wake up later? And you don't remember tossing and turning or anything like that, but you're still feeling tired? How do you know if you're getting good sleep or not?

Christine Hansen 23:58
Well, that would be one sign is that you're still tired? You know. And that's when I think that that's when for me, I have all kinds of alarm bells going off. If I have people who who've been sleeping eight hours and who also have their partner if they have one confirmed like UK everyone's been sleeping, and they're still really tired, then I'd really go in and see to have a lab test done to see if you're not having a sleep disorder like sleep apnea, for example. And the sleep apnea is basically where your airway is closed for a second and then you stop breathing. And so you always have to wake up again, in order to restart basically. So people with sleep apnea don't necessarily know it. Some are snoring a lot and that you can really hear them stopping breathing regularly. But for some it can be very quiet. And so that's something that's one possibility. There are lots of different reasons but But when that happens, then I'd suggest to really go to a lab and have yourself tested to see if you're actually sleeping. Like if you're if your sleep is connected. And they actually getting enough because usually eight hours should be enough for you not to feel completely groggy the next day.

Kathleen Shannon 25:21
Okay, can we talk a little bit about the different levels of sleep. So in my own research, I've learned that there is, you know, deep sleep light sleep REM sleep, can you explain to us what some of that is? Yeah.

Christine Hansen 25:33
So in general, you can categorize sleep into two phases, which is like the REM sleep and the non REM sleep. So REM sleep is when we are dreaming, very simply, but and non REM sleep is where we are sleeping, but we don't see pictures in front of our eyes. Now, we sleep in cycles in different sleep cycles. And each cycle is divided into different phases. So you have a light phase, which is that and then you have a second stage, which is a deepest sleep where your whole body is starting to your core temperature goes down, your pulse goes down. And then you have the third stage, which is like a really deep sleep, when someone has really a lot of trouble waking you up. Or if you are a parent, when you hear your baby cry, and you were in the third stage, you literally have a lot of difficulties to orient yourself and sometimes even to balance your own body, and then you wake up again. And those cycles, they become longer. So the first one is usually around like an hour, more or less, no, 90 minutes, and then the cycles afterwards become longer. So we're 100 minutes, two hours. And it's really important that each cycle is there, because they all have different functions. So if you're missing some, then you know your body is lacking that purpose of that cycle. So that's basically how it works. And between those cycles, we wake up very quickly, very shortly. But we usually we don't remember, like some of us, we just turn around we fluff our pillow, you know. So it's very normal to wake up basically, because we are connecting those sleep cycles. So that's just in general how, what sleep looks like.

Emily Thompson 27:22
So you're saying a minute ago that you don't like giving, don't like giving these sort of generic tips that are sort of right for everyone. So I won't ask you that though, I really want to. Instead, I will ask, Is there something that comes up most often that people are doing wrong? whenever it comes to not getting enough sleep?

Christine Hansen 27:43
Yeah, um, there are different things. It's difficult, like, let's say the easiest thing to pinpoint for me when working with people are things like nutrition, or hydration. So it's very important that you know, your own levels of how you react to different things. For example, some people are very, very sensitive to caffeine, and they cannot have another cup of coffee after 12 or even 10am. Other people are much less sensitive to that. And they can have another cup of coffee at 6pm, and nothing will happen. So those are very individual things. But very often that is what's happening. For some people, it can even be fruit in the evening that has fructose that can keep them awake. And for a lot, it's dehydration, so we forget to drink during the day. And then it's basically your body waking you up at night because it wants to signal to you that it needs the water of the day. So those are little things. But a lot of other things that are not that often talked about is actually our relation to sleep, what we connect with it. And also stress management that we keep everything to the last minute. So if you are someone who's anxious very quickly, or who's just like a warrior, like not in terms of war, but in terms of the worry, then something I could suggest is that you take some time during the day where you do just that you just worry. So you can go to a quiet space. And you just let those thoughts come to you. And you just leave yourself and give yourself permission to just even freak out for a moment. And it's going to help you to take all of that pressure from the evening or especially the moment when you have to go to bed. Other things are you know, some people are really scared of sleep. I know that some people are not sure if they're going to wake up again. So there's things like that because sleep You know, the last the longest sleep that we have is death. So you have people who still have issues with that. And then you have being on we need to talk Come

on. Okay,

Kathleen Shannon 30:05
I love that you say that because I feel like that's something that really, I just thought I was a crazy person, truly whenever I had Fox, because I was convinced that if he slept longer than, you know, three hours at a time that he might die, and that and it was probably a little bit of like postpartum hormone imbalances that were leading to that thought. But I was really truly worried. And I trust me, I wasn't like waking him up intentionally or trying to wake him up. But sometimes I wondered if that thought alone was enough to wake him up out of his sleep. I know it sounds crazy and silly. But I'm actually glad that you said that, because I think I was afraid of him dying in his sleep, and, and even still, like, I'm like, Oh, my gosh, what will happen if he sleeps too long. So as much as I want him to sleep eight hours a night, every night, I still think I have a little bit of that fear. And it might not be directly related to my own death. But the fear of sleep is very real. So I love that you acknowledge that because I felt so kind of almost alone or ashamed or crazy in that feeling.

Christine Hansen 31:17
No. And that's something that's very important to me. Because when you look at sleep, you have a lot of experts who who look just at external factors, but very often, it's, it's actually something that's inside of us. And there are lots of people who are really, really scared of going to sleep at night, because they are really scared of not waking up again. So it's definitely something that's real. And you having a child could be both, you know, it could be you worried about him. And it could also be you worried about yourself, not waking up, not being there not being aware.

Kathleen Shannon 31:53
So there's lots of different things that are there. But don't feel crazy. There's some other scary things that happen with sleep, too. Like I've experienced both sleepwalking and sleep paralysis, where I wake up, but I can't open my eyes. So that's kind of scary. And then also things like nightmares. I know a lot of people struggle with So, you know, maybe not everyone acknowledges the fear, but there can be fear. Absolutely. sleeping.

Christine Hansen 32:17
Absolutely. And, you know, it takes a lot of courage to be honest with yourself on that. And to, to, to be ready to think about it, as well. And lots of times you don't hear that in relation with sleep. And I just recently had a conversation with someone who knew exactly what the sheets you had the hunch that it had to do with a very like a traumatic experience in her life. And she just told me, I thought I was crazy for thinking that that was related to my sleep deprivation. And it was just hearing that no, it is it can absolutely be related that just had was a huge relief. So don't feel crazy about it. It's very common, it's just that we don't talk about it that much. Okay, what else? Okay. It can be very simple factors like not getting enough daylight. And until I started working from home, I couldn't really understand that because I had to go to work every day. And I was always a little bit of outside. But now I completely get it like I can be inside of my house all day long. And if you're someone who is working in a workspace that isn't close to a window, or that doesn't have a lot of daylight coming in, basically, your body is not getting enough sunlight. And so that can be a very simple trigger for your whole body clock to become messed up. So those are small things that sometimes we just overlook. And when you actually work with someone, and you ask them, have you been outside today, or over the last three days, and it's just like, Oh, actually, I just went into my car into the parking garage, into my office and back again, maybe to the gym where you have artificial light, which is not the same as sunlight. And it just messes up your whole system. So those are some external factors that you have to look at as well. But it's tricky. It's like it's really a whole puzzle that you have to fit together. But those are some that I think most people are prone to have an issue with. And you know, because it's so complex, sometimes you don't know where to look. And it really helps if you have an approach of looking at all kinds of external factors, but also internal factors. And that's what I think is the most healthy way of tackling this issue. And then of course, seeing if there's really a medical reason, obviously, that you have to go a different route. But until that's really established, there's lots of things you can do with small tweaks and lifestyle changes.

Emily Thompson 34:48
I want to hear from you about tech. So screen time before bed. I've heard both ways good and bad. And what Imagine a lot of bosses listening this enjoy a good Instagram scroll before going to bed. What are your views on screen time before bed?

Christine Hansen 35:10
Okay, so screen time has the reputation that it has because of a very simple factor. So when you have a screen, the light that it emits its artificial blue light. Now blue light is all around us. It's basically why the sky is blue. But the problem with artificial blue light is that the rays that it's emitting are much shorter and therefore a lot more intense. And they have a high impact on your retina. And they mess with your production of melatonin, which is a sleep hormone. Now, for some people, they are not that sensitive to it, and it doesn't make much of a difference. But for others, it can really make a huge difference on how they sleep. And also usually when you have people who say I can only sleep in front of the TV, it's not necessarily a sign that TV is calming them down. But it's usually a sign that they really tired and that they actually caught the proper window of going to bed. So it's I don't think well, I wouldn't say that it is supporting you to go to sleep. But for some people, it makes a bigger impact than others. And also, some people are just naturally tired at the moment when they go and have I don't know their regular Netflix binge, you know, when they before they go to bed. So that's basically why the screen time issue is coming up so many times. So it makes absolute sense. But as I said, it really depends on how sensitive you are to it. But if you are someone who has struggled with sleep, I would really recommend not including any screen time at least an hour before going to bed.

Kathleen Shannon 37:01
So but what I'm hearing you say is that there are a lot of variables that could be affecting your sleep from the time that you stopped drinking caffeine and the day to even sugar in the evening. And I'm thinking about all of these for my kiddo to like, oh, wow, I give him a banana right before bed and like, way to go Kathleen, like maybe I should actually do something. You

Christine Hansen 37:21
have different kinds of food. You know, bananas can be asleep food, which are actually great for sleep. So you're bang on there. But I wouldn't give him like a citrus food like an orange or things like that. That can be a little bit hard. But you're not doing caffeine. You're not doing anything you are on your mom. Today, you're just worrying like there's it's already the best sign in the world.

Kathleen Shannon 37:45
No. Well, I mean, it's definitely our big struggle. And I feel just so embarrassed. Like the other night he woke up or he Fox woke up and I ended up in his bed at 3am. And then the next moment I woke up and it was 730. And we were both sleeping in his little twin sized bed. And I was just like, Man, what is wrong with us? Like, why can we not figure this out? But um, okay, so my question is, there are all these things around food like whole 30s. And, you know, the sugar, detoxes all these different programs. So if you were to do like a sleep detox, and again, I know that you said that there are a lot of variables, but what could some of the best practices like if you were to do a sleep detox for a week, or two weeks or a month, just to really see what's affecting your sleep and what isn't like, what would the ideal day or scenario or bedtime routine look like?

Christine Hansen 38:42
Okay, so something that you should, or do we have to hire you. It's a whole sleep detox is like it's incredibly complex, but something that I can easily tell you is that you can very simply figure out what kind of foods you should be eating and which ones are not that perfect for sleep. And the very simple reason for that is that everyone knows melatonin, like especially I know, especially in the States, it's a supplement. Now in the meantime. And the problem with Melatonin is that it derives from an other hormone called tryptophane. And tryptophan isn't produced by our body, we have to take it from the outside. So basically, we have to eat it. And you have different foods, which I refer to as sleep foods, which have high levels of tryptophane. So and it's very easy to figure those out. So you can google them, you have great articles on that. And if you are very serious about a whole lifestyle change, I definitely suggest to look at those foods and to change your diet around to work with those foods first and see how they affect you. And you can also simply find out foods, anything that processed, like anything that's very saturated and processed is something that I completely skipped for my diet. So organic can help. And anything like the basically, the simplest rule is that if you pick something up from the store, and it has a huge list of ingredients, it's not necessarily the best choice. Like the fewer ingredients are on there, the purer your product is and the healthier it usually is. So I'd really go with that. And then look at the sugar levels that are in there as well. Does that makes sense? Like just nutrition wise? Yeah,

Kathleen Shannon 40:39
totally. So our food can affect our sleep. What are some foods that are really good for sleep?

Unknown Speaker 40:44
You can,

Kathleen Shannon 40:45
obviously you said look up the things with tryptophan in them. Are there other like knowing now that a banana is okay, banana

Christine Hansen 40:51
is okay. Some

Kathleen Shannon 40:52
other foods that you think specifically promote healthy sleep,

Christine Hansen 40:55
some things that you can have is like broccoli. Or if you're not a vegetarian needs, like Turkey is very good for sleep. And I don't know them all on top of the head. But what you can do is you can look my article on the Huffington Post, which is called how foods can help you sleep and I have a list of ingredients there. But nuts are generally very good as well for sleep. So

Kathleen Shannon 41:22
Oh, good. We'll be sure to link to that in our show notes at being boss club as well,

Christine Hansen 41:26
because it's exactly what I'm talking about right now. So it's really exactly that's

Emily Thompson 41:32
awesome. I'm doing I'm actually three days in right now to a whole 30. And it's probably my third or fourth that I've done in the past couple of years. And the thing that I'm looking forward to most is about two weeks in or two weeks and going to bed because this leap that I have during like that middle phase, especially middle to end of whole 30 is the most glorious sleep I have ever felt. So yeah, cleaning up your diet, really hardcore, will do some amazing things for how well you sleep.

Christine Hansen 42:08
And also cutting down alcohol. I hate to say because I'm sitting here with a glass of Bobby, actually. I'm not an alcoholic, but it's our anniversaries celebrating here.

Kathleen Shannon 42:21
Happy anniversary. And also it's evening for you. In

Christine Hansen 42:27
the evening, I'm not like

I'm just saying it because alcohol can help you to fall asleep quicker. But the the kick back of it is that it's going to come and haunt you in the middle of the night. And when you wake up from that it's more difficult to fall asleep again. So lots of people who have an alcohol Detox Detox, they will notice that their sleep is getting better too.

Emily Thompson 42:52
Yeah, alcohol is no fun for me anymore in the sleep the waking up in the middle of the night is the pit. Thank you getting older and ruining my ability to

Christine Hansen 43:04
horrible let's not fares, and

Unknown Speaker 43:07
no, not at all.

Kathleen Shannon 43:09
Okay, is there anything else we need to cover on sleep? Is there anything that we haven't that we we don't even know that we don't know, whenever it comes to sleep.

Christine Hansen 43:18
Um, I think that just again, my message and basically the way that I work and what I believe is that you have to start with yourself in terms of being ready to accept sleep as being a priority. And whatever you need as a motivation, you will find it because he will find entrepreneurs, successful entrepreneurs telling you how important it is, you will find doctors telling you how important it is, you will find psychiatrists who will tell you how important it is everything in your life that somehow makes an impact on you being a better person, a healthier human being is related to sleep. And so you have to start with your own willingness to change something fast before you start implementing a gazillion different tips because it's just like having a body transformation in terms of going on a diet and going to the gym. And you know, you're not going to have the body of a marathon runner within a couple of weeks. It takes time. It's a lot of work, you will have to shift lots of routines that you probably had for years and years and years. But the good news is that lots of times, you can really get rid of your sleep problem without having to rely on medication or anything like that. And that's also something that I just very quickly want to note one of the most annoying healthy things out there are sleep meds. And they're really dangerous. And if you're not someone who can really benefit from them, because you have a medical Sleep Disorder, it's really something that you have to look into to find alternatives to it, because they do a lot of damage. And that's basically what I want to get out there that it's not just a one trick pony, you there's lots of different facets to it. So hopefully, I have managed to give you a little bit of the different ideas that you can look at when you find yourself with a sleep problem just to be aware of them, and to figure them out.

Emily Thompson 45:36
I love that. I have one more question for you.

Christine Hansen 45:39
Absolutely.

Emily Thompson 45:40
So we talk a lot about like having a morning routine to help you prepare for your day. And that's really important for like, having success and getting the things done. And you know, all the really fantastic people enrolled have a really solid morning routine. Does sleep work better? If you have a solid nighttime routine? Is that a thing? Or am I just making that up? No,

Christine Hansen 46:03
you're not? Absolutely not. It because basically, our brain is a beautiful thing. But it's also a very simple thing in ways that you can you can train it. So it's going to make connections. So if you have a bedtime routine, and you really stick to it, your brain is going to get ready to go to sleep much easier, it's going to be much easier for you to relax. So having a great bedtime routine is really something that you should start and I'm actually very glad that you're asking because I prepared bedroom routine sleep to eat a cheap house cheat sheet for the being boss audience on my website. Oh, awesome. Yeah. So you can just go to sleep like a boss calm and then slash being boss. And I will have prepared a little. Some different tips that you can use to create a sleep routine that works very well. And one of my favorite steps is actually to have a nice facial massage like to have a nice cream putting on because actually that is going to help you to relax to anything that has to do with like, massage, but don't use it as an excuse for your husband, though. You need to massage me every night.

Unknown Speaker 47:26
Well, you can

Emily Thompson 47:26
I don't think I want David massaging my

Christine Hansen 47:30
left to be your face.

It's one of my favorite stabs in the evening, really. So and I'm giving you a couple of tips on what you can do to get a creative or there's lovely bedtime routine that fit fits your style, and that will help you to go to sleep easier.

Emily Thompson 47:47
Oh, wonderful. Thank you so much for that. Kathleen.

Kathleen Shannon 47:50
Yeah. So just for five minutes, we have to address the mom bosses here.

Unknown Speaker 47:59
Do it?

Kathleen Shannon 48:01
Well, and dad bosses, but typically it's the moms but um, I need to know how to get my kid to go to sleep and stay asleep.

Christine Hansen 48:16
Okay, step number one is really that you need to be ready to actually want this, you know,

Emily Thompson 48:25
a man.

Kathleen Shannon 48:28
I feel like what you're saying though, is I need to be ready to emotionally ready to cry it out. No, I feel like that's what I'm hearing you say? No. But

Christine Hansen 48:38
I think that you miss him maybe a little bit as well. And you know that i

Kathleen Shannon 48:42
don't i don't miss him. I don't even like him anymore.

Unknown Speaker 48:48
It's very tricky

Christine Hansen 48:51
with toddlers, you know, but whatever you choose to do, you know, the whatever it is, you know, whatever method or whatever. If you decide to stay with him, whatever you choose to do, you need to stick to it. You need to be consistent because children I'm not saying like infants, but as of six months usually, children really love the word to be black and white, meaning they cannot deal with gray zones. It just confuses them. They are insecure about it. And even you know, toddler age, my daughter is just as old as your son is now And believe me, I know exactly how you feel when bedtime is a mess. Because our favorite word is just no right now. So it's like it's, it's like it's, I know it's a job. It's a job to push against it, you know again and again and again. But I also know that staying with the boundaries that I've put set up for her and her knowing that they are there to stay is really reassuring for her And so you have to remember that that you are not punishing him or that you are not upsetting him, that you're really helping him by staying by sticking to whatever you decided works best for you in order to help him sleep. And there are so many different ways of doing it. So it's really finding out something that you can do. And you also have to, you have to know that he is not necessarily going to be happy. But there's a big difference between a toddler who is sad, and a toddler who is frustrated. You know, and I think that's one of the key pieces that you have to keep in mind. See,

Kathleen Shannon 50:42
I think that why I have a hard time with being a mom is I was never around kids. So whenever he's flipping out and like crying as if I'm you telling him that I'm going to murder him, like, he acts like I'm murdering him, yeah, by asking him to get in bed and lay down and you're going to stay there and you're going to close your eyes and you're going to go to sleep, he acts like I'm killing him. And so then I really feel like I'm killing him because his reaction, I get some acting as like, it feels as if I told Emily, if I was like, Emily, you got to go get in bed now. She's like, flipping out, I would think, wow, there's something really wrong here. And so it's hard not to feel like there's something really wrong whenever he's flipping out.

Christine Hansen 51:24
Yeah, and it's, you have to know that so many toddlers do this, though. It's like, the thing is, it's not nice, it's not cool. And the problem is that they have, they still have issues to regulate themselves. You know, like when they once they are worked up, it's difficult for them to come down again, just New York, neurologically speaking, it's it's their brain is not quite ready to do that yet. And they need the help of a caregiver. So you or someone they trust in order to sometimes come down again. And if you are completely tense, it's very difficult for them for for folks to do that. So something that I like you to imagine is that if you go in there and you feel imagine you have a bubble around yourself, and Fox also has a bubble. And if you feel his bubble becoming like glowing red working himself up, it's your job to have a nice calm bubble around you. Imagine a nice calm color, like a turquoise or I don't know purple something, you connect with calm, and you want him to be embraced in your bubble and cool down to that color. So that's something that I really like to imagine when I have my daughter screaming around and I just know that she needs me to help her. Calm down again. And that's very difficult if you're very tense. So if you feel that you cannot do it, take a break. And try first to work on yourself in order to be more ready more easily to get into your calm color. Because if he's red and you are like a neon orange, yellow, it's not going to help. Okay, does that make sense?

Kathleen Shannon 53:16
Yes, I think I need to smoke more weed.

Unknown Speaker 53:18
Probably.

Emily Thompson 53:22
Your show your kid is both a safe place to sleep. You've got it.

Kathleen Shannon 53:29
Okay, so I'm gonna work on being turquoise. You work on her boys

Emily Thompson 53:34
and he'll work on being not so read.

Kathleen Shannon 53:37
I might have to move out of my house. No, I think that that's great advice. And I you know, it's definitely something I'm I'm working on it. I'm trying you guys I'm trying to be you know, it's

Christine Hansen 53:50
it's okay not to be perfect. And it's also very okay to be frustrated and to be not happy with your kid for a moment. Believe me. It's It's normal. It's it's hard. I mean, whenever I tried to to just look at my iPhone and not giving it to my daughter all hell breaks loose. Like, it's, it's embarrassing. The whole village knows us by now. She's just

she's a toddler. She's a toddler.

Kathleen Shannon 54:24
Right? And I think that's the thing I'm learning is that all toddlers are like, yeah, I think what I'm really learning is that you actually can't make them sleep and you can't make them poop in the potty and make them do all these things, especially if they're going through a developmental phase where it's their job to, you know, push against, find their own freedom. I just thought that that would happen whenever he was like, 16 No, no, I

Christine Hansen 54:49
think it's probably going to be easier with 16 than with to

Unknown Speaker 54:53
me and I hope so.

Kathleen Shannon 54:57
Christine, thank you so much for Joining us we will be sure to put a lot of your Notes and references on our show notes at being boss club. But can you also let our listeners know where they can find you?

Christine Hansen 55:09
Yes. So you can very easily find me on my website, which is the pluck a bastard calm. And you can also find me on Facebook and on Twitter, Twitter. I'm by Christine age. And my blog is also by Christine hanson.com.

Kathleen Shannon 55:25
And you're also in the clubhouse aren't I'm in the clubhouse? Yes, please

Christine Hansen 55:28
shoot me a message whenever you have a question.

Kathleen Shannon 55:32
Thank you. Yeah, and so maybe we can even I mean, I'm not putting you on the spot here. But maybe we could even do a q&a after your episode goes live. We do a monthly q&a in our clubhouse. And I know that some of our clubhouse bosses would probably love to ask you a few questions about sleep. I'd love

Christine Hansen 55:47
to i'd absolutely love to

Kathleen Shannon 55:50
Kathleen here I wanted to pop in because I've been getting asked a lot what my role at braid creative is now that being bosses taken off so much, and I wanted to let you guys know that branding, business visioning and coaching creatives to blend more of who they are into what they do while positioning themselves as confident creative experts is still a huge part of my work and my life. At braid creative I'm still giving my team creative direction and putting my stamp of approval on every single project behind the scenes. But a big part of my role there is helping to create the braid method branding ecourse This is something I'm super passionate about. And what this ecourse does is it helps creatives who can't quite hire, break creative one on one work on their own brand and their own business vision. We have ecourse book, a ton of exercises and even audio files so that you can learn on the go. The E course is now open to new students only until August 8. Learn more at Bree creative calm and click ecourse in the main menu. Thank you for listening to being boss. Please be sure to visit our website at being boss club where you can find Show Notes for this episode. Listen to past episodes and discover more of our content that will help you be boss in work and life. Did you like this episode, please share it with a friend and show some love by leaving a rating and review on iTunes.

Emily Thompson 57:14
Do the work. Be boss and we'll see you next week.