22 hours Ago By Annabel Jones
I had every gadget, pillowcase and sleep supplement going, but it only made things worse. Here’s what actually worked. I was born a good sleeper.
The eldest of four siblings, my mother insists I slept through the night “from day dot”. In my 20s I gloated about my propensity for sleeping soundly. “As soon as my head hits the pillow I’m off” I would pipe up when the subject of insomnia came up.
In my mid-30s, my grandmother warned me that sleep deprivation was waiting in the wings. With a consoling tone she insisted that being up for hours in the night is a sad consequence of age. And yet, in my ignorance I swore it would never happen to me.
Until it did. And now? Sleep is all I can think about. Consult any longevity expert and they’ll tell you that sleep is the holy grail of wellbeing.
Without a good night’s kip you may as well forget about cryotherapy and infrared light – high tech interventions will be null and void if you can’t access the cell rejuvenation of deep uninterrupted shut-eye. The algorithm on my Instagram feed is so attuned to my obsession, I’m fed an eternal stream of solutions from magnesium body butters to odd-shaped pillows that promise to optimise your sleeping position..
