Is Hitting the Snooze Button Bad for You?
The body naturally has different waking thresholds as we sleep, meaning it’s easier (and better) to wake up at certain points in the sleep cycle than others. REM sleep is the most restorative part of the sleep cycle, and is vital to good health. When you snooze, you can disrupt REM sleep - leading to activation of the sympathetic nervous system responsible for your fight or flight response, which causes increased heart rate and blood pressure (Team et al., 2021). The few minutes you spend dozing is not enough to fall back into REM sleep, and depending on where you’re at in your sleep cycle when your alarm goes off again, it might actually make it more difficult to wake up and start your day.
Tips to Avoid Snoozing Your Day Away
If you find yourself hitting the snooze button everyday, it might be helpful to change some of your sleeping habits to support more regular, restful sleep.
Create a consistent sleep schedule - Sleeping in on the weekends sounds fun, but it can actually make more challenging to consistently get restful sleep. When your sleep and wake times are drastically shifting, your whole sleep schedule is thrown off - and getting back on track can be challenging. Cultivating a consistent sleep-wake schedule, meaning you wake up at the same time every day and go to bed at the same time every day, can make it much easier to reliably get adequate and restful sleep.
Make a pre-bedtime routine - Establishing a pre-bedtime routine is a key part of healthy sleep. This routine marks the beginning of your wind-down time, signaling to your brain and body that sleep is on the horizon. The National Sleep Foundation recommends at least 30 minutes of wind-down time before bed. Most experts recommend technology-free wind down time, meaning no phones or TV to avoid exposure to blue light.
Treat your bedroom like a sleep sanctuary - Cultivating your bedroom as a place only for sleeping and technology-free relaxation can have a significant impact on your ability to fall asleep.
There’s an app for that - The app Sleep Cycle can help you avoid snoozing and wake up at the ideal time during your sleep cycle. You set the time you have to be up, let’s say 6:30am. You can then allow the app to wake you up between 6-6:30 when it senses your sleep cycle is at the lightest point (the app uses a combination of movement and sounds to determine this), allowing you to wake up refreshed and ready to start your day.
References
Team, B. and S. (2021, December 21). Is hitting Snooze bad for your health?. Cleveland Clinic. https://health.clevelandclinic.org/is-hitting-snooze-once-er-maybe-three-times-bad-for-your-health/