Episode 034: How to Get A Quality Night's Sleep with Katie Leadbetter
In this episode, we’re going to talk about sleep. I'm joined by Katie Leadbetter, a Nutrition Consultant, and fellow 21-Day Sugar Detox Coach. Katie helps people maintain health and vitality through whole foods based nutrition, customized supplementation and wellness coaching.
Katie and I recently held an Instagram Sleep Challenge, because we were both struggling with sleep and needed some accountability around it. You'll hear us share 10 tips to get a better quality night's sleep, as well as hear us share our own personal experiences with getting quality sleep!
What I want for you to know that is that sleep is vitally important to your health. It's perhaps even more important than eating a healthy diet and exercising. It's an important part in hormonal function, detoxification and metabolism.
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Naomi Nakamura: Hey guys, welcome back to the Live FAB Life podcast. I am so excited for this episode, because I'm joined by my good friend, Katie Leadbetter. Katie is a nutrition consultant graduate of Bauman College Holistic Nutrition and Culinary Arts. She's also a fellow 21-day sugar detox coach. As a private nutrition consultant, she focuses on working one-on-one with her clients to help them improve their digestion, balance their blood sugar through diet analysis, cooking and shopping instruction, and individualized dietary and nutrient recommendations. She's been following the paleo diet, and has been gluten free since 2012. Katie is super enthusiastic about helping people maintain health and vitality through whole foods based nutrition, customized supplementation and wellness coaching.
I am so excited to have her with me. If you follow both of us on Instagram, if you're not, you should, because you're missing out. A couple of weeks ago, we did an Instagram sleep challenge, because we were both struggling with sleep. For five days, we did Instagram Lives alternating on her account and my account, and every day, we gave a tip on how to get better sleep, and we challenge ourselves to focus in on better sleep that week, and we were both really successful at it. In this episode, we are sharing the 10 tips, five from each of us, and sharing our thoughts, and why sleep is important, and how to get good sleep.
It's just fun to have a friend on the show who has the same values, and does this same kind of work. We're just sharing our thoughts and stuff, and so I loved collaborating with Katie that week, totally enjoyed having her on the show. We're thinking about more ways that we can do this moving forward. I hope you enjoy this episode, and let's get to the show.
Katie, welcome to the show.
Katie L.: Thank you so much for having me. This is so exciting.
Naomi Nakamura: For those of you who may not know Katie, Katie is a fellow 21-day sugar detox coach, but I would love for you to share your background with us.
Katie L.: I went to Bauman College, which is here in the Bay Area. I graduated in 2016, yes, with a nutrition and consultant certification. I became a coach just before that actually was in the fall of 2015. I came to real food in 2011 is when I made a big shift to my diet, and it was a really hard change initially, but I finally stuck with it. Then I finally did kick sugar to the curb at least in the majority of my [inaudible 00:03:11]. It definitely happened initially when I was switched off of the processed food diet. I'm passionate about gut health and blood sugar regulation, because to me, those are the things that are at the root of really if we get those under control, a lot of other things fall into place.
Naomi Nakamura: I think, that's a really good thing to point out, because I have been having those thoughts lately. Like, what are the common denominators around a lot of illnesses? We're a little bit off topic right now, but I don't know if you heard of a quote from Dr. Terry Wahl of Wahls Protocol, where she talked about how we basically all have the same disease, because we all have basic things in common, like, blood sugar dysregulation and perhaps lack of vitamin D, all of these different things, but one of the things that I think is at the root of a lot of people is this general feeling of malaise or unwellness is a lack of sleep.
Katie L.: Absolutely.
Naomi Nakamura: That's what we're going to talk about today, because for those of you who aren't following Katie and I on Instagram, which you really should give us a follow, because we share some great stuff. A couple of weeks ago, Katie and I did a really informal really, really casual Instagram sleep challenge, because we were both struggling with sleep.
Katie L.: Yes.
Naomi Nakamura: I would venture as far as to say for some people focusing on sleep can be the most important thing above cleaning up their diet, or even above getting exercise because it is really that important. I like to say that we can get away with a poor diet, and we can get away with maybe not enough exercise, but we really cannot function without sleep.
Katie L.: So true. I've definitely heard several people recently saying that. Like, they would prioritize sleep over exercise, sleep over diet. Like, if you have to choose one thing to focus on, it's sleep. It's almost like don't bother doing the other stuff if you're not sleeping well. I hate to say that because I run detox groups. You run detox groups. You work with clients all the time, but if you realize that's how important it is, then you're really like, "Okay, this is not a joke, and I understand that not everybody ..." I don't have kids. You don't have kids. It's easy for us to be like, "Oh yeah, we go to bed," but it's like, "Well, you have kids. You know you're going to be awake in the middle of the night how many times."
You have to plan extra for that. Don't go to bed at 11:00. You should be going to bed at 9:00, maybe at 8:00. It depends on what your life's like, but plan for those things, because they're going to come up.
Naomi Nakamura: And think about ways that maybe you can incorporate more sleep. Like, do you really need to stay up and watch one more show, right?
Katie L.: Right.
Naomi Nakamura: Like I said, Katie and I did this really casual sleep challenge, because we both needed it. For us, we understand the importance of sleep, and maybe we can share some of those things with you, but even for us, we're aware of the value and the importance of it. It's still a challenge. It really is we ... No, like Katie said, we both don't have kids. It doesn't mean that we don't still have a lot going on. We both still have full-time jobs. We're trying to build our nutrition businesses on the side. We both have family and social obligations. We both have dogs. We do take them a lot of time, and we both have things we like to enjoy, but that doesn't mean that we're allowed to deprioritize sleep. I think in our modern society, that's just become more of the norm, that sleep has just become so devalued.
Katie L.: Like, a badge of honor to be like, "Man, I only got four hours of sleep last night." People say that. Like, "Look at me, and I'm still up." It's like I would be like, "That would do it."
Naomi Nakamura: I know. What we're going to do today is we are going to share with you 10 tips on how to get a better nice sleep. Do you want to start?
Katie L.: Sure. My first tip is to set a bedtime alarm on either your phone or if you have some sort of Fitbit or an Apple Watch or whatever, set an alarm to go off to remind you to start getting ready for bed. Ideally for me, it goes off actually an hour before I want to be in bed so that I'm like, "Okay, it's already time to start turning off my things, and getting ready for bed, packing my lunch, watching my face, all that kind of stuff."
Naomi Nakamura: I was thinking about it. I haven't tried this, but can you set an alarm with Alexa? Maybe you can even have Alexa tell you, "Hey Katie, it's time to go to bed."
Katie L.: I don't have an Alexa, but maybe I could ask Siri to do it.
Naomi Nakamura: Another helper.
Katie L.: Yes.
Naomi Nakamura: That was tip number one. My first tip, it goes hand in hand, is to turn off all your devices one hour before bed. I am really guilty of not doing this, but when I do, we've proven it that I get better sleep. Like I said, we did this Instagram challenge a couple of weeks ago, but I think we both saved our highlight stories. You can go back, and I'll link to our profiles in the show notes, but you can go back and take a look at literal proof on how this really helps me. I don't know about you, but before I know it, an hour can go by of me not realizing how much scrolling time I'm doing on social media.
Naomi Nakamura: I have a confession to make. I play words with friends to the point where I am maxed out on the number of games at the end of the day, and I thought, "I got to catch up on my games," and because I have so many games open, it can literally take an hour to get caught up.
Katie L.: Wow.
Naomi Nakamura: Yeah, so you really need to just shut off the devices. That's in preparation of, like you said, getting another things you need to get done in preparation for the next day, or even just being able to quiet your mind. I know a lot of us go to bed, and we have a hard time falling asleep even though we're in bed at a decent hour, but because we have so much going on in our minds, that if we just take the time to shut down the devices, that gives us the time. I had somebody on Instagram asked me, "Well, what do you do in that hour?" I was like, "Well, for me, I usually set my ... You know, I'll set some kind of alarm 10 minutes, and I'll tidy up around the house just for 10 minutes at the end of the day."
Then I will go through my bedtime routine of taking the dog out for her final potty break. I'll go upstairs and wash my face, and do my nighttime routine. I try to meditate before bed, maybe if I want to do a little bit of reading an actual book, and not a device reading, away from things that stimulate my brain as much as possible.
Katie L.: That's exactly what I think. That would lead up time it could like, but it is, I think, really important like you said just to start quieting my mind so that I'm not being stimulated by not just the light, but the stuff in there. I'm definitely the scroller, so not so much TV anymore. I think, it used to be more that I would watch that extra show, but now it's more giving off the scrolling.
Naomi Nakamura: I like what you said about how you use it to get ready for the next day to pack your lunch, because that's setting you up for other healthy habits. If you have your lunch packed and ready to go, tomorrow at lunch time, you're going to have your food ready that you're not going out there, and making maybe a poor choice in what to eat. It's really also setting you up for success for the next day.
Katie L.: Yeah, it's like a twofer.
Naomi Nakamura: Exactly. What's your next tip, tip number three?
Katie L.: I'll give my next tip because it pairs off with this, although I didn't go in this order in our challenge, but it was to have that bedtime routine, and that to keep it consistent across the weeknights and the weekends, so have that thing, because not only does that ... it's just this routine that we're used to, but it triggers your brain. Your brain is like, "Oops, I know what's coming next. This is coming next. I'm preparing myself for sleep." Have the thing, whatever it is. For me, it's stretching before bed, packing my lunch.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, why don't you take us through your exact routine?
Katie L.: Okay, my ideal routine because this doesn't always happen. It's about 20 minutes of stretching before bed.
Naomi Nakamura: What kind of stretching do you do?
Katie L.: Initially, it's been some leg stretches. I have some knee pain when I was running a few years back, and so I was rehabbing that with some physical therapy structures. It morphed into some yoga stuff. It's just whenever I'm feeling like sometimes I'll use the roller, the foam roller to roll out, and just whatever when I'm with that usually happens. I'll confess that I do often listen to a podcast or a book while I'm doing that, because it's hard to not have any devices on, but at least I'm not staring at a screen. That's my concession. Then it's definitely packing my lunch, picking out my outfit, packing any supplements I'm taking with me to work the next day. I like to make sure that my pan is ready in the morning, so I wash the pan.
In order or me to not be grumpy in the morning, I have to have all these things ready to go so that the morning is smooth and I can walk the dogs, and I can stretch in the morning, and do a few things. If I have my pan cleaned, if I have my little breakfast thermos cleaned, if I have my supplements packed, then I'm ready, quick, and out the door a lot easier and happier, and not rushing and slamming cupboards, and, "Get out of the way, Jim. Get out of the way, dogs." It's a confession. That's definitely how it is sometimes. I try to avoid that by getting all that ready the night before. Then it's washing my face, brushing my teeth, usually diffuse some essential oils in my diffuser, or I rob them on myself. Then reading a book, pretty much the routine.
Naomi Nakamura: I love that, because not only are you taking the time to get yourself ready for a good night sleep, but it's also setting you up to have a successful next day at least to get your day started on the right foot. I'm sure you can attest to this that I would imagine that if you skip any one part of it, it makes things go a little bit frazzled.
Katie L.: It does, definitely. It's a little bit of self-care too.
Naomi Nakamura: Absolutely. All of these things combine into one. I mean, this is what I talk about when we want to set ourselves up for success, and it takes a little bit of forethought and a little bit of effort, and a little bit of planning in the beginning, but then it just becomes second nature. Tip number four is my tip. It goes hand in hand with what my bedtime routine is. I had mentioned this earlier. I have started meditating before bed, and I've done this on and off. Honestly, I've done it more when I've been having problems sleeping.
It's like, when things are going well, I let it go, but it has been proven for me that when I spend even just five minutes or 10 minutes, but I like 20 minutes of meditating before bed, I sleep so much more peacefully. I mean, I'm always going to fall asleep, but the quality of my sleep tends to be a lot better. I think, it goes back to what we said earlier with the ability to quiet our mind.
Katie L.: I think, sleep quality is so important, because I think some people can fall asleep and maybe even stay asleep, but are they waking rested? That's when I was like, "Are you waking rested, because if not, then your sleep quality is probably not that good?" There are other factors to look at like maybe meditating that can help with that.
Naomi Nakamura: Well, I think, if you are still getting a lot of sleep, a lot of hour of sleep, but like you said, you are still waking up tired and fatigued, which has definitely happened to me. I think, those are signs that there might be some other things going on, just something to pay more attention to and be a little bit more mindful of.
Katie L.: Yeah, tracking it and getting that information to see, "What can I do? What can I change here?"
Naomi Nakamura: Do you meditate?
Katie L.: I usually meditate in the morning. That's my goal is to start the day with meditating, like, a clear, calm mind. Then sometimes if I'm not out like that when I go to bed, I will meditate, but it's not with an app or anything. I think I mentioned in our stories, it's like a woo woo hippy gratitude for my body meditation. I'll just do a body scan, and just like, "Thank you hypothalamus, and thank you frontal lobe," and I'll go through my head, and I'll go all the way down. Thanks lungs, and I really appreciate you heart, and all the way down.
Usually, I just fall asleep in there, but I feel like it's important to be grateful for all the parts of our bodies do for us every day, and we often don't say thank you to a lot of things that we are fortunate enough to have, so I try to do that when I'm having a little bit of trouble sleeping, and to just regulate my breathing. It's a little bit of a combination of my own creation.
Naomi Nakamura: For the record, I don't think there is such thing as woo woo. I think, it's a matter of people just being more mindful. I think that's awesome. I do use an app to meditate. I really, really do have a problem quieting my mind, so if I just have a voice there to guide me through it, it helps me. I have a few apps that I've used over the years. Right now, I'm using Headspace, which I can't decide if I like it or not, but I've been using it for two weeks, and I like it so far.
Katie L.: Good.
Naomi Nakamura: Your next tip, tip number five.
Katie L.: My next tip is to sleep in a dark room. It should be dark like a cave. That can be hard in our modern world, but one, our eyes are receptive to especially the blue light from our devices, so that's one reason that we want to shut down those devices early on. That blue light triggers our body to think that it's daytime, and so it's not ... The right hormones are not being triggered to help you fall asleep, but our body has light receptors all over our skin, our eyes, everywhere. If the TV is on, let's say your eyes are closed, you're still getting that light input from the TV, and all of those little device like your clock, whether something is charging, all of these things have little lights on them, and they contribute to light.
I think that it's important to really try to either cover them with some tape if you can, a washcloth if you can't tape it off, something to help make it dark, and then maybe investing in something like blackout curtains I think is really worth it.
Naomi Nakamura: Interesting, I don't have blackout curtains, but my tip goes hand in hand with that. That's sleeping with an eye mask. I am very light sensitive, and I told this story in our challenge, but the first time I tried an eye mask was I was on a red-eye from San Francisco to New York City. If you ever flew in on red-eye on JetBlue, they give you a little blanket and some ear plugs, and an eye mask. I thought, "Oh, this is so nice," and I tried it. I had the best sleep on a red-eye on an airplane, because I do not sleep on red-eyes. I don't even know why I booked myself on that flight. I was like, "This is so fantastic." This was back in 2010.
Ever since then, I have been hooked on sleeping with an eye mask. Now, when I don't have it with me, my eyes physically hurt, but getting back to your point, I did not realize, I guess, that it make the connection about how our body still absorbs light, because I would see peoples' Instagram stories or what not, and hear people talk about having to cover the clock with tape. I was like, "Why don't they just get an eye mask?" But when you made your point about how it still affects the rhythm of our body, it really made so much sense. I actually broke the clock in my room, so I really don't have any of that stuff. That's not something I have to worry about, but I do use an eye mask, which helps me immensely.
Katie L.: I use an eye mask too. It's like my blankie. I can't sleep without it. If I go somewhere and forget it, I go buy one. It's just I have to have one, and I've got my husband have to have it too.
Naomi Nakamura: But you enhance your eye mask, right? You put a little bit of essential oils on it.
Katie L.: Yeah, so these are flax seed masks. I buy them. I don't make them. I certainly could make them, but I don't. They put some fresh lavender, dried lavender in there. Then after a while, it loses its scent, so I'll add a little bit of a drop or two of lavender to refresh it. You don't need a lot, because it is so close to your face, so don't put a ton on your eye mask if you are having your own.
Naomi Nakamura: What is your next tip?
Katie L.: My next one was to sleep in a cool room, so not just a dark room, but a cool room. If you think of how we used to live before, we had all of these modern insolation and modern infrastructures, heating and cooling systems, it cools down at night, so our bodies know that trigger of cooling to be triggering us to go to sleep. Ideally, it's around the 64-degree range is what I've read, so trying to keep it cool in your bedroom. That's my next tip.
Naomi Nakamura: I love it. You and I live in the San Francisco Bay area, where typically, it is not very hot. However, I feel like, and tell me if you think this, ever since we had the drought years, I really feel like there's climate change, because it feels so much hotter. For those of you who don't live in the Bay Area, most places don't have air conditioning, because we never needed it.
Katie L.: Right.
Naomi Nakamura: But the past, I would say maybe three or four summers, it has gotten really bad. I will tell you that there is nothing, nothing, nothing worse than trying to go to bed when it's too hot. I mean, I have had friends who on the hottest days could not take it, and literally went and checked into a hotel for the AC-
Katie L.: Wow, that's awesome.
Naomi Nakamura: ... because you can't sleep when it's hot, so your point about sleeping in a cool room is spot on. I actually invested in a little AC just for my bedroom last summer, because I was like, "I cannot take another summer of hot nights."
Katie L.: I think, we may have to do it this summer, because my husband's already complaining about how hot the bedroom is. That's in the winter. I'm like, "Honey, I turned off the heater." Like, "We have a nest," and it will go on in the middle of the night, and I'll get on my phone real quick, and I'll just turn it off so that I don't hear him complaining about it being too hot. I think, it's going to be a rough one. I'm a little worried.
Naomi Nakamura: My next tip is for those of you, and this is not related to the cool room, but when I was really, really having bad sleep problems, I never had a problem falling asleep, especially if it was cool weather. My problem was that I could never stay asleep. I would wake up in the middle of the night without fail every night usually between 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning, because I was hungry, like starving hungry. It was really impacting the quality of my sleep. This is happening every single and night, and I didn't know what was going on, and when I saw my first functional medicine doctor, Dr. Melissa, who I interviewed in episode two, she told me that it was a sign of hypoglycemia, because my blood sugar was off.
What she recommended which I do that has helped me immensely with my sleep is to eat a small pie of protein about an hour before bed, so maybe when your alarm goes off that it's time to start your evening routine, maybe you just have a hard-boiled egg, or a small piece of turkey, or just a really, really, little piece of protein. What that will do is that will help balance your blood sugar, because carbs affect your blood sugar. If you're eating a heavy carb dinner, or you haven't had a whole lot of protein or fats throughout the day, that's going to cause your blood sugar to become unstable.
Naomi Nakamura: If you think about it when you go to sleep in the evening, your body's in a fasted state, so if your blood sugar is not balanced, it's going to disrupt a whole lot of things in your body, especially your sleep. Protein is one thing that helps balance blood sugar, so eating just a little bit can help you maybe sleep through the night if that's an issue for you.
Katie L.: That's a great idea, because I know people who sometimes will eat a snack before bed. That's usually not like that. It's usually something else.
Naomi Nakamura: Ice cream.
Katie L.: Yeah, not quite that ideal, so it's like, "Okay, you already have this behavior of eating. Let's swap it with something healthier that will still help you sleep, but has some nutritional value to it."
Naomi Nakamura: Nutritional value and again twofer help you sleep.
Katie L.: Yes, definitely.
Naomi Nakamura: Now, is this your final tip?
Katie L.: It is. My last tip is to, and I mentioned this in my bedtime routine, diffuse some calming essential oils. I like it for two reasons. One is think of what I typically would diffuse at bedtime if you like lavender and seed or what. Those are very supportive of sleep. I like those because they support sleep, but also that background noise.
Naomi Nakamura: That white noise.
Katie L.: Yeah, and so you get that in the background, and so we would like that. Unfortunately, our diffuser is not working right now, so I'm going to have to figure something out, because we've been without it for a few days, and I need it back.
Naomi Nakamura: I love that. I like to diffuse as well, diffuse essential oils when I sleep. Lavender is my favorite. It's just so calming.
Katie L.: It's great for pretty much anybody of any age. It's the best.
Naomi Nakamura: Yes, it's very gentle.
Katie L.: Yeah, it can do anything, and it works for everything, and it's very gentle for even children and stuff. Yeah, it's a good one.
Naomi Nakamura: My final tip is to follow the sun seasonally. What I mean by that is that we all have a natural circadian rhythm, and it aligns to what the season is. Of course, we're coming out of winter when we had longer nights, short days, long nights, and so what I did during the peak of winter is that when the sun started to set, and in California, that usually meant about between 4:00 and 5:00 PM or even 5:00 and 6:00 PM, I wouldn't go to bed, but I would start to dim the lights in my home to align my natural circadian rhythm with the season. I found that that helped me immensely whenever I was struggling with sleep.
Naomi Nakamura: Now that we're in spring, and we're moving into summer, obviously, I won't do that until later because our days are longer, and our nights are shorter, but just by syncing your body to your natural circadian rhythms will really bring yourself back into balance, and can really help with your sleep. If lights are blazing all night, and you're not going to bed until after midnight, well, that's really disrupting your circadian rhythms, which then has direct impact on just the way your hormones work in your body. Your hormones are the chemical messengers in your body, so they affect every single part of your body.
Naomi Nakamura: We have tons and tons of different hormones, some that we've never even heard of before. In fact, I just listened to a really good podcast episode with a, I think, she's either a naturopath or a functional medicine doctor. She specializes in ... I think, she's on the board for the DUTCH Hormone Test Company. I'm not sure, but she talked about how it has direct impact on progesterone, which is the hormone that really helps us with anxiety and fear. I will link to this episode in the show notes, but she specifically talked about how your circadian rhythms have direct impact on that. This is a tip I picked up a couple of years ago, but jut to align your body with your circadian rhythms may be different, and especially on where you live in the world, but to align to it will really help you if you struggle with sleep.
Katie L.: I like that seasonal model of living, not just looking at food, but looking at me trying to live in more harmony with the seasons, and so maybe being a little bit more restful, getting a little more sleep in the winter, not that you would go to bed at 5:00 at night, but maybe you would go to bed at 8:30 and 9:00 versus summer. Maybe it's 9:30 or 10:00, shifting a little bit with the season certainly. I really think it's a great idea to support our sleep.
Naomi Nakamura: I would love to hear how our sleep challenge helped you, or what you've learned about your from it, or what were you takeaways, and how are you doing now?
Katie L.: I'm doing okay. I think, our sleep goes ... It is the weekend when we were recording this, so that's a little bit hard to say. Definitely no, I really noticed if I did not turn off my computer when my alarm went off to get ready for bed if I kept looking through it, because, "Oh, I just have one more thing to do or whatever." Those nights, I wouldn't sleep as well. There were other anomaly things that's like, "Oh, this big thing is coming up, or all this stuff is up in the air, and made it harder overall." I think, I'm more cognizant of my sleep, and I'm continuing just to post my sleep stats, because I think, it's a good accountability for me to do for myself, so I could be like, "Oh, look, they are getting better."
Katie L.: Ultimately, that's what I want to do. Like you said, we know all of these tips, but I needed someone else to be of a push to make me stick with it.
Naomi Nakamura: Because coaches need coaches too.
Katie L.: That's true.
Naomi Nakamura: For me, I found that I get up at the same time every day no matter what without an alarm. My natural alarm clock, which whenever I say that, I think of that sign-filled episode with Kramer. Did you ever see that?
Katie L.: I'm sure I have. It's been a long time.
Naomi Nakamura: My natural body alarm clock always wakes up at the same time every day. My goal is to get seven to eight hours of sleep, which is my sweet spot for me. I have to go to bed at a certain time, and I found that if I am not asleep, not in bed, but asleep by 10:30 at the latest, my sleep will be compromised. I experimented a little bit on the weekend, so my alarm, bedtime alarm will go off at 10 to 9:00 every night, 8:50 PM. That's usually enough time to get me in bed by 9:20 if I'd like to read a little bit, and meditate for 15 to 20 minutes. I'm usually asleep between 10:00 and 10:15.
Especially in the weekends, I'll try and push that an hour later, because it is the weekend. My sleep definitely is not of the same quality. There was one night this week that I got eight hours and 29 minute. Katie and I both track our sleep by our Fitbit. I went back looking through my Fitbit, and the last time that happened was in April 2017, so almost a year. Well actually by the time this airs, it would have been a year. I can't tell you how good I felt that day.
Katie L.: I bet.
Naomi Nakamura: I felt so good, but for a year of averaging about six hours of sleep. Since we've done this challenge, I've been having at least seven hours, and it has made a huge difference in clarity of mind, and my ability to focus, and my energy throughout the day, and my desire to work out, so huge impact for me.
Katie L.: I'm less likely to push myself in my workout if I'm tired. I'm like, "Oh, I'm tired. It's Thursday or Friday." I'm exhausted. I didn't sleep well, so I won't push myself with that. It's almost like an excuse on some level for me to be just like, "Oh, I'm super tired. I should not," which is true. You should not go super hard when you are maybe really exhausted, but it's also like ...
Naomi Nakamura: It's a catch-22, because as someone who used to run marathons, and I did push myself, I'm really cognizant now about, "Oh, I didn't get a good night sleep. Am I causing more stress if I do push myself?" I really have to pull myself back, and not have that mindset as well. Like I said, it is a catch-22. Like, what do you do here? Well, what do you do is you get more sleep?
Katie L.: You get more sleep. This is what you do.
Naomi Nakamura: Exactly. We are trying to do weekly check-ins on our sleep, because we're not doing daily Instagram lives anymore, which is what we did during our sleep challenge, because that was a lot of effort, but we're trying to do it weekly, and we alternate between either one of our Instagram account, so I will link to both of our accounts in the show notes, but you can also give Katie a followup at cleaneatingwithKatie.
Katie L.: Yes.
Naomi Nakamura: Any other words of wisdom before we wrap up?
Katie L.: Just go to bed.
Naomi Nakamura: Good words of wisdom. Besides Instagram, where can people connect with you?
Katie L.: I have a website, cleaneatingwithkatie.com and cleaneatingwithkatie@gmail. I have a couple of blog articles on there about sleep with a few other tips besides the ones that we gave today. Then I'm on Facebook. The same thing, clean eating with Katie.
Naomi Nakamura: Awesome. Now, I am not a recipe developer. I just don't have that knock, but Katie creates some fantastic recipes, so make sure you get over to her website to check them out. They're usually 21-day sugar detox compliant. She also will be a good resource if you want to learn more about essential oils too.
Katie L.: Definitely.
Naomi Nakamura: Thank you so much for joining us. I'm so excited we're able to do this together.
Katie L.: Me too. This was so much fun.
Naomi Nakamura is a Functional Nutrition Health Coach. She helps passionate, ambitious high-achievers who are being dragged down by fatigue, burnout, sugar cravings, poor sleep, unexplained weight issues, and hormonal challenges optimize health, find balance, and upgrade their energy so they can do big things in this world.
Through her weekly show, The Live FAB Live Podcast, programs, coaching, and services, she teaches women how to optimize their diet, support their gut health, reduce their toxic load, and improve their productivity, bringing work + wellness together.
Naomi resides in the San Francisco Bay Area and can often be found exploring the area with her puppy girl, Coco Pop!
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