Blossom Your Awesome Sleep Better With Morgan Adams

Blossom Your Awesome Sleep Better With Morgan Adams

Morgan Adams joins with a lot of great insights on how to sleep better. Morgan is a sleep coach whose clients like to call her their "sleep soulmate."

On this episode Morgan is sharing awesome insights for catching some deeper z's. 

• the perfect evening routine
• how the morning routine effects your entire day into the night 
• the dos and don'ts for the perfect night's sleep and other bedside habits to consider 

KEY TAKEAWAY - Sleep issues plague a huge number of us. It's far more prevalent in women and there are a lot of other myths around sleep and insights that can help you finally learn how to unwind so you can get better quality sleep night after night without those pesky sleeping pills.

To learn more about Morgan check her out here.

To see more of my work check me out at my website

Where I write and cover mindfulness and other things to help you Blossom Your Awesome.

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To see more of who I'm talking to on the Podcast, to advertise your brand on the Blossom Your Awesome Podcast or just get in touch click here.  

Transcript

Sue (00:00.934)
Hi there today on the show we have got Morgan Adams here with us. I am so honored and delighted to have you here. Welcome to the show.

Morgan Adams (00:09.187)
Thank you, Sue. I'm excited to be here in chat. All things sleep with you.

Sue (00:12.914)
Oh, I am so excited to get into this with you because this is kind of like my thing. Everyone knows I've had insomnia for so long. But so, Morgan, you are a sleep coach. You are also I love this. So your clients call you sleep soulmate. I think that's so adorable. So give us the backstory here. How and why you got into this line of work.

Morgan Adams (00:29.295)
I'm out.

Morgan Adams (00:34.583)
Yes, so I had a huge struggle with insomnia myself several years ago, and it was manifesting as what we call sleep onset insomnia. Basically, it took me a really long time, like maybe up to two hours to fall asleep. And it was sort of sparked off by a relationship struggle that I was having at the time, and I just could not kick it. And so after a couple months, I decided to go to my primary care doctor.

and was given Ambien. And at that time, I was a pharmaceutical sales rep. So when a pill was suggested to me, I had no qualms whatsoever about accepting it because there was a pill for every ill. So it was fine by me to take the pills, no problem. However, I did have a lot of side effects. And now the pill did actually get me to sleep a little faster. So it did what it promised.

but those after effects the next day were pretty bad. So a lot of grogginess, a lot of difficulty focusing, and it was hard at sometimes to do my job well during the day. So that went on for years, eight years actually. And after eight years, I had sort of a turning point because I met the man who is now my husband and we were in the new dating stage.

and the relationship and he said to me one night, you know, when you take that pill, it really freaks me out because you act like a zombie. And that was like, oh no, I just got called out, you know, and it was in a very nice way, obviously, but it was at that point that I decided these pills can't be a part of your life anymore. So what I did at the time, which I don't recommend people doing, is just doing it by yourself. So I ended up sort of tapering down.

the pills, tapering the pills down. And that's the correct way to do it, of course, but I didn't consult my doctor. I didn't have any support. So for anyone listening, please consult with your prescribing provider and ideally hire someone like a sleep coach to help you with the accountability and support along the way, because it's not always easy. Fortunately, I was able to do this by myself out of sheer grit and determination. And.

Morgan Adams (02:57.715)
ended up sleeping pretty well for many years after that until there was a plot twist in 2020 and that plot twist, something we all experienced collectively. And that was the pandemic in 2020. So in March of 2020, my sleep started to falter again. And I was really concerned because I didn't want to go down that whole route of insomnia that I had been through before. So I started getting really proactive. I bought.

myself an aura ring to track my sleep. I started Googling how to sleep better and I was able to really get my sleep back on track pretty quickly. And I got really interested in the whole topic. Like, you know, it's amazing like how quickly you can turn things around if there's a problem with sleep. And so I just started organically sharing what I was doing on Facebook. And I found out at that point that a lot of other people were struggling at the same time that I was.

So this was 2020, late in 2020, I had this revelation that I needed to do something with sleep as a profession. So I had been, I'd had breast cancer in 2018. So I had been through this complete health transformation, health journey. And I knew in my core that I wanted to do something to help women with their health. I just didn't know really how that would play out. And when this sleep fascination sprung out of me,

It was just like, okay, I can't stop this urge to like delve into sleep and help women with their sleep. So it was late in 2020 that I decided this and I got all these certifications and started my practice in 2021. So it was a, it was a long road to get me to where I am now, for sure.

Sue (04:46.115)
Wow, I love this. And you know, I always love it when someone has that first hand experience like you do and that struggle. So let me ask you, so you were actually taking these sleeping pills for eight years?

Morgan Adams (05:02.156)
Yes.

Sue (05:04.138)
And then when you did taper off, what were some of the first things you noticed, like with wellness or just physically, what were some of the first things?

Morgan Adams (05:16.663)
Well, you know, it's been so long. It's hard to recollect, but I think that the most important thing that I noticed was that I didn't have any grogginess. Like, because, you know, I've come to learn so much about sleeping pills after the fact. I did not know anything about them. And what I've come to know at this point is that 80% of people who take sleeping pills report some type of residual next day side effect. It's usually like grogginess, hard time waking up.

hard to focus. And that for me was like the big, the big kicker that was just really hard at some points to like, carry on a conversation or do my work because at the time I was in a job where I had to produce writing very quickly, I would freeze at my keyboard, it was just it was just not good. So I think that the clarity of mind and just more focus was something that I noticed pretty quickly after the pills were out of my system for sure.

that stands out the most.

Sue (06:18.342)
Mm-hmm. And now let me ask you, Morgan, so, you know, women and sleep, like, what is the deal? What do you find with your clients? What's like the most, like, number one contributing factor to not just being able to chill and get a good night's rest?

Morgan Adams (06:35.479)
Yeah. So we as women are at somewhat of a disadvantage when it comes to sleep. So we're about 40 to 50 percent more likely to develop insomnia. And a recent survey in 2021 said that women were one and a half times more likely than men to report waking up, not feeling well rested. So we're definitely dealing with this more than men. And there's really kind of three reasons, broad reasons why.

women are struggling with sleep more than men. So the first reason is kind of an obvious one, it's hormones because from teenage hood to menopause, our hormones can go through a lot of fluctuations, especially in the paramenopause, menopausal phase. So that's one key factor. The second factor is that women tend to be more prone to mood disorders, like anxiety and depression. And those put us at more of a risk

getting sleep issues like insomnia. And then the third reason is really more like socio-cultural issues. And what I mean by that is women are dealing with so many roles around us. So for example, just I'll throw out a typical type of prototype of a client, 45 years old female who has still got teenage children at home. She's got aging parents who frequently need her help.

and she's also a manager at a large company. So she has all of these competing demands and we kind of call her like the sandwich generation because of all these demands on her. And because of all these demands, the stress and anxiety are mounting. So those are the three main reasons. And I would say that in my own practice personally, I think that stress and anxiety is what I see most often as the common through line with all of these women.

for sure.

Sue (08:35.942)
And now, you know, I know you have a thing on your website that people can access for guidance there. But can you give us some practical guidance here on like, you know, what you recommend for an evening routine, like some things that we can kind of put into place to kind of start unwinding?

Morgan Adams (08:52.407)
Yeah.

Morgan Adams (08:56.499)
Yeah, so I do actually have a free mini course on evening and morning routines, but some broad based generality guidelines would be, you know, number one to really prioritize some kind of wind down routine. A lot of women who have children know the importance of doing a wind down routine for their young, their toddlers, for example, they give them a bath, they read them a story, because they know that if they don't bedtime is not going to be pretty.

Women quite often forget to do that for themselves. So they will quite frequently, this is very common with a lot of my clients is that they'll put the kids to bed and they'll start working or they'll start doing Netflix or getting involved in a project. And all of a sudden it's like midnight and they're like, oh my gosh, I must go to bed now. So they really haven't given themselves a proper wind down time. So when you think about what is a proper wind down time, I get this question a lot.

You know, it's great to have an hour or more, but for a lot of people, that's not quite realistic for everyone's schedule. But I would definitely say at least a half an hour to like put your work away, to do something calm that's not stimulating. And that could be, you know, a variety of things. You know, a lot of people are shocked to find that my evening routine is watching TV. They're like, what, you're a sleep coach. Doesn't that go against all things, sleep hygiene?

And actually in my situation, I find it very relaxing. And I know a lot of other people do too. But if you're gonna do something like that, like watch TV, there are some things that you can do to kind of mitigate any kind of negative byproducts. So you wanna make sure that you're watching content that is not stimulating, things that are kind of maybe funny or just like a documentary or the Great British Baking Show is always a good one, food shows and...

home shows, just like not a lot of depth to them. And you wanna make sure that you're watching your show or whatever on a real TV, you know, that's fairly far away from you so that the blue light is not as in your face. You know, you don't wanna have a laptop right on your lap looking down. And I think that wearing blue blocking glasses when you're looking at a TV is also a really good intervention. So there are ways to get around it.

Morgan Adams (11:21.847)
But essentially you want to find the routine that is personally relaxing to you. And what's relaxing to you might not be relaxing to me. So baths, for example, I know a lot of people find baths really relaxing, but I don't like baths. So I wouldn't choose that as a routine for my evening because I don't find them relaxing. So it's a very, very individualized type of scenario with evening routines.

Sue (11:50.942)
Oh, I love that. That's such great practical guidance. And now what about a morning routine? Because I know it seems people don't always get how those correlate, right? Even just starting your day off with some really like, you know, good exercises that you stick to ritualistic stuff can be helpful.

Morgan Adams (12:11.787)
Yes. Yeah, I'm a huge believer in morning routines. And, you know, a lot of people kind of scoff at the morning routine when I talk about it, because they think that if I'm talking about morning routines, that must mean I'm talking about you need to get up at 5am, which is so not the case. So whether or not you're an early bird, or a night owl, you're going to have a morning of some sort. And so whatever morning that is, you really

would be best served to have some kind of intentionality to your morning. So there's a really great quote by Louise Hay is how you start your day is how you live your day. And so I really feel that when you start your day with some kind of calming practice, some intentionality, you're setting the tone to sort of ward off that stress that could build up throughout the day and then into the night, which could affect your sleep. So really one thing that I definitely urge all my clients to do

really all of them have found it incredibly beneficial, is starting the morning with morning sunlight.

Sue (13:31.206)
Okay, I would just in a moment kind of take that one from the top, you know, with the morning routine.

Morgan Adams (13:43.535)
So morning routines, I think, are great for everybody. And it doesn't really matter if you're a morning person or a night owl. You don't have to be a 5 a.m. wake up person to have a morning routine. But essentially, the mornings are a way to bookmark your day. I think that really good sleep starts in the morning. And there's a great quote by Louise Hay, "'How you start your day is how you live your day.'" So booking in some kind of practice that involves intentionality and grounding I think is really essential.

Um, one of the other key practices, I think for a morning practice is having morning sunlight. And I, I'm a big proponent of this with all of my clients and pretty much all of them have found it to be super helpful. So what I mean by that is about, you know, within an hour of waking up, you want to make sure that you go outside.

and you get exposed to natural light for about 10 minutes. If it's a cloudy day, that still counts. You just might wanna stay out a little longer. The key is not to have your sunglasses on. I see a lot of people walking around my neighborhood in the morning, walking their dogs with me, and they're wearing sunglasses. Now the problem with the sunglasses is that it is blocking the natural light from hitting your retina. So the whole process is all about the natural light hitting your retina.

When that happens, it sends the signal to your suprachiasmatic nucleus, which is your circadian pacemaker. And from there, a bunch of really unique and interesting cascades of neurotransmitters and hormones happen. So for example, any residual melatonin from the night before gets shut off, your cortisol increases for more energy, your serotonin increases for mood boosting, and it also prepares your melatonin production for the following night.

So if you're using your sunglasses in the morning, you're losing out on all of those really awesome free benefits. So that is really like a key essential practice in the morning that I recommend that everybody do. Even if it's raining a little bit, maybe just get an umbrella and take a little bit of a shorter time outside.

Sue (15:53.806)
Oh, I love that. That is great practical guidance. Now, you know, let's talk about things that people should not be doing at night before bed. Like what are some of the things that we just should not be doing at all?

Morgan Adams (16:08.875)
Yeah. So one of the things that I would really discourage people from doing, and I don't think this has talked about enough, it's, um, stimulating conversations or provocative conversations. So what I mean by that is, you know, let's just say a married couple, for example, they've put the kids to bed and they start talking. And it's really their only time to have a convert, like an adult conversation.

and the conversation might center around finances or something that's like a triggering conversation. So I always recommend that you try to really intentionally redirect those kinds of conversations so that if it's something that's triggering that might get you upset, lead to a fight, really just table that for another time. And I don't think a lot of people talk about this. So that's one thing. Another thing is,

heavy involvement with electronics, right? So it's a precarious situation because electronics like screens are everywhere. I mean, our life is so centered around screens at times that it's hard to pull ourselves off them. But what I really recommend for people to do is focus on things that are more passive media, for example. So that would be like breath work apps, meditation apps.

that could be TV as long as we, you know, like I covered not too stimulating versus active media. So active media would be like social media, texting, games. So you just really kind of want to be intentional about the kind of media you consume because if you're consuming a lot of active media, you become activated yourself and energized and that activation makes it a lot harder to get to sleep. Right?

So we want to really consider that. We also want to consider the brightness of our screens and the whole thing about blue light, because that blue light is going to suppress our melatonin production. And when you have light eyes, your eyes are more sensitive to melatonin, to the blue light, rather. So you want to be extra careful about that blue light exposure. So a really easy way to mitigate this is to get some blue light.

Morgan Adams (18:31.779)
blue light blocking glasses that are in a sort of a dark tone. If you're really opposed to wearing a pair of glasses, you could also do a screen that's red. You can manipulate your iPhone screen or whatever to be red or grayscale so that it's less tempting to look at and it's not as bright. So there are some ways you can sort of change your technology so that the light is not as bright and blue.

So those are a couple of things. I would also caution people to be really attentive to what they consume as far as like alcohol. So I know that alcohol is like the biggest sleep aid we have. And a lot of people, like I know a lot of people honestly who have a couple glasses of wine at night so that they can fall asleep, they get drowsy. And it does work for that purpose, but the problem is, is that.

it hurts the quality of your sleep. So they've done studies showing that more than one glass of alcohol for a woman at night can reduce sleep quality by up to 39%. So that's a lot of sleep quality to be leaving on the table for just one drink. So your sleep gets quite disrupted the more you drink. We also wanna be mindful about when we have our last bite of food. So wrapping up dinner.

Sue (19:43.095)
I'm sorry.

Morgan Adams (19:54.955)
you know, around three hours before bed is always a good practice. Some people may need a small little bedtime snack, especially a lot of my clients will have blood sugar issues that wake them up at two or three AM. And sometimes those blood sugar issues can be mitigated by just a very small snack about an hour before bed, like maybe half a banana with a tablespoon of nut butter keeps them from having that blood sugar crash.

but you really want to save your, you really want to make sure that your dinners are not super heavy and rich.

Sue (20:33.339)
Wow, so many great and powerful insights there, Morgan. And, you know, I love, I want to talk to you about this a little more because you started with something. You said this is something that's not talked about enough. And it's so true. This idea of stimulating conversation, you know, where I think we sometimes are not having enough deep stimulating dialogue.

Morgan Adams (20:50.147)
Yes.

Sue (20:57.91)
But when we are, it kind of comes up at the most inopportune times or whenever, like you say, you get that few minutes at the end of the evening, the four bed, once the kids are put down, all of that. So talk to us a little bit more about that.

Morgan Adams (21:15.955)
Yeah, so I would say that, you know, as a person in a relationship, you probably know, like triggering conversations. So I would just try to avoid bringing those types of topics up. And if you, for example, like if you need to have sort of like a quote finance meeting with your partner, and you know, a lot of us need to do that from time to time, it could be triggering. So maybe having those conversations like on a week weekend, like during the day so that

if there's any kind of ruffling of feathers or any kind of hurt feelings, things can get smoothed over before bed, right? And I mean, you know, things happen in life that are just spontaneous. It's unrealistic to say that you can completely avoid having a run-in with somebody in the evening because things come up just in the spur of the moment. It doesn't have to be like a planned event. But there's a really good book called Sharing the Covers.

that I always recommend to people who are in relationships and have struggles with sleep because she goes really deep into how to really consider sleep in a partnership. So she's talking about snoring, how to deal with a snoring partner, how to deal with children in the middle of the night, like how to divide out those responsibilities and like how to actually manage those conversations. So like...

It's a true topic that I don't think is discussed enough. So I applaud her for going out and writing a book like that just delves right into that topic.

Sue (22:53.21)
Mm hmm. Oh, that sounds awesome. And I applaud you for just all of your knowledge and insights and some of the stuff we're touching on because it's so interesting. You know, when we're younger, it also you know, something that happens is sleep changes for us, right? Like for me, I went through a traumatic thing that caused my insomnia, but

I know people who were like deep sleepers when they were younger and as you get older and like you say menopause and perimenopause and all of that, your body starts changing and your sleep gets thrown off. And there's all of this stuff we have to start considering that we never considered when we were younger, right? Like drinking a bunch of alcohol before bed or having a big chocolate chip cookie and just all of these things that didn't impact us in the same way.

Morgan Adams (23:44.331)
Yes. And you know, another thing that I'll throw out there, a lot of people don't appreciate this enough is that when we get into our fifties, we actually have less melatonin production. And that is the hormone that is sort of our sleep regulator. And this is a lot of the reason why a lot of people, you know, 50 plus tend to struggle with their sleep. And so, you know, there's supplementation for that, fortunately, you know, I'm not a big

supplement pusher, but I feel like there's a time and a place and that potentially could be the time and the place to consider some kind of melatonin supplementation, you know, and it can it can happen to some people in their late 40s. There's not like a magic Age but you can you can get a test you can get a test that measures your melatonin production to see kind of How you're falling on the spectrum

Sue (24:35.266)
Right. And I know, again, I think it's just, it just this insight here how our bodies change and we don't get how our bodies change as we age and how that impacts different aspects of life. So I think that's so powerful for us to be kind of sharing that here. Now, let me ask you, what about some sleep myths? Like what is a sleep myth?

that you, we need to debunk here.

Morgan Adams (25:07.231)
Yeah, I would say the biggest sleep myth that I hear time and time again is everyone needs eight hours of sleep. You see this in a lot of content about, you know, you've got to get eight hours of sleep. It's really a myth. The National Sleep Foundation recommends seven to nine hours of sleep for adults 18 to 64. So I think the eight kind of is that number in the middle, that's just easy to throw out. And if you if you actually look deeper into the

the Sleep Foundation's recommendations, you will see in the fine print, it says anywhere from six to 10 hours could be appropriate for people. So that's quite a range there. So I think what everyone needs to really understand is that everyone has their own sleep need. So just as we all have our own shoe size, our own calorie need, what's good for you is not maybe the amount of hours that's good for me. Like seven and a half hours is like the ideal

amount of sleep that I like. And some people need eight and a half hours. I know a few people who are like six and a half hours, I'm fine with that. Now we really get into kind of murky area when you get under six, six and a half. There are not a lot of people out there who are

Sue (26:29.782)
Uh.

Morgan Adams (26:32.739)
There are not a lot of people out there who are biologically designed to function on under six hours of sleep. They're called short sleepers and they're sort of a genetic abnormality really. But we hear quite often people bragging about, oh, I only need five hours of sleep.

Morgan Adams (27:00.911)
Let's see.

Morgan Adams (27:08.663)
kind of got on a tangent actually. Sorry. I started going from eight hours to now we're talking about five hours.

Sue (27:10.89)
And now, now.

Sue (27:15.574)
Now that's fine. So you were saying short sleepers.

Morgan Adams (27:22.648)
Let me take a sip.

Morgan Adams (27:28.643)
So sometimes you'll hear people sort of bragging about only needing five hours of sleep. There are very, very few people in the world, like 1% that can actually get away with less than six hours of sleep. It's called being a short sleeper. And a lot of people just feel like they're adapting to it. They're getting used to it. But if you actually look at the way they're performing.

their performance goes down if you measure them on an objective way. So we really just wanna be mindful of like really understanding our own personal sleep need and then just doing what we can to honor that and to like prioritize it the best we can.

Sue (28:13.342)
Mm-hmm. And I think, you know, something, it's, it's one of those things where it's, it's not so much quantity, it's that quality versus quantity, right? Are you getting good, sound, solid sleep versus I was in bed for 10 hours, you know?

Morgan Adams (28:24.653)
Yes.

Morgan Adams (28:28.363)
Yes. Yeah, I would much rather see somebody get six and a half, six and a half hours of really high quality sleep than eight hours of broken sleep any day they're going to feel better. For sure.

Sue (28:43.79)
Right. And now, you know, if somebody is stuck and struggling or has just been struggling with sleep, what is your guidance to that person? Because obviously, you're helping people find, you know, solutions and alternatives to sleeping pills and you know, what just like the typical response from your doctor or like Western clinicians and things. There's this whole

the CBTI approach, right? Where we're taking, looking at it as a whole and saying, okay, these behaviors and these things and finding ways to have natural sleep. What is your guidance to that person who's stuck in struggling and doesn't know where to sleep?

Morgan Adams (29:14.413)
Yes.

Morgan Adams (29:27.627)
Yeah. I would say that if you are struggling with sleep for more than two or three months, definitely reach out for help because acute insomnia is technically defined as having trouble falling asleep, staying asleep or waking to waking up too early at least three nights a week for three months. So with that kind of acute insomnia, quite often it's caused by an event. And then that event sort of

dissipates and people resume normal sleep. Well, in some instances, the acute insomnia just continues and it rolls over into chronic insomnia, which is three months or more. So I really urge people to sort of get intervention to nip it in the bud before it gets chronic because the longer it goes on, the more deeply ingrained these habits get. And it can be quite difficult to make a turnaround. Now, I've worked with people who've had insomnia for 20 years.

and I've been able to help them with a really focused approach. So there's definitely hope no matter how long you've been struggling. But I would say my advice to people if they've been struggling for two or three months is to definitely reach out and get help, either a doctor, sleep coach, or just get some, just get an extra set of eyes on what's going on with your sleep, for sure.

Sue (30:47.802)
And I love that affirmation there Morgan, because I think so often we, when people are struggling, they start losing hope. They've tried all of these things. Many people that just never work and eventually people give up, but knowing that you have to keep searching, keep seeking, and there are solutions out there.

Morgan Adams (31:10.359)
Yes, yeah, I really believe exactly what you said that there's always hope for somebody who's having struggles sleeping. So often people will label themselves, like I'm an insomniac, and just that label gets perpetuated internally for them. And so I think that one of the key things that I help my clients do, and I really recommend that people...

really fully examine their mindset around sleeping problems. So instead of calling yourself an insomniac, maybe describe yourself as somebody who's having struggles with sleep and is working on them. So it's really about a shift in how you're labeling yourself quite often. People will often say, I'm a terrible sleeper. I'm a bad sleeper, but like reframing that into just what I said is like, I'm having some challenges that I'm working on and.

I'm confident that I can get my sleep back to baseline. It's a lot more of a positive message to yourself.

Sue (32:12.598)
Oh, I love that. Now, wow, this has all been so insightful, so much great wisdom, and so many wonderful takeaways for people. So a couple of things, first and foremost, I just want to thank you so much for your time today and all of your wisdom and practical guidance and things you've shared. It's been wonderful.

Morgan Adams (32:34.04)
My pleasure, I'm glad to be able to share it.

Sue (32:37.07)
Oh, I loved having you here and sharing all of that. I'm going to be sure to have your links for people to access and the free sleep course you have on your website. I think that would be a great place for people to start. So I will have links to all of that. And then in closing, you've already said so many wonderful things, but if there was just one message, your hope for everybody, what would that closing message be?

Morgan Adams (33:01.739)
Yeah, I would say really lean into some of the things that you can do for your sleep that are free and accessible. So the morning sunlight, working out, having a consistent wake time, doing all those foundational things before you jump into the biohacks and the supplements. So really start with the small, actionable, free things before you get fancy, I think would be my advice to somebody who's just getting started with their

Sleep journey.

Sue (33:35.019)
Oh, I love it. That is such a powerful closing message. You've been so wonderful, Morgan. Thank you so much. Thanks.

Morgan Adams (33:41.795)
Thank you, Sue.