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Have you ever wondered why the human body needs a sufficient amount of sleep every day? Besides feeling well-rested and energized for the day ahead, you rely on sleep for keeping your body in a healthy state and providing it with the rest it needs to keep you functioning and your immunity high.
Another component of the sleep / immune system connection is your mattress. It’s no secret that an uncomfortable mattress can disrupt the quality of your sleep, which could have immune repercussions, but did you know the mattress itself could also influence your immune system?
Most mattresses are manufactured using harmful chemicals that have the potential to harm your health and damage your immune system. Some of the common chemicals you can expect to find include:
Synthetic Latex – This material is made from the volatile organic compounds (VOC) styrene and butadiene. Additional chemicals may be used in processing.
Foam – Many foam mattresses are petroleum-based and break down over time, which off-gases VOCs into the air you breathe.
Fire Retardants – Chemical flame retardants are created so they don’t completely bind to materials and will be released into your bedroom over time.
Vinyl – When vinyl is produced, chemicals are used throughout every step of the process and will leach out into the air over time.
The comfort level is another important aspect of your mattress that could be affecting your immune system. According to the National Sleep Foundation, cytokines, a type of protein in your body that targets infection and inflammation, is created while your body is at rest. Cytokines, in addition to being created during sleep, are also released during sleep, giving your body’s immune system the fighting power it needs.
With that in mind, it’s not hard to explain that chronic sleep loss can have detrimental short-term (like catching a cold or flu) and long-term effects. Without enough sleep, your body won’t have the opportunity it needs to produce the number of cytokines required to effectively fight off viruses and other illnesses. In fact, in addition to heightening your chances of getting the common cold or influenza, chronic sleep loss has been shown to even increase your risk of chronic illnesses such as heart disease, diabetes, and obesity, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Looking to biohack your way to better productivity, health and wellbeing? Sleep is the first place you should start. An article in Clinical Education outlines just how impactful sleep is to every aspect of your life:
These are all very important elements of our lives – from mental to physical capabilities. Even moderate sleep deprivation has drastic negative effects on all of the factors listed above. This is why having a mattress that allows you to sleep peacefully for the entire night is so important.
Not every mattress is the same – even when it comes to purchasing a luxury mattress, there are many factors to consider when looking for a sleep system that will support high-quality sleep. The Samina Sleep System is an all-natural luxury mattress that was designed with the highest quality natural materials that improve comfort and wellbeing.
Samina’s luxury mattress and sleep system stands apart from the standard mattress; instead, the Samina Sleep System provides spinal support for every moment that you are asleep. In the end, spinal support and orthopedic design promote higher quality sleep and therefore a higher quality of life!
Switching your mattress can have a profound effect on your immune system and your overall health. When you eliminate the harmful chemicals that you’ve been breathing in night after night and surround yourself in nurturing, natural materials instead, you’ll allow your immune system to function just as it intended.
Support your body’s natural detox and immunity functions by investing in the proper sleep solution. Learn more about how the Samina Sleeping System can elevate your health by requesting more information here!
Having a child can be a beautiful thing, but of course, there are some changes to your daily habits and health that can drastically change with the introduction of a newborn into your world. But did you know that it is highly common for mothers (and fathers, to a lesser extent) to feel sleep-deprived well into a child’s life?
If you’re the proud mother of a five or six-year-old, you may still be experiencing the effects of sleep deprivation. According to a study published in the Sleep Journal by the Sleep Research Society, both men and women experienced a below-average level of satisfaction with their sleep quality and length.
In both women and men, sleep satisfaction and duration did not fully recover for up to 6 years after the birth of their first child.
Besides reducing cognitive ability, sleep deprivation takes the shape of changes in mental health in many mothers. Today’s Parent’s article on sleep and mental health lists mental health repercussions from a lack of sleep, specifically around anxiety and depression.
The mental health conditions can be exacerbated or brought on by the lack of sleep and subsequent mood swings that occur as a result of sleep deprivation. Low moods can occur after one night of lacklustre sleep, but add four more years onto that and it’s safe to say that many parents’ moods, from frustration to impatience to anger, can be attributed to chronic sleep issues.
So sleep affects a mother’s mental health – what can be done about it?
Sleep can be confusing to manage, with so many tips and tricks to test out. While a bedtime routine and even your day leading up to sleep are important factors to focus on, starting with a luxury mattress that will support you both mentally and physically can help you make the most of every minute asleep.
After years working on sleep health and psychology, our top recommendations for improving your sleep as a parent include:
This means that you have to plan your sleep ahead of time and draw boundaries around your sleep schedule as much as possible. This might feel fairly easy for you, but for many, this may include developing a shift schedule with you and your partner to protect the quality of your sleep as much as possible.
You may not feel like you have enough time to have your own bedtime routine, but it’s important to introduce consistency to alert your body that it is time to sleep – therefore making every minute in bed count. This can simply mean having the same tea every night half an hour before bed, lighting a candle with a specific scent or staying screen-free for an hour before bed.
Many factors can affect your quality of sleep, including your sleep comfort. A luxury mattress that is created with careful attention to materials and requirements, will be able to physically and mentally support you and your quality of sleep.
SAMINA has created a sleep system that includes luxury mattress bedding made from 60% organic cotton and 40% Bio-Ceramic® yarn. Bio-Ceramic® yarn delivers healthy infrared radiation and negative ions, both of which encourage healthy sleep patterns for users. These benefits help your body’s microcirculation, energy restoration, more drowsiness to promote the initial transition to sleep and optimal ambient heat and moisture.
Further, the construction of the bedding carefully considers physical support and how stress on the body can be reduced for a more restful and relaxed sleep.
Dr. Liborio Parrino, Chair of the World Sleep Day Committee, stated in the World Sleep Day Toolkit:
“Extending our sleep period also improves our mental and body performances during the day and, last but not least, enhances our dreaming experience, as REM stages are mostly concentrated in the final portion of sleep, which is often curtailed by the urging rules of modern life.”
Make sleep your priority. SAMINA sleep systems, including their luxury eco-friendly mattress, all of which are constructed to deliver comfortable sleep with the added health benefits of non-toxic mattress materials. Parents, we know you are tired. Let us help you restore your healthy sleep patterns and make the most of your time both awake and asleep. Contact us and request more information about SAMINA sleep systems here.
If there’s one thing modern technology has given us, it’s a window into the world. Unfortunately, this window has shown us that the world is in trouble and it’s up to us to start taking the steps necessary to save it. Sleeping on an eco-friendly mattress is one way to limit your carbon footprint on the planet and improve your sleep simultaneously.
SAMINA is a strong believer in living green, which is one reason we introduced our green mattress to the sleep industry. We like to say, “we’re saving the planet one bed at a time.” At first glance, you might assume we’re referring to the amazing sleep our customers receive on a brand new SAMINA luxury mattress, but we’re being far more literal. Here’s what you should know about our certified green mattresses and how they’re helping make a difference to the planet.
Eco-friendly refers to products that aren’t harmful to the environment, like our non-toxic mattresses. It can also include products that help the environment in some way. At SAMINA, we’re a proud supporter of the environment. So, when we began designing mattresses, bed frames, and sleep accessories, we took the time to think about how our products would affect the world around us. This is how we developed our bio-ceramic bedding and SAMINA Healthy Sleep System.
The SAMINA Bio-Ceramic Bedding uses a mix of 40% bio-ceramic yarn (biodegradable material) and 60% organic cotton. This comfortable natural fabric is then folded around virgin sheep’s wool for a cushiony, insulated mattress topper like no other. This is biohacking in a whole new way.
The sheep’s wool used in all SAMINA products is removed carefully and without harming any creatures tall or small. Combining the wool with the bio-ceramic fibers produces a moisture-wicking, temperature controlling material perfect for hot or cold climates. We also love the detoxification qualities of the fabric, which allows sleepers to fully relax and eliminate mental and physical stress during sleep.
The SAMINA Healthy Sleep System provides a variety of eco-conscious components for the healthiest sleep you’ll ever experience. These include:
This system uses materials that benefit the environment, harnessing the earth’s best qualities and leaving behind fabric that can be recycled, reused, or biodegrade when no longer in use.
Using eco-friendly materials in bedding does more than just help the environment when those fabrics are no longer usable. They also provide a non-toxic, chemical free comfort that reduces allergies, illness, and pollution. Here are some of the most common reasons our customers make the switch to SAMINA:
Choosing an eco-friendly mattress guarantees the bedding you choose is natural and safe for your family, children and pets.
Sourcing renewable materials from the environment creates a sustainable product and provides financial support to local and international craftsman.
Natural materials are durable. There’s a reason sheep’s wool sweaters and blankets are passed down for generations. If well cared for, they are practically indestructible.
Some of the natural materials we use, like the SAMINA rubber mattress, are easier to wash than traditional mattresses. They repel moisture and host antibacterial properties fighting off mold and mildew that live inside cloth mattresses.
Choosing to go eco-friendly shouldn’t be a tough choice and at SAMINA, we like to think we make it a little easier by providing a product that sells itself. Our mattresses and sleep products aren’t just safe for the environment, they also provide a thorough and comfortable sleep you can count on.
For more information on SAMINA and our eco-friendly approach to sleep, we invite you to try our products firsthand. It’s best when you can schedule an appointment to view our products and experience the SAMINA difference, but you may also order directly from us over the phone. A SAMINA Sleep Concierge will verify each order to ensure you and your sleeping partner, when applicable, have the right system for your respective physical needs and specific sleep concerns.
Our healthy sleep concierge service is available Monday – Saturday, 9am – 6pm PST. Our aim is to reply to you within 24 hours.
As a naturopathic doctor that focuses his practice on environmental medicine and healthy clean living,
I came across a very interesting phenomenon in practice. I have seen that there’s a very small number
of patients in my practice that seem to be extremely sensitive to the materials that their mattresses and
pillows are made of. Even though this is a small number of patients (perhaps less than 10% of my
patients), it’s still very significant as these patients have been experiencing a collection of “strange and
undiagnosed” symptoms that ended up being caused by their everyday exposure to their mattresses.
Over many years, they have seen multiple doctors, running lots of tests, and even done MRIs, in their
attempt to find out what is causing their symptoms that do not seem to be improving with attempted
treatment over the last few months or years.
The collection of symptoms that my patients report, which I believe to be related to their exposure to
VOCs from their mattresses or pillows are fatigue, balance issues/dizziness (especially in the
morning), brain fog or poor concentration, headache in the morning, and along with the more rare
symptom of numbness and tingling either in their hands, feet, or face. The reason that I feel these are
coming from their mattress and pillow is that 1) their symptoms started shortly after they purchased them. 2) Their symptoms match those of low chronic ongoing exposure to solvent/VOCs/off-gassing.
3) Their symptoms improved once they tried sleeping on a mattress that does not off-gas petroleum-based solvents VOCs. These symptoms and the improvements have been seen specifically with
regards to some memory foam-based mattresses and pillows and their subsequent removal.
One question I get asked often is “Why does my partner have no symptoms while sleeping on the
same mattress that I appear to be reactive to?”
Without going into a lot of detail here, the simplest answer is that we are individuals and have very
different genetics and different total body burdens of toxicants and toxins. Everyone responds
differently to chemicals – from chemical cleaners to pharmaceuticals, to alcohol. Depending on how
well we can clear a specific category of toxicants/toxins (due to your individual genetic profile – for
example our glutathione-s-transferase detoxification profile and our methylation profile), and how high
of a total body burden we’ve acquired based on our hobbies, diets, jobs, and lifestyle, we will all
respond very differently to chemicals. Thus, the same exact exposure to a chemical compound will
cause one person to experience no symptoms, while in another person it may manifest with very
significant and life-altering symptoms.
Seeing the improvement in my patients’ health has inspired me to purchase an organic, clean, and
non-off gassing mattress for myself, specifically one made from natural rubber, latex foam. I have been
sleeping on one for years now, enjoying a cleaner sleeping experience and sleeping better overall.
It wasn’t until recently that I have had a chance to upgrade my bed to a Samina mattress & bed frame.
I decided to invest in my health a bit more, especially considering all the research showing how
important good quality sleep is for prevention of diseases such as cardiovascular disease and
dementia/cognitive function.
When the crew from Samina came to my condo to install the bed, I was very pleasantly surprised by
the quality of the inclined bedframe and how It fits together so simply and without the use of any metal,
using a lock and key latch design. Also, with how easy it was to change from a 3 degrees incline to 5
or 7-degree incline if I ever decided to increase the incline (I started and stayed with 3 degrees for
now). It was obvious that a lot of care was taken in designing not only the bedframe but in every layer of the mattress, from the wooden panels for back support, organic latex foam, to the merino wool
layer.
To keep things short and simple, I was happy with the improvement that I experience in my sleep from
this upgrade to the Samina bed from my previous organic latex mattress. Both are great options for
improving the quality of my sleep and reducing my risk of developing any symptoms/future health
concerns and I can comfortably recommend anyone who is interested in optimizing their health to
look into upgrading to a Samina bed if they have the option to.
Dr. Aviad Elgez, ND
Vitamin D & Your Sleep: What’s the Connection?
by Eliana Raver
With all the summer warnings on avoiding harmful UV rays, it’s easy to forget that a little sun can be a good thing. Exposure to sunlight provides up to 90% of our Vitamin D[i]; an irreplaceable, life-sustaining vitamin that has a profound effect on all facets of our health.
We all know Vitamin D is essential, but we’ve only started discovering its far-reaching effect on all body systems. The relationship between Vitamin D and sleep is a relatively new area of research. Its connection to a healthy sleep cycles has yet to be fully understood, but the results we have so far are startling. According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information
“…several large sample epidemiology studies found that dietary intake of vitamin D was related to midpoint of sleep, sleep duration, and maintaining sleep.”
In addition, their statistics showed that as Vitamin D levels rose, people’s risk for sleep disorders dropped significantly. That itself is an overwhelming discovery, but Vitamin D does more than simply lower the risk. It has been shown to work synergistically with the immune system to fight against harmful inflammation, improving symptoms in several cases of sleep apnea[ii]. Hence tapping people into healthy sleep cycles.
Beyond that, Medical News Today shared that taking Vitamin D to support sleep has further secondary effects. Research shows that a healthy sleep cycle and Vitamin D levels together may help reduce chronic pain:
“Following a review of published research on the relationship between vitamin D, sleep, and pain, researchers propose that vitamin D supplementation, together with good sleep hygiene, may offer an effective way to manage pain in conditions such as arthritis, chronic back pain, fibromyalgia, and menstrual cramps.”
These findings correlate to an American study of veterans suffering chronic pain that assessed their reaction to high doses of Vitamin D. The researchers found that higher levels led to better sleep and reduced pain-without any side effects. Considering the valuable role Vitamin D plays in fighting inflammation, these results make perfect sense.
We may not fully understand all the ways Vitamin D protects and supports our bodies, but what we do know for sure is that it is an amazing help to promote both healing within the body and restful and pain free sleep cycles. In fact, Dr. Mercola considers Vitamin D the most effective cancer prevention vitamin.
So, are you ready to go outside now? All the benefits Vitamin D provides are a wonderful reason to soak up the sunshine this summer. Enjoy your summertime, reduce inflammation in the body and sleep well, too!
While you apply natural, non-toxic sunscreen at the beach or pool this summer, you might want to consider that what you sleep on is just as important as what you put on your skin. The average mattress is a hotbed of harmful petrochemicals, and achieving healthy sleep is actually something that will support your wellness 24 hours a day. Read more about petrochemicals here, and we invite you to explore SAMINA’s organic, master-crafted sleep systems today.
[i] “Sleep, Sunshine, and Vitamin D.” The Royal Women’s Hospital, www.thewomens.org.au/health-information/periods/healthy-periods/sleep-sunshine-vitamin-d. Accessed July 16, 2019.
[ii] “The role of vitamin D in obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome”, Breathe, ERS Publications, (Kostas Archontogeorgis, Evangelia Nena, Nikolaos Papanas, Paschalis Steiropoulos) breathe.ersjournals.com/content/14/3/206. Accessed July 16, 2019.