Sleep Easy with Sleepy Tech: 6 Products to Help You Sleep Better

By on January 26, 2021

Ah sleep, a wonderful part of the biological process that helps our mind and body recover from the strain and stress of the day.  But, there are many, many people that suffer from a variety of sleeping issues, leaving them groggy and unable to fully recover from their active lives.  While of course there are those with problems so severe that they must seek professional help, for many of us it’s simple a problem with our quality of sleep.  We toss and turn, wake up to any noise, or simply lie awake in bed with a racing mind that won’t quiet down enough to drift into dream world.

For people like us, thankfully, there are simpler solutions than medication and sleep studies… and technology is always here to help!  Let’s look at seven products that’ll help you get the best sleep of your life.

Heated Mattress Pads

bed warmer

Have you ever gotten ready to crawl into bed on a cold winter’s night, prepared to be warm and toasty under the covers… only to met with icy sheets and chilly comforters?  While fleece and flannel sheets can mitigate this a bit, it still can be a huge problem, especially if you shift positions in your sleep and suddenly wake up to a code spot on your bed.

The best thing you can do for yourself during the colder months is to get you a heated mattress pad.  There are a bunch of spot heater pads that you could theoretically use in place of a whole heated mattress pad, but the electric ones warn against using them overnight and the rubber hot water holders have a chance of leaking.  Heated mattress pads, however, are made to be used overnight, and various models also have heat settings to adjust your bed to your perfect warmth.  I recommend trying Sunbeam’s Heated Mattress Pads, as they come in all bed sizes and are affordable to boot.

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White Noise Machines

white noise

For light sleepers, sometimes the biggest thing getting between you and a good night’s sleep is just a bit of noise.  If you have pets, roommates, noisy neighbors, or even a leak faucet, anything can turn a good night into a nightmare.  The best solution for that is a white noise machine.

White noise helps to drown out the invasive sounds of your environment, while not being invasive enough itself to interrupt your sleep.  HoMedic’s Sound Spa device allows for six different settings for sounds, with sounds ranging from thunder to the ocean to just white noise itself.  It also has an timer to turn it off if you wish, or you can run the machine all night.

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Sleep Headphones

sleep headphones

White noise machines can be great, but what if your sound problem is… closer?  A snoring partner, for example, or pets playing in the room in the middle of the night?  White noise machines cannot easily drown out noises like that if they’re happening mere inches from your ear, so another solution might be needed.  Ear plugs may seem like a suitable solution, but they can also drown out the alarm clock in the morning, and be very uncomfortable for those that sleep on their sides.

The best solution to this end is a pair of headphones designed for sleeping.  With something like these CozyPhones Sleep Headphones, you can plug it into your phone or white noise machine and play something to drown out all the nearby noises… and if you use your phone as an alarm clock and plug your headphones into it, there will be no missing the alarm in the morning.  Additionally, the headphones themselves are flat, making it easy to lay on for side sleepers, and most come inside of headbands to make it less likely for the headphones to slip off during the night.

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Sleep Tracker

jawbones

Sometimes you just know you’ve been sleeping poorly, but just can’t pinpoint on the why.  In that case, the best idea is to have your sleep patterns tracked… but professional sleep studies are expensive, and there are many viable solutions if your sleeping issues aren’t that severe.  There are a variety of apps for phones that can do this job, but if you happen to share your bed, the results can be a bit skewed as the app picks up on your partner’s or pet’s movements.

With that being the case, it’s better to get a more personal sleep tracker.  If you own a smartwatch or fitness tracker already, these often have sleep trackers of their own that do a good job at showing you your sleep patterns.  If not, though, there are still options available for advanced sleep trackers.

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Special Light Bulbs

light bulb

Maybe, your problem is just getting tired.  While technology has made massive leaps and bounds with the invention of electricity and allowing our homes to have light 24/7, that does have some unintended consequences.  The lights in our homes tend to mess with our bodies’ natural circadian cycle, and signals our brains to make more seratonin (which keeps us awake) and delay in making melatonin (which helps us sleep).

Of course, with the hustle and bustle of the everyday world, we can’t really shut everything off as the sun goes down and simply wait for the morning before doing it all again.  But, there are ways to mitigate the effects of nighttime activity, and one of these is to get special light bulbs that block the typical light wavelengths that mess with our minds.  These Good Night lightbulbs are a perfect fit in a bedroom, allowing you to see while you wind down from the day, while promoting your body’s sleepy chemicals as you go about your nighttime routine.

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Computer Reader Glasses

glasses

Then again, light bulbs really won’t help much if you’re still staring at computer or phone screens in your newly outfitted rooms.  These screens are often even worse than the light throughout the house, as your eyes are getting constant full doses of the blue light that keeps us awake throughout the day, making it harder to finally get to sleep.  There is a reason doctors say to not use your phones for an hour before bed, and it’s not from the rush that social media check ins give you!

The best solution?  Well, it’s not technically a piece of technology, but it helps you use technology without interrupting your sleep patterns, so good enough, right?  These computer reader glasses might seem a little silly to wear to the uninitiated, but they block out the blue light that promotes seratonin productions, allowing you to enjoy your electronics throughout the evening.

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With these, hopefully you start getting a better night’s sleep, and are ready for a new day ahead!  Do you have any suggestions, tips, or anything else you recommend for a good night’s sleep?  Let us know in the comments!

About Elizabeth Henges

I'm actually an accountant, but I like being a multifaceted nerd. I enjoy writing about nearly anything, but I'm partial to video games, cats, and trying to find neat little doodads.

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