Sleep and Stress Can Affect Your Immunity Protection

Remember when your mom used to say that staying out too late would cause you to get sick? Mom was right! Experts say that not only does prolonged sleep deprivation wear down your immunity protection but getting adequate rest can help boost your immune defenses. Make sure you get enough sleep and go to bed at a reasonable hour. During cold and flu season give your immune defenses an extra boost by getting 7 to 8 hours of sleep a night.

Since your body regenerates, repairs, and renews itself while sleeping, it is important to include "quiet time" as part of your day when you can unwind and learn the value of being calm. Try and listen to peaceful music at some point during your day. Take this time to relax and be happy even if it is for only 20-30 minutes a day. This will aid in your immunity protection.

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Even though we don't know the exact mechanism by which sleep impacts immunity, we do know that a lack of it prevents the body from repairing cells. And when we skip that important physiological step, we reduce our immune defenses and get sick more easily.

What Affects Immunity protection?
Much like soldiers who grow weary in battle, your immune cells can also lose some of their protective effects when your body is constantly battling poor health habits. As such, it's not surprising that doctors frequently recommend certain lifestyle changes as a way to optimize the function of your immune defenses. The most important thing you can do for your immunity protection is to achieve lifestyle balance and adopt the fundamentals of healthy living. This will give your immune system what it needs to function at optimal capacity.

Immune System Support

Reducing stress is at the top of that balancing system. There is overwhelming evidence that stress and the substances secreted by the body during stress negatively impacts your immunity protection. The good news is that lowering your stress can help your body maintain both your physical and your emotional health. People who have less stress are simply healthier overall.

In addition to what you eat, certain lifestyle changes can boost your immune defenses, including:  Washing your hands thoroughly and often with soap and warm water, particularly before eating and after using the bathroom. This reduces the number of organisms that can enter your body. Cooking meat thoroughly to kill dangerous bacteria and other microorganisms can help with immunity protection.

Getting at least 8 hours of sleep every day stimulates and energizes the immune system. Make sure to maintain a healthy weight since obesity can lead to weakened immunity protection. Exercise at least 30 minutes most days of the week. Physical activity stimulates the immune defenses and helps with weight maintenance or reduction.

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Support Your Immune System

Consume alcohol moderately. Drinking too much alcohol can dramatically decrease your immunity protection. People who regularly drink small amounts of alcohol tend to live longer than people who don't drink at all. Alcohol helps prevent coronary heart disease in people who are at a stage of life when coronary heart disease is a risk. For men this is over the age of 40 and for women it's after menopause. The health benefits come from regularly drinking small amounts. The maximum benefit is achieved by drinking between one and two units of alcohol a day.

Eat less sugar. One-hundred grams of sugar, the amount in one 12-ounce can of regular soda, can reduce the ability of your immune defenses to kill germs by 40 percent for up to 5 hours!

Give up smoking. it is the biggest single risk to your health after inactivity. Smokers have shorter lives due to lung cancer, cancer of the bladder, mouth and other organ ailments, heart disease, bronchitis, asthma, and other conditions. And it's not just lungs and hearts that are at risk, smoking will also slow down your rate of healing and weaken your immunity protection. That's bad news if you need an operation or injure yourself.

Be positive. This gives us a better view of life, and boosts our immune defenses as well. Every day, spend 20 minutes focused on a really uplifting thought or memory. You will feel better and your immunity protection will get a boost.

All of these are possible kinds of behaviors you can change or focus on to boost your immunity protection. Of course, there are things out of our control, such as genes and family histories, but if you include healthier patterns into your daily living, this increases the likelihood for better health.

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