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Welcome to The Modern Midlife Collective—where midlife isn’t a crisis, it’s a rebirth. Hosted by Dr. Ade Akindipe, DNP, and Dr. Jillian Woodruff, MD, this is the podcast for women ready to unapologetically own their power, thrive through the ups and downs of hormones, weight, and self-care, and show the world that thriving at 40 and beyond isn’t just possible—it’s your birthright.
Biweekly, we bring you science-backed insights on hormones, menopause, longevity, and sexual health—real tools to empower women in midlife and beyond. With a fearless blend of functional medicine, real-life wisdom, and no-nonsense empowerment, we’re here to challenge the norms, break through the barriers, and help you step into a life of vitality, confidence, and unstoppable strength.
Ready to rise? Let’s do this.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (00:00)
Okay, so if you've ever woken up at 3 a.m. staring at the ceiling, doing math that you did not sign up for, then this episode is for you.
Jillian Woodruff MD (00:08)
that midlife witching hour. You're wide awake, your mind is racing, hormones are parting, I guess, and the next morning you feel like you've been hit by a truck made of brain fog.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (00:20)
Well, today we are breaking down why sleep gets so messy in midlife and what's actually happening in your body when your eyes pop out before dawn.
Jillian Woodruff MD (00:29)
Yes, it's not just insomnia. It's a biological traffic jam between stress and hormones and your nervous system. So let's name it that. That two to four AM window is classic. Cortisol starts to rise, blood sugar dips, and if your estrogen's dropping, then your temperature regulation goes haywire.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (00:34)
Thank
⁓ boy, let's talk.
And add hot flashes and night sweats on top of that and your brain gets the message, wake up, it's time to get up, even though you're tired, you're in bed. So it's kind of like this internal alarm system that kind of makes you feel like you need to get up and unfortunately many women suffer through that.
Jillian Woodruff MD (01:10)
Yes, and then you start thinking about everything. You're thinking about your to-do list. Did I pack the kids homework? Did they finish their homework before I packed it away? Did I make a lunch? Who do you need to pay back? Who do you owe? What emails did you send? Should you have sent? Your brain will not shut off. So either this happens before you even go to sleep and why you can't get to sleep or you wake up with these thoughts.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (01:34)
Right. And now that cortisol is spiking higher, like we've talked about in other episodes, your melatonin, that one supposed to help you with sleep, decreases and your body says, hey, I guess we're up. So we're just going to have to just be up. And the next morning you're kind of, you know, trying to get out of that fog because you're still very tired. But unfortunately, this is the whole cycle. And unfortunately, women are grabbing for caffeine, trying to get their body in motion to kind of power through the day.
Jillian Woodruff MD (02:02)
Yeah, so does this sound familiar? If it does, you are not crazy. You are being hormonally hijacked.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (02:09)
That just sounds bad. But hey, that's why we're here. We're here to help you connect these dots, okay? We've talked a lot about estrogen and how much this regulates a lot of things in your body. It helps regulate serotonin. Serotonin's a really powerful neurotransmitter and helps with body temperature. So progesterone is your natural, we call it chill pill. It helps calm. It boosts GABA, which is a calming neurotransmitter that slows down brain activity.
It's supposed to make you feel like you can power down, shut everything off and go to sleep. But when these levels fall, especially after ovulation, that starts to get kind of unpredictable. So your brain is still saying a little bit more, he wants to sleep, but the stress response kind of kicks in. And it's kind of like these competing things that are happening. So we're going to expand more about what you can do about this during this time.
Jillian Woodruff MD (03:03)
Exactly. And estrogen, the other hormone, helps maintain healthy levels of serotonin. And serotonin is one of the key mood and sleep stabilizers. So when your estrogen drops, your serotonin can dip too, and that can make you more prone to mood swings and anxiety and restless sleep. And when estrogen levels fluctuate and they're going up and down during three-minute pause, you get those sudden temperature swings.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (03:09)
Mm. Mm.
Jillian Woodruff MD (03:31)
at the infamous hot flashes and night sweats. And these don't eal awake at two or three in the morning.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (03:38)
Imagine just losing your estrogen and progesterone at the same time. You lose the brain's two main chill systems, your mood regulation, your temperature. So, you know, and then let's not forget about insulin too. You know, this puts you more prone to insulin resistance. So if your blood sugar is crashing overnight, cortisol steps in to kind of raise things up, right? And then you're awake again. So, you know, if you've had that glass of wine, for example, or a bowl of popcorn before you go to bed,
Just think about how that can also make things even worse. So we need to think about how we can reset our system with those hormone imbalances, either with hormone replacement therapy or lifestyle so that we can kind of help our changing chemistry as we get older.
Jillian Woodruff MD (04:20)
Right. So here's what's going on behind the scenes with insulin and weight. feel like each episode we have to kind of touch on the weight because it's such a issue that the majority of people may notice first and really, you know, be concerned with. So either they've had issues all of their life with weight and they're getting worse or they're having new issues when they've never had a problem with weight before. So
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (04:30)
Yeah.
Jillian Woodruff MD (04:45)
Your body needs energy. Even at night, when you're sleeping, your body needs a considerable amount of energy to do the processes of restoration and healing and recovering. So normally your blood sugar stays stable because insulin and cortisol are in a synchronized dance. Insulin stores energy, cortisol calls for its release when you need a little boost. So during midlife as estrogen levels
fall, your cells become a more resistant to insulin. So insulin is like knocking at the door like, hi, I'm here and I've got my friend glucose, can we come in? And the owner of the house is like, I do not know you. So you can't come in, just stay out there. And so then insulin and glucose party in your bloodstream. And then it's like, we have too much glucose and I'm going to just store you as fat, right? So your body is storing that as fat, you may not even have a ton of glucose, but it's not.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (05:15)
you insulin. So insulin is like a pop.
and stay out.
Jillian Woodruff MD (05:41)
be utilized in the way that it needs to. So if you have a high carb meal before bed or you have alcohol before bed, this is going to spike your blood sugar overnight and then your blood sugar is going to crash a few hours later and your brain is going to sense this low fuel and in response your adrenal glands will release cortisol, sometimes even adrenaline, and it's because it's trying to push glucose into your bloodstream because it's thinking
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (05:56)
That's
Jillian Woodruff MD (06:09)
Certainly, you'll let me in now, you mute me, but that doesn't happen. So this sudden cortisol surge makes your heart race, your mind starts spinning, you wake up just like that, 3 a.m. you're awake, wondering why.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (06:23)
And that's why midlife brain fog really hits hard. So you're not just tired, you're missing that time of the, you know, the nighttime when things are supposed to shuffle and get into place and everything that you did the day before is supposed to kind of move out of your brain essentially. And just so you can start to, you know, reboot, you know,
grow new cells, regenerate so that you can feel better in the morning. So that second half of your sleep where what we call the rapid eye movement, the REM, is super important. And it's that stage that unfortunately a lot of women kind of miss that. You cut that process so short that a lot of times you wake up with even worse brain fog. So women will say, I've just lost my edge. Especially if you worked in a place where you constantly need to be alert, you can imagine how it can be very frustrating.
to function properly in the kind of role that you're in. So that's why it's important for this time of your life to protect your sleep. Like your life depends on it, because it kind of does. It's not just about rest. It's about protecting your ability to think. And I know if I'm not sleeping well, I don't do well the next day. It's very difficult for me if I pass that particular time. So there's that routine that I like to do before.
Jillian Woodruff MD (07:23)
Yes, it does.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (07:39)
⁓ I actually hit the bed, not getting to bed and then trying to get to bed. Anyway, I digress. Sleep is important.
Jillian Woodruff MD (07:44)
No, that's so important,
absolutely. And we should talk about quantity and quality. Most adults need about seven to nine hours of sleep. I'm on the nine hour side. I know that's what I feel the best is if I sleep something nine hours at least. But during perimenopause and many menopause, many women average less than this, sometimes five or six, even less, which is not enough for the brain to, and the body, it's not enough for the body or the brain.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (07:59)
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Jillian Woodruff MD (08:13)
to reset, to recover, to regenerate. And what I think matters even more than the amount of sleep is your quality of sleep and cycling through those sleep stages. And we go through about five sleep cycles a night and each cycle lasts about 90 minutes. And the first half of the night leans heavier on your deep restorative slow wave sleep. And that's when growth hormones release, that's when your tissues repair.
That's when you are getting rid of your toxins. So your brain cells, your neurons get rid of toxic waste. And some of that is amyloid, amyloid plaques, which is what you find in Alzheimer's. You find a buildup of amyloid, which is not good. During deep restorative sleep, you're getting rid of that. So if you're not having deep restorative sleep, that's going to affect your brain health, right?
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (08:52)
Mm.
That's not good.
Jillian Woodruff MD (09:06)
And so when you're finding
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (09:07)
Absolutely.
Jillian Woodruff MD (09:08)
this buildup, so one thing we can do to help with decreasing our risk of dementia is sleeping, but having the quality that we need. The second half of our cycle is that REM sleep that you've already discussed.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (09:21)
Absolutely. And that's the reason why, and this is probably a segue into what we're going to talk about next is the weight gain. If you're not getting all that quality sleep, remember that hormone cortisol we talked about is your body trying to protect you. Stress hormone goes up. That just means more weight gain, which is another huge issue for perimenopausal women. So poor sleep.
Equals waking. So one of the things I talk about with women is, know, how are you sleeping? How many hours are you sleeping? Are you actually getting quality sleep? Like you mentioned, are you tossing and turning? Do you wake up feeling rested? Do you feel like you need to power through your day with the first cup of coffee? If that's how you're getting through the day, then there's probably some kind of dysregulation in your sleep cycle. So when you're sleep deprived, your metabolism,
gets kind of cranky too. like, well, I just don't have the, I don't have all the tools for me to crank up this metabolism so that I can lose weight. It's not going to focus on weight, weight loss, right? It's going to focus on trying to, you know, boost your energy or some other things that it prioritizes instead of weight loss, if that makes sense.
Jillian Woodruff MD (10:28)
Well, this is why like in a short visit in our office, there is not enough time to go into all of these things. You know, a woman may come to see me because she knows that she wants menopausal hormones and I'm like, great. I'm glad that you, I don't have to talk you into that part if you're ready for that. But there are so, that doesn't fix everything. You know, the things that you do, I'm really passionate about lifestyle medicine and sleep is one of those tenants of a
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (10:47)
Mm-hmm.
Jillian Woodruff MD (10:56)
of lifestyle medicine, there's no way around it. You have to have this for so many functions, everything, for everything, and to feel the way that we want to feel. And it's not that easy to fix. So we're giving you as many takeaways as we can today, but imagine you're coming and you're having symptoms of perimenopause or menopause. It's not just hormones, it's not just sleep, it's not just nutrition, it's not just sex, it's everything, you know?
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (11:03)
Many.
Jillian Woodruff MD (11:25)
And so it's so hard to have that time to go through all these things and it's very frustrating for patients, for women and for doctors, providers to be able to get into this. And so I've been seeing more and more things popping up where there are people who only focus on sleep and I'm like, yes, go do it. And like coaches, right? And they're like, and sleep doctors and things that focus specifically on.
your sleep because we kno and you brought up w get a chance to tell peop and leptin and you know wha many people have he don't, but these are thin like relin tells you that y leptin tells you you're f a about obesity and a family history of ob
ghrelin than others or less leptin, they're unable to tell that they're full. And when you don't sleep enough, that really disrupts these two proteins. you may eat and you continue to eat because your body doesn't have enough leptin to tell you it's full and that you don't need to eat anymore. Or you sleep when you don't have enough sleep, you have more ghrelin.
This protein is telling you, you're hungry, you need to eat. I'm craving carbs, I'm craving sugar. And so you may be eating more or not eating even the appropriate things, maybe eating more carbs because, not because you're weak, but your hormones are literally asking you to give them more fuel. They're tricking you, you know, and sleep can counteract that. Sleep can decrease
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (13:08)
Yes.
Jillian Woodruff MD (13:10)
the hunger hormone and increase the satiety and full hormone.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (13:15)
And that's why I tell my patients all the time that weight loss can just be a byproduct of a good lifestyle when you make lifestyle changes, right? So imagine if you are grabbing that mid morning pastry because you need energy, you didn't sleep or you're grabbing some caffeine. So, you know, a woman is thinking, I just don't have the willpower, but it may not just be willpower. It's your body craving what it.
things it needs, right? Or you're just trying to do what you can so that you can power through the day. But if you fix the root cause, which is your sleep, then everything starts to kind of align and then you're not reaching for all of those things just for quick energy. Like, you you're grabbing that pastry in the morning that's going to quickly spike your blood sugars up, but then you end up crashing and then you're looking for the next thing that's going to improve your, increase your energy.
So you're chasing energy because your body never got the reset it needed in the first eight, which is last night's sleep. So fix the sleep and then your sugar cravings start to quiet down. You know, it's not magic, right? It just makes sense, it? Metabolic health, you know, if you don't, if that cycle doesn't, if you've been doing this when you were 20 and when you're 30 and now you're in your 40s and 50s and beyond, eventually it starts to catch up. It's years of doing the same things and then you now have the hormonal changes.
And unfortunately, insulin starts to go up and insulin starts to go up. Then you start to have things like blood sugar goes up, pre-diabetes, diabetes, and so on. So yes, fix the sleep. And then we can start to work on weight loss and start to reduce belly fat and things like that and improving your energy that you feel better the next day.
Jillian Woodruff MD (14:50)
Now we cannot blame all of our sleep problems on menopause. There are often other culprits that are maybe overlooked. So some other like common sleep disruptors are one, obstructive sleep apnea. And this happens when your airways partially or even completely collapse during your sleep. So you're snoring. People who are snoring or even stop breathing while they're sleeping and like gasp for breath. These are symptoms of
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (14:55)
often other culprit that are maybe...
Jillian Woodruff MD (15:18)
obstructive sleep apnea. So each of these like episodes where you're not getting enough oxygen jolts your body out of sleep, out of your deep sleep and then floods your body with these stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline like we were just talking about. And this is going to increase your blood pressure, it increases your risk of heart disease, of stroke, of insulin resistance. And in midlife women, the drop in estrogen can weaken your airway muscles, making apnea more common. So this has to be evaluated.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (15:20)
So each of these episodes where you're not getting enough oxygen, bolts your body out of sleep, out of your deep sleep, then floods your body with de-stress bubbles.
Jillian Woodruff MD (15:47)
This is a, know, if you have sleep apnea, obstructive sleep apnea, there is no alternative to getting that taken care of and treated. So even if you feel like you're sleeping, but you have this problem, you're not getting the quality, the quantity of sleep that you need or the oxygen that your brain needs to recover and reset. Restless leg syndrome, that's another one that really interferes with your sleep.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (16:10)
Yes. ⁓
Jillian Woodruff MD (16:14)
This is like this like irresistible urge to move your legs and you may feel tingling or like a crawling sensation or you know, just uncomfortable restlessness that hits you when you're trying to fall asleep or
wakes you from sleep. And this is surprisingly more common in women and in women drink perimenopause because of the estrogen levels and estrogen helps regulate dopamine, which is a neurotransmitter that coordinates movement.
So when estrogen drops, your dopamine signaling can get bit wonky and that can trigger this restless legs or worsening of your restless legs. Low iron stores, which I see a lot in peri-menopausal women, in menopausal women, especially in peri-menopausal women that are having a lot of heavy periods. So you may have iron stores that are in the normal range, normal. You know how I feel about normal. I don't like that word.
But these low iron stores can make restless legs worse. So you want to make sure you're getting your iron and your ferritin checked. The ferritin is your iron stores. I'm sorry to go on, but like these really big ones like overactive bladders. Yeah, right. Ferritin, yes. And I think, ⁓ I just see a lot of people aren't doing that because they're waiting for you to have some huge overt issue.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (17:19)
No, those are really important things to check for sure. Ferritin, yeah.
Jillian Woodruff MD (17:33)
You know, so maybe if you are having a lot of bleeding, it would be checked, but not if you're just having this complaint. And I feel like having this symptom should lead to the check, not waiting for a hemorrhage. But overactive bladder, that's a big one too, because estrogen starts to fall and it thins tissues. So people may have a vagina, their vagina may feel dry or have pain with intimacy. The same thing happens in your bladder. The tissue's thin, they're more dry, they're irritable.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (17:39)
Right.
then they're dry, they're irritable,
Jillian Woodruff MD (18:01)
then your bladder starts squeezing and people start being diagnosed with interstitial cystitis when they don't actually have interstitial cystitis, which is an inflammatory
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (18:01)
then your bladder starts squeezing. And people start being diagnosed with interstitial arthritis when they don't actually have interstitial arthritis.
Jillian Woodruff MD (18:11)
condition of the bladder. But they just may need a little local estrogen. Bladder capacity also gets smaller, so you don't hold as much so people have more frequency. But that is just definitely bladder atrophy. Vaginal estrogen can help with that. So waking up once per night is
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (18:26)
Yes.
Jillian Woodruff MD (18:28)
Consider normal,
that's typical. There's nothing to write home about. To go to the bathroom, you can go pee once. But if you pee two or more times, that's nocturia, that's not normal, that needs to be checked out, that's interfering with your sleep cycles. And then one more thing that I could think about, which you mentioned, alcohol. That's a big deal because alcohol, yeah, you think it makes you like, relax, right? And it's like decreasing your stress. And so it's nice way.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (18:36)
See you next time.
That's a big one. Yeah, you think it makes you like, relax, right? And it's like, decreasing your stress. so, it's a nice way,
Jillian Woodruff MD (18:56)
You know, using it socially is one thing, but using it because you're going to wind down,
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (18:56)
you know, using it socially is one thing, but using it as a way
Jillian Woodruff MD (19:00)
that's a big deal because your body needs to metabolize alcohol and that happens a few hours later. And so the same thing that's happening, you know, what we just talked about, I said alcohol increases that heart rate, increases your temperature. People have more hot flashes. We said this, but it just bears repeating. There's really no safe amount of alcohol for women.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (19:10)
talked about, I said alcohol increases that heart rate, increases your temperature, you have a lot of heart pressures. We've said this, there's really no safe amount of alcohol for
women. During the scary medibod, your food is really important, always open and excited.
Jillian Woodruff MD (19:23)
During this period menopause, menopause, your liver is really important. It's always important, right? But it needs to metabolize
our hormones. So I see this a lot. It just works so much less efficiently when you have alcohol on board. It worsens hot flashes, night sweats, snoring, restless legs, increases reflux, heartburn, and dehydrates you. And then you wake up thirsty and then have to pee again.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (19:43)
Yeah.
Jillian Woodruff MD (19:48)
It's a terrible cycle.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (19:49)
It's terrible.
Jillian Woodruff MD (19:53)
my gosh, it sounds terrible and like, but there's things you can do. That's like the best
part of this is that a little vaginal estrogen can help you. Avoiding alcohol could help you like these small changes. And then another one is like your melatonin, your pineal gland. Right, I dig myself into these holes a day and then I can't get out because it's so exciting to me, but like.
resetting your pineal gland. I love this because we can like change things so quickly by ourselves. Like if you get outside within the first 30 minutes or so waking up in sunlight. So for us Alaskans, this may be a little more difficult, right? Right. Yes, you need a satellite, but it has to be specific UV light. So it can't be just turning on your lights.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (20:32)
I was going to say it's a little difficult for us here, but light, maybe not sunlight, but some light, some.
Jillian Woodruff MD (20:43)
And you can't be in a car. So if you park in a garage and you back your car out in the daylight, that doesn't count. You need to actually go outside. So like on your porch, like my dream is to like really not work. And in the morning go and take my coffee or tea to the front porch and just sit there for a while. Like, isn't that the best way to wake up? And that's setting your pineal gland. And then it's going to set your melatonin. It's going to push off melatonin release, which makes you sleepy.
and it will release at the time of day where it needs to, which is like two hours before sleep. Like, wouldn't that be amazing if we could do that?
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (21:18)
That would be amazing.
Jillian Woodruff MD (21:20)
So we have to kind of make it like in Alaska. We do not have sunlight within 30 minutes waking up at this time. A satellite it will do the same thing. I have a satellite that will come on the same time every day and it increases like an intensity. Very gently overtime, so that's one way and then in the evening it's dark here so it's fine, but like in your home.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (21:24)
We just don't, yes.
Jillian Woodruff MD (21:42)
Even though it's the evening and it's dark outside, you do not want to have really bright lights on after dinner. So that's the, can set up your like lightscape to like be lower light, you know, not have fluorescent lights, LED lights have like the slower lights you're gonna, you're getting ready. It's actually like fun to kind of, yeah.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (21:58)
It's kind of like setting your body ready. No, seriously,
things, strategies definitely work. think starting with the basics, you know, getting your body, it's kind of like not tricking your body, but getting your body ready for bed. So cooling the room, getting the temperature down 65 to 67 degrees Fahrenheit is ideal.
If you're sleeping with someone else in the room, might have to compromise a little bit or maybe get a small fan. Anything that's going to cool you down, light blankets, kick off those socks, anything that's going to make you go. Sometimes that transition, maybe you start off kind of cool, but then you start to get warmer as the hours of the night passes. So just kind of getting yourself into that routine, especially if you know this is what's happening.
And then ditching those screens. The society we are right now, we are exposed to so much at nighttime. have your phone, maybe you're charging your phone at your bedside. So getting away from having the phone next to you or setting your notifications and getting that blue light away from your face. It's kind of like, I look at it like caffeine for your brain. It's like, ⁓ I'm awake.
And then it gets harder and harder for you to shut your brain off because now you're exposed to more information and light and then it kind of gets the brain going again. So, and if you're doing all of that, know, ditching the screens and kind of calming down, I love yoga. Yoga before bed is also great. It just, there's something about it. It just calms you. Forward folds is one of my favorites. Deep breathing, meditation exercises.
really do help calm the nervous system. And if you want to go into supplements, course magnesium glycinate is a great one. I use one of those. A few hundred milligrams before bed or L-Phening, know, micronized progesterone of course for that progesterone loss is also great. Helps wind down and get you to sleep and stay asleep. And for the love of sleep, that wine.
that glass of wine ladies, we're going to have to just stop that because it just makes it worse. really does. It fragments, I mean, it'll relax you initially, but like Dr. Jill says, you know, it just doesn't keep you asleep and it just kind of makes you, um, it just wreaks havoc on your, on your sleep cycle. So, um, you know, but your sleep should not get shallow. It should get to that second part of your, that REM sleep.
where body processes things and starts to allow you to restore, restorative sleep is what we call it. And then you can start to feel better again. So very, very key.
Jillian Woodruff MD (24:32)
Yeah, the deep sleep,
the deep sleep for restore and the REM sleep for consolidating our memories. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I love aesthetics. So the blue light, it signals these pathways associated with collagen breakdown. We do not want to break down collagen in our faces leads to wrinkles and skin. Gravity takes on and skin drooping and
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (24:38)
Mm-hmm.
do not want to do that now.
Jillian Woodruff MD (24:55)
laxity and then also in darker skinned people that increases hyperpigmentation. So if you have hyperpigmentation like spots on your skin, it makes them continue to be dark. It's hard to get rid of them. So blue light is not even good for your skin and accelerates aging. Isn't that terrible? Especially when we're like in front of screens a lot, like during the day, but they think they do have, and I don't actually use this, but they have, ⁓
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (25:00)
So if you have hyperpigmentation like spots on your skin and it...
Gosh, that's horrible. ⁓
Jillian Woodruff MD (25:21)
So not even just blue light glasses. So like if you're on your computer in the evening, like if my kids are on the computer, they have blue light glasses they wear, that's important because it also affects your eye health, but they do have screens that you can put over your screen to decrease the amount of blue light. And that could probably be good for us. Or I think even you can change your screen. I'm not quite sure about this, but that could be good for us, especially people who are working in front of computers all day.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (25:32)
Yeah. nice.
Yes.
Yeah, because you're exposed to all that light all day. mean, my glasses has something in front of it. I'm not sure what the lens is. I've had it for a few years, but it definitely helps that you're not having that such bright exposure to that light. So that's definitely helped since I started using that.
Jillian Woodruff MD (25:50)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. So melatonin before bed is also something that can help taking it 30 minutes before bed. So you don't want to do it too early in the evening. It's really just to signal that it's time to sleep. Because if we, know, for a lot of times with our American lifestyle, that melatonin starts to go well with age, your melatonin level starts to go down. But with our American lifestyle in the evening, that cortisol level spikes again.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (26:13)
Mm.
Jillian Woodruff MD (26:30)
supposed to be high in the daytime and then go down. But when we come home and you have all of your home stuff to do, it goes back up. there are supplements that can decrease the cortisol and increase the melatonin. And so you want to just do those in the proper timing. And that's something you can talk to a hormone specialist about too.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (26:48)
Absolutely. And ladies, ⁓ if you snore or gasp or wake up with headaches, it might be time to look for something called sleep apnea. It's actually pretty common and it can be missed. We tend to think it's a men issue because men, you know, it's like, ⁓ he snores or, you know, my husband has sleep apnea or things like that. But it can happen with women too.
Jillian Woodruff MD (26:59)
Mm-hmm.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (27:10)
But hormone shifts change how our airways and muscles function too. So if your partner says you snore, it might be a good idea to just check, you know, and it's so much easier now. There's different tests. You can do it at home. You don't have to actually go to the place to get it done. But that can also help. Get a sleep study to make sure that you're getting the restorative sleep that you need.
Jillian Woodruff MD (27:29)
And consistency wins, so you wanna have the same bedtime and the same wake up time, even on the weekends. This is you teaching your hormones that rhythm again, that may have been lost. You need to think of sleep like a relationship. You can't ignore it all day and then expect fireworks at night.
So if you're whispering, why do I wake up at 3 a.m. into the dark of the night, now you know. And your body is signaling an imbalance. You need to listen.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (27:57)
That's right, that's right.
support your hormones, calm your stress response, stabilize your blood sugar so that at 3 a.m. those wakeups start to fade away and you can start to sleep again.
Jillian Woodruff MD (28:09)
Yep. If you've learned something from this episode, because I think we have to cut this one off here, share this episode with your sleep deprived friend. There is power in knowing you're not alone. There's power in information and education. Also share your comments with us, share questions that may prompt future shows with us by emailing connect at modernmidlifecollective.com.
Or follow us on Instagram at ModernMidlifeCollective.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (28:40)
Yes, midlife doesn't have to mean sleepless nights. It just means you're learning a new rhythm.
Jillian Woodruff MD (28:46)
We will see you next time on the Modern Midlife Collective. Bye.
Aderonke Akindipe, DNP (28:50)
Bye bye.