One of the most healthy foods is Honey. This “Liquid Gold,” as it has been called throughout the ages, is full of essential vitamins and minerals that help our body in more ways than one. But today, we are going to mainly be talking about Honey as a sleeping aid. We know that it is useful for persistent cough, we like to eat it on a slice, but it turns out that consuming Honey the night before bed has several health benefits. See how it works, but also be moderate in its consumption.
Fructose is essential as it helps the body in slowing down the processing of glucose. Together, these two chemicals are able to maintain your glucose levels while you sleep. With enough glucose and glycogen in your liver for the night, you’re less likely to wake up looking for food.
Honey Can Help You Sleep: What Is The Proof?
Okay, so here is what happens when you don’t have carbohydrates, so if your last meal was a snack in the late afternoon. And typically, carbohydrates digest into glucose and end up in your bloodstream in your blood, and then your pancreas secretes insulin, which sends a message to your liver to get rid of that glucose from your blood.
So you go to bed, and when you are sleeping, your brain is extremely active. In fact, our brain is more active during sleep than it is during the day, so it is consuming a lot of glucose, and with it, it is consuming a lot of energy, because during sleep is when memory consolidation happens as well as other very taxing processes.
As the brain consumes the glucose, because we didn’t eat any carbohydrates in the evening, your blood sugar drops, and our bodies are designed with a self-defense mechanism in mind that is thousands of years old. When blood sugar drops, two things happen, cortisol, the stress hormone, goes up, and adrenaline, the fight or flight hormone, goes up as well. Why? Because from an evolutionary perspective, what used to happen in the past was that when blood sugar is low, you have to hunt for food or find food, there’s no time to sleep.
So here is where this tablespoon of Honey comes in, Honey stabilizes your blood sugar levels through the night, and because it is fructose, it does not cause a considerable spike or a massive crash of your blood sugar. It keeps it really stable, and that avoids the spike of cortisol and adrenalin, letting you get a good night’s sleep.
There are many studies that support the claims that Honey has a positive effect on our sleeping habits. If you are interested in learning more, you can read this extensive study here. The article goes in-depth about studies conducted on a honey-milk mix and its effects on the human body.
Another independent study found out that Honey causes a significant improvement in the sleep quality of both adults and children.
How To Use Honey For Sleep?
When I first mention Honey to people as a natural sleeping aid. Many of them honestly tell me that they have never thought of it that way. Well, Honey has always been considered one of nature’s natural remedies. There are historical accounts of Honey being used as a sleep remedy throughout the world.
What the main benefit of Honey is that it helps keep your liver full throughout the night, which helps your mind and body stay calm, thus preventing you from waking up all of a sudden. Honey will become active in your production of melatonin and serotonin in your brain, along with releasing tryptophan in your brain.
Seratonin is a brain hormone that promotes restful sleep well-being as wells as a feeling of fullness after a meal, but serotonin levels are normally low. The usual effects of low serotonin are the following: depression, anxiety, insomnia, and the urge to overeat.
Here is where the vital amino acid tryptophan, produced by Honey comes in. It helps your body in creating serotonin, thus keeping you safe from the harmful effects that we listed previously.
Well, Honey has always been considered one of nature’s natural remedies. There are historical accounts of Honey being used as a sleep remedy throughout the world.
An ancient Chinese says that you should be “eating honey every night” in order to get some goodnight’s sleep. Additionally, a prevalent remedy in Eastern European folklore, ed drinking a cup of heated-up milk mixed in with a teaspoon of honey before bed.
Also, a popular treatment in the middle ages recommended to those who could not sleep well was mixing two to three tablespoons of all-natural Honey with two tablespoons of cider vinegar into a glass of heated up water. Traditional meskan healers have long prescribed the teaspoon of raw Honey.
Replace Sugar With Honey In Your Daily Diet (Your Body Will Thank You)
Refined sugar or white sugar, although the most common sweetener consumed in excess, is harmful to our health by raising blood sugar levels and can lead to conditions such as obesity or diabetes.
However, there are several alternatives to replacing this ingredient with more natural ones, such as stevia or Honey, an excellent option if we know the amounts to make an adequate replacement. That’s why we are going to explain how to replace sugar with Honey and get delicious and healthy results.
Honey has always been seen as an alternative to sugar and a much healthier alternative, but you can’t just replace sugar with Honey. There are three things to keep in mind when sweetening with Honey: This option is sweeter than sugar, so you should use a smaller amount. Honey also contains water, something you should consider when using it in your recipes.
The equivalence is:
- 1 cup sugar = 3/4 cup honey
- 1 tablespoon sugar = 3/4 tablespoon honey
- 1 teaspoon sugar = half a teaspoon of Honey
In the case of Honey, you should always use less than the specified amount of sugar.
Note: When it comes to a large amount of sugar, it is recommended to use a cup less if Honey is used, for example, if the recipe requires 5 cups of sugar, only 4 honey is used.
So now you are ready to remove sugar from your life, and if you are looking to cook some healthy meals using Honey I would recommend checking out this link.
Another very useful resource that I really like is a database of different types of Honey which thoroughly describes their tastes, benefits as well as in which part of the world they are most common.
Recap: The Exact Benefits Of Consuming Honey
- Honey will help maintain your blood sugar levels stable, thus allowing you to stay asleep.
- It will help your liver slow down glucose processing, thus not allowing the creating of the stress and fight or flight hormones.
- In addition, swapping out sugar for Honey will help you maintain a healthy weight, thus avoiding a whole nother problem.
More tips to follow for better sleep:
