11 Old-Fashioned Tricks For Falling Asleep That Actually Work

Did your grandparents turn on a fan to help you fall asleep when you were a kid? If so, there may have been something to it. “It turns out white noise is a lot like the best comfy mattress — when it’s doing its job, you barely recognize it is there,” Erin Berman, a sleep expert with NECTAR Sleep tells Bustle. “White noise works on the principles of sound masking. Basically, our ears have developed through evolution as a sort of alarm system. When you hear something, good or bad, your senses prick up and you become more alert. When you sound mask with white noise, it blends all sounds in the background and foreground into one static thing. That means your brain relaxes and can more easily drift off into a sleeping state.”

If you grew up with parents who demanded you make your bed, they may have been onto something. As Francis says, it all has to do with creating a good sleep environment.

“Going to bed in a clean, relaxed environment can make it easier to fall asleep,” she says. “According to a survey commissioned by the National Sleep Foundation (2011), seven out of 10 people surveyed said they made their bed every day or almost every day. The bed-makers were 19 percent more likely to report getting a good night’s sleep on most days.”

People have been coming up for “rules” for sleep for centuries, and for good reason. If you miss out on a night’s rest, you really can’t make that up. “If the sleep deficit is only a few hours, you may be able to catch up the next day,” says Brantner. “However, there’s a ceiling — more than a couple hours and you’re out of luck.”

You can’t just hop back into bed and sleep for a day, for example, and suddenly be all caught up. “Studies have shown that too much sleep at once actually has a negative effect,” Brantner says. “It makes you groggy and increases mortality. So it’s thought that you can make up for a little bit of lost sleep, but a deep chronic deficit is just impossible to gain back.”

So drink a glass of warm milk, turn off your lights, and climb into bed at the same time each night. You’ll sleep better, and feel better, as a result.