“I don’t put off going to bed, more going to sleep,” says Shirley , 37, a researcher and administrator from South Wales. “I should go to sleep well before midnight to start work at 8 or 9 the following day. But I usually settle down into bed with the light off about 1am. My current sleep time is 3 or 4am.”
Much is written about the importance of getting a good night’s sleep, having a consistent bedtime and setting a morning alarm. Science tells us regular sleep patterns lead to longer lives, lower our chance of developing Alzheimer’s, and, anecdotally, we know that it makes us feel better. So why do so many of us sabotage our sleep by staying up later than we should?
Rachel Wearmouth is political correspondent for HuffPost UK based in Westminster where she focuses on Brexit, the Labour Party and the SNP. She began her journalism career in 2008 with The Northern Echo and started specialising in politics as regional affairs correspondent for Newcastle dailies The Journal and Evening Chronicle. Rachel also worked as politics and investigations reporter, based in Holyrood, for Scotland s Sunday Post before moving to HuffPost UK in 2017. She can be contacted on: rachel.wearmouth@huffpost.com
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