WHAT
If you've heard talk about blue light recently, its because studies are showing the effects of blue light to your sleep & many companies have now come out with blue light blocking glasses as a product.
Blue Light Blocking Glasses (Blue Blockers), are glasses with special lenses that block or scatter blue light. Blue light is emitted from most of our tech devices and light bulbs. To really understand what these glasses can do, we have to learn a little about how our body reacts to light and how light impacts our circadian rhythm.
Blue and green light has shorter wave lengths, producing more energy.
Amber and red light has longer wave lengths, producing less energy.
Part of your circadian rhythm, your internal sleep-wake cycle, is the creation of melatonin- our bodies natural sleep drug. The pineal gland in your brain creates melatonin. When light becomes dim, the pineal gland is stimulated and begins to secrete melatonin to help you sleep. When we are exposed to bright lights, in particular short wave lengths (blue & green), our body stops the stimulation of the pineal gland, therefore reducing and stopping melatonin production.
Long story short, blue light stops your body from creating melatonin. Blue light can also slowly cause damage to your eye sight.
Fun Fact: blue light doesn’t just enter your body through your eyes, your skin absorbs light too.
WHY YOU SHOULD CARE
Blue light suppresses melatonin production, as already mentioned. Think about your evenings. How much time in the evening do you spend inside, under fluorescent & LED lights, looking at the TV screen, computer screen, phones, tablets, open the fridge to light, playing a video games, reading a book next to a light, reading an e-book, scrolling though social media, looking at a digital clock? You get the point.
For many, evenings are spend under blue light in our modern world. It would be difficult to spend your evenings with only candlelight, and would probably cause a fire hazard. So here we are, living life under blue lights which messes up our sleep.
Even if at bed time you turn off the light and put your phone on "night mode" to reduce the short waves it takes your body close to an hour to start adjusting and begin producing melatonin. Then while we sleep we are being exposed to light from night lights, digital clocks, cable boxes, street lights, etc. Remember the fun fact above, your skin can absorb blue light too. Light absorption through your skin also impacts melatonin production. One study even found that illuminating a flashlight on the back of your knee can decrease melatonin production.
This delay and interruption in natural melatonin production impacts the amount of deep and REM sleep that you get each night.
Most teens and adults already struggle with getting to bed and falling asleep in time to get the recommended 8 hours, and with the blue light impacts you are basically wiping out another hour or two.
Poor sleep quality can greatly affect our health by disregulating our hormones, creating emotional instability, reducing performance during the day, leading to feelings of depression, exhaustion, and weight gain.
Overall when you get poor sleep it leads to poor health and decision making.
Over exposure to blue light at night also affects your mitochondria as they become overburdened processing all of the blue light. This mitochondria overwhelm can cause inflammation leading to vision loss, heart disease, and potentially increase your risk of breast cancer and prostate cancer.
Luckily there are small steps you can make in your home to decrease impacts of blue light and help with your melatonin production.
HOW TO IMPLEMENT
Go into your bedroom, shut the lights off, and see where any potential light could be coming through. Think about ways you can reduce or remove those light sources. You can do the same, thinking about the 2 hours you spend prior to going to sleep and how you can make small adjustments to limit the blue light you come in contact with.
During the day you can wear clear lens blue blocking glasses to reduce harm to your eyesight & can wear the same or the preferred red/amber tinted blue blocking glasses to eliminate the blue light disrupting your circadian rhythm.
Below are some ways you can reduce your blue light (junk light) exposure in the evenings.
I WANT MORE
I have been wear blue blocking glasses for a few months now. I notice a different in my energy levels when I wear them for intense computer time, my eyes just don't become as tired. My hubby has also followed this bio-hacking trend and he notices the same effects as well as better REM sleep. Here are some recommended brands:
Ladyboss glasses are stylish, well made, and scatter the blue waves to reduce its impact to your eyes. They are a female owned & operated company.
TIJN Blue Light Blocking Glasses can be found on amazon for only $16.99 and come in many different colors. Not as well made as Ladyboss glasses, but they are very affordable.
Blueblockers from Knockaround. These have a yellow tint to them to reduce the blue light from devices. $15 for the basic pair & come highly recommended by my husband.
The TrueDark Classic glasses are the most advanced and will be the best option to truly impact your REM sleep if you don't want to reduce your screen time before bed
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