Natural and artificial lighting can cause health problems and affect your sleeping patterns. It’s important to know that the type of lighting that is in your home or workplace can also change your overall health. Here is how certain types of light can make it difficult to sleep soundly along with how certain types of light can damage your physical well-being.
Five Ways that Artificial Lighting Can Affect Your Sleeping Patterns Make You Sick
Artificial Light Stimulates Your Brain
In the olden days, people woke up when dawn was approaching so that they could work throughout the day, and they usually went to sleep as it became dark. This lifestyle would regulate the human body’s natural circadian rhythms, leading to sound sleep without any interruptions.
Today, this has changed because employers may require you to work during the evening or late at night in artificial lighting. And if you are at home instead, then you may watch television, use a computer or play with your smartphone late into the night. Artificial light stimulates your brain, and your electronic devices can emit certain types of light that is especially detrimental. Artificial lighting can cause health problems, all that blue light is not good for you.
Developing Diabetes Mellitus
Researchers are trying to understand why more individuals are developing type 2 diabetes, and they believe that excessive exposure to artificial lighting is detrimental. When you are exposed to artificial light, it changes your body’s chemistry, affecting the levels of melatonin and other hormones. In the past few years, more children and teenagers are developing diabetes mellitus, and it is possible that the exposure to overhead lighting in schools in combination with the use of electronic devices such as computers is changing the chemistry of their bodies.
Causing Mood Disorders
With more people spending the majority of their time inside, they are exposed to less sunlight. Without exposure to sunlight, the human body is unable to produce vitamin D, and this nutrient can prevent mood disorders such as depression.
Modern humans may only go outside for a few minutes to walk to a vehicle or to go inside a building, and this is not enough time for your body to absorb sunlight into your skin and eyes. If you are feeling depressed, then your therapist will probably recommend going outside more into the natural sunlight while spending less time in front of a computer or a television.
Read Next: Symptoms You Should Never Ignore
Higher Incidence of Developing Cancer
New research reveals that artificial lighting can cause some types of cancer, including prostate, colorectal, breast and lung tumors. In addition to the artificial lighting that is in your own home at night, you are exposed to streetlights along the sidewalks and roads while driving or walking.
If there are exterior lighting fixtures outside your home, then the artificial light enters your windows at night, changing your sleeping patterns along with causing chemical changes in your body that can lead to particular types of cancer.
Gaining a Lot of Weight
If you are gaining weight, then your exposure to the blue light that is emitted from a smartphone, computer or television is often the reason. Artificial lighting will change your body’s hormone levels, and some of these natural chemicals can lead to obesity. When you are staying up all night watching television, you will have a lot of exposure to artificial lighting, including the blue light spectrum.
Today, you can buy special eyeglasses that will protect you from blue light, or you can buy special clear screens to place over a television and a computer. While you are waiting for your body to adjust to the reduction of blue light, you can request weight loss meal delivery to your office or home.
Change Your Lifestyle
When you have insomnia or a sleeping disorder, you should change your lifestyle to avoid staying up late at night while using your electronic devices. By doing this, you can also improve your overall health.
Author Bio:Paisley Hansen is a freelance writer and expert in health, fitness, beauty, and fashion. When she isn’t writing she can usually be found reading a good book or hitting the gym. Follow her here.
