This blog post was sent to us unsolicited by a Raw Botanics customer. Needless to say, we are thrilled with her results. Check it out!
________
Waking up feeling rested and refreshed is everything to me. It can totally make or break your day! I have been cursed with being a light sleeper all my life. I am envious of those who can lay their head on a pillow and fall into a deep abyss and sleep through anything. I admit, I am “sleep-challenged” and it has always been a battle for me. But, it seemed to be getting worse...I questioned if this was related to stress because of the pandemic or maybe even holy cow, I can’t believe I am going to say this but menopause!
Those close to me know I require total darkness, an eye mask, white noise sounds AND a fan when I sleep. NO, I am NOT a vampire, but my friends hate getting stuck sharing a bedroom with me on a girls trip! Even with all of these sleep aids, I still toss and turn at the slightest sound or beam of light. I often wake up in the middle of the night thinking about things I need to do (or forgot to do) and oftentimes, feel like I have anxiety when I wake up. It is definitely not ideal when I have early morning calls and need to present to a large group of colleagues! UGGH!
Like most of the population, I have been forced into a work from home situation. The work that I do requires sitting at the computer for hours at a time, extreme focus, sharp listening skills, and a lot of ZOOM calls. Some days it is harder than others to get in the zone because I feel like I am in a fog and am not energized when I wake up. I decided I could not live like this, and wanted to learn how I could “train myself” to sleep like those lucky SOB’s who can sleep through a hurricane! I like to research things (perhaps that has to do with working for a life science company) and I learned about a cool sleep analysis app that would help me understand my sleep or lack of it, so I downloaded it on my Apple Watch. I started to wear my watch to bed each night, which was weird at first, but the data I gathered from it was rather interesting. I could see my sleep patterns, how often I had less restful sleep, my heart rate and if I had any disturbances while asleep. This intrigued me.
Thus, I was inclined to do more research on ways to get better sleep. Trust me, I have tried everything! First it was meditation and Pilates before going to sleep, then bamboo bedding, I even threw in a weighted blanket, turning off my phone an hour before bedtime and finally reading the latest book-club favorite or writing in a journal for 30 minutes before dozing off; but to my disappointment, NOTHING made me sleep more soundly.
Typically, I go to bed around 10:30pm and wake up most days around 6:30am...that’s 8 hrs “sleeping”. Though, for me I would only get around 5.5 actual restful hours of sleep. NO BUENO! At this point, I was desperate to feel better when I got up!
So, enter sleep supplements. First, I tried a well known gummy sleep supplement with Melatonin and and L-Theanine. It said on the bottle to take 2 before bed, so I did. Wrong answer—-I was so groggy the next morning and did not feel as refreshed as I was hoping I would, so the next night I only took 1. Fast forward 6 months and I feel like I have been sleeping better, without being too groggy in the morning and I do feel a bit more rested than before. I have continued to monitor my sleep on the app and did see an improvement. Voila, my problem was solved.
Not so fast! I started to notice I would “hit a wall” around 3pm and felt like I really needed a nap, which never happened to me previously. Bummed, but willing to accept this as my “new normal” I kept using this sleep supplement.
Hold on, the story isn’t over. A trusted, dear friend introduced me to Raw Botanics REST softgels. They have no melatonin so I was not convinced this would work for me, but promised I would try it. UMMMM, OMG! After just one night, WOW, what a difference! Even the data on the sleep app agreed. I had 6.5 hrs of restful, undisturbed sleep on the 1st night! I continued to take just ONE of these each night for a week and my quality of sleep has been so much better. I feel calmer and more rested when I wake up. I never feel groggy so my early morning meetings are no longer a challenge. And, I noticed that I don’t “hit a wall” at 3pm anymore.
To make sure it wasn’t a fluke, I went back to the “other” supplement for a few days, to really see if my sleep was more improved using REST. I noticed the numbers of restful sleep hours dropped back down below 6hrs of sound sleep using this “other supplement”. So, I tossed them out and now use REST every night.
I realized at that moment, the key to my new found sleep success is the result of two things, 1) trusting my friend who recommended I try it and 2) the key ingredients found in REST Softgels. I had never heard of CBN (or Ashwagandha and Reishi for that matter) before using REST, but it clearly has made a positive impact on my level of deep sleep and made a significant improvement over a rather short time.
Check it out yourself, here is a comparison between two nights. In graphic #1 you can see I had deeper, more restful spans of sleep after taking the REST softgels whereas in graphic #2 after taking the “other” supplement my sleep was disturbed more often, thus I had less restful blocks of sleep.
Graphic 1 - REST Sleep Supplement
Graphic 2 - “Other” Sleep Supplement
I am now a believer in Raw Botanics! I won’t go to sleep without taking the REST softgels again!
Don’t short change yourself, you need to get a great night’s sleep, to reset when you close your eyes and to feel like a whole new you when you wake up!
I hope you follow my lead and invest in a better nights sleep!
- Jacquie B.