When it comes to feeling our best, it’s usually nutrition, exercise and maybe a little mindfulness we turn to first. But what if you knew that an essential key to health was supporting your circadian rhythms?
You may have heard the term ‘body clock’ or ‘circadian rhythms’ before. Let’s take a quick look at what that actually means so you can understand how vital supporting your circadian health is...
Your Master Clock
Within your brain is a tiny structure called the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN). The SCN is your body’s ‘master clock’, in charge of generating your 24 hour internal clock that governs when you sleep and wake, your brain function, mood, body temperature, energy levels, hunger, digestion, metabolism, hormone health and so much more. Being able to sleep and recover from your day, to digest and metabolise your food well, and to have the energy to engage with everyday life heavily depends upon whether your master clock is functioning well, and much of that depends on light and darkness.
The SCN works mainly through receiving cues from our environment, especially light. When light hits the eye, messages are sent to the SCN to tell it what time of day it is, which then sets off a cascade of responses, ideally helping us feel energised in the daytime, and supporting sleep at night. If the SCN doesn’t receive these messages, our body clock can become dysregulated, leading to hormonal imbalances, sleep issues, and many other challenges. That’s partly the reason you may feel so groggy after a late night watching TV, taking an overnight flight, or working shift patterns. At night, the SCN should sense plenty of darkness, allowing for the proper production of melatonin, known as the ‘sleep hormone’, but also a powerful antioxidant responsible for preventing neurological disorders, mood issues, supporting healthy ageing, and preventing many serious diseases from developing.
10 signs your circadian rhythms are off
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Poor sleep or difficulty getting to sleep
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Waking throughout the night
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Fatigue during the day
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Loss of appetite in the morning
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Difficulty concentrating
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Mood swings
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Headaches
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Sugar cravings
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Blood sugar imbalances
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Weight gain
Circadian Health & Ancestral Wisdom
Balanced circadian rhythms are essential because they coordinate nearly every major physiological system. When these rhythms are aligned, the body functions smoothly; when they’re disrupted, many systems become strained. Your metabolic health, fertility, emotional stability, digestion and longevity all depend upon healthy circadian rhythms. As you’ve read; the part of the brain responsible for timing the body clock is dependant upon light and darkness. The thing is, our modern world isn’t set up to support our circadian rhythms, in fact it’s incredibly easy to disrupt them without even realising.
Ideally, we want to be getting as much sunlight as possible in the morning in order to signal to the SCN that it’s daytime; time to feel alert and energised; time to digest food; time to focus. In the evening, we want the SCN to receive messages that it’s time to wind down and prepare for sleep; time to decrease cortisol; time to recover and repair.
Our ancestors would have naturally aligned with the cycles of light and dark, perfectly supporting their circadian rhythms and overall health. Around the 1700s however, gas lamps and urban lighting made cities noticeably brighter at night and people began staying awake later. When the eclectic bulb was invented in the late 1800s, this allowed people to override nature’s darkness within their own homes. For the first time, humans could reliably override sunset. Average sleep duration decreased, and circadian timing shifted later.
How Modern Lighting Has Impacted Women’s Hormone Health
Fast-forward to 2010, and something significant happened, especially when it comes to female hormonal health. A recent study published in Science Advances shows that for thousands of years, women’s reproductive hormonal cycles were intimately in-tune with the moon’s light and gravitational pull. Around 2010 however (with the introduction of smart phones) everything started to change. From studying 3000+ menstrual cycles, researchers found:
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Menstrual cycles used to significantly align with the Moon. In long-term logs from many women, menstrual onset often fell near full or new moons—especially before about 2010.
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This synchrony has weakened in recent years. After ~2010, the timing of periods became much less aligned with lunar phases for most participants. Now, this alignment only seems to happen mildly and briefly each year in January, when the moon’s gravitational pull is strongest.
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Artificial light at night is the leading explanation. Increased exposure to LEDs, screens, and bright nighttime lighting likely disrupts any underlying biological sensitivity to lunar cues.
This study highlights just how disconnected we’ve become from nature, how much modern technology is wreaking havoc on our bodies, and how vital it is to return to our roots and re-think how we live in order to support our health. Especially in Winter, when we may use artificial lighting more after sunset, circadian rhythms can become disrupted. But, this is also a season we can choose to heal our relationship with light and darkness, embracing darker nights and the opportunity to tap into the body’s ancestral wisdom.
5 Ways To Support Your Circadian Health
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View sunlight ASAP after waking
In order to kick-start your body clock for the day and support optimal energy levels and hormonal balance, you need to look outside so your eyes can receive sunlight, and your SCN can get the message that the day has begun. Doing this can have a significant impact on mood and energy levels, as well as insulin sensitivity and metabolism. Simply open a window and look out, or step outside when the sun is up. If you wake up before sunrise in Winter, you can use a light box with at least 10,000 lux brightness to stimulate alertness, although we always recommend using the power of nature when you can.
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Set your clock with movement and food
Other than light, other activities that help to set our circadian rhythms include moving and eating, as organs such as the liver and pancreas have their own clocks too. Eating breakfast is a powerful cue to your internal clock that it’s morning, whilst consistent and regular morning exercise - even a brief walk or a few minutes of body weight exercises - can regulate your rhythms. You can apply these principles by eating breakfast within 1-2 hours of waking, and making a habit of moving your body in the morning. Our Dawn capsules contain energy and focus-supporting Cordyceps and Lion’s Mane mushrooms to promote alertness all morning. We recommend 2-4 capsules per day for optimal benefit.
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Take regular light breaks throughout the day
Even on the gloomiest, cloudiest days, outdoor light levels are a lot brighter than they are indoors, supporting circadian health. Apps light Light Meter and Lux Light Meter allow you to measure the brightness in your environment. We need at the very least 1,000 lux (a measurement of brightness) in the day to feel alert, however many indoor environments are 500 lux or lower, whilst a sunny day can give you 100,000 lux of brightness. Aim to get outside several times throughout the day, perhaps setting a timer every couple of hours reminding you to take a light break. This is especially important when it comes to mealtimes, as eating outside in the sun can support healthy insulin levels.
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Wind down in the afternoons
As the day progresses, our levels of cortisol should ideally decrease so that by the time we go to bed, we’re in a relaxed state. For many of us though, afternoons can be a chaotic time of school pick-ups, catching up on deadlines, running errands or commuting. Purposefully doing something to help you feel calmer in the afternoon is a powerful way to support your body’s rhythms and improve your ability to relax at night. Try 5 minutes of 4-7 breathing to calm your nervous system, a 5 minute meditation, or 2-4 capsules of our Dusk supplement, with Reishi and Chaga for nervous system and immune support.
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Embrace darkness after sunset
To support optimal sleep and circadian health, it’s vital to embrace darkness as much as possible. Melatonin - the powerful antioxidant sleep hormone we mentioned earlier - needs a dark environment in order to be secreted. This means we need plenty of darkness way before bedtime in order to promote restful, restorative sleep and recovery. A bright environment or too much screentime at night keeps blood sugar and cortisol levels elevated, preventing us from achieving deep sleep and disrupting metabolic health. To take back your circadian health and reconnect to the power of darkness, turn all bright lights off after sunset, use incandescent or red spectrum lightbulbs, try blue light blocking glasses and try to make your sleeping environment as dark as possible.
Reclaiming your circadian health could be one of the most important things you do for your physical and mental wellbeing this Winter. We hope you found this article useful and can put these points into practice to support your health.
-The APE Nutrition Team