How to Take the Perfect Nap

As you get older, sometimes it’s harder to find time to nap. Oddly enough, as you get older, you also crave a nap more than you ever did when you were young. Life’s cruel in that way.

Yet, sometimes that perfect opportunity presents itself, and you find yourself in an empty house with no responsibilities. Your child is out of the house. Your spouse is running an errand. Now is your time to seize the moment and hit that couch for that long-overdue nap. Now the question, though, is how long can you afford to nap before you ruin your entire day?

Thankfully, the Cleveland Clinic has a scientific answer to that age-old question. We’ve all had that nap that runs two-plus hours and it completely takes you out of the day. We’ve also had the 10-minute catnap that accomplishes nothing other than making us even more tired.

Dr. Alicia Roth, PhD, a sleep psychologist at the clinic says that the perfect nap is 30 minutes or less, “If you do it in the right way, it can be very restorative and positive for your sleep.”

How to Have the Perfect Nap

As I mentioned above, those naps that stretch hours feel nice in the theory but the grogginess that comes after is quickly a regret. Dr. Roth says that’s true, and that’s because sleeping for an hour or longer can interrupt the deep sleep you were in, the ones that you’d rather have at bedtime.

If you’re going to go in for that nap, though, it also helps to do it earlier in the day. That makes sense, right? This creates a buffer in case you nap for longer than you want.

“The later you nap in the day, the more detrimental it’s going to be to your nighttime sleep,” Roth explained. “It’s also important to remember that napping includes dozing off on the couch in the evening.”

That part rings true to me. Far too many times I’m locked into the Monday Night Football game only to be bored of it by halftime… thirty minutes later the game is in the fourth quarter and now my bedtime routine is all out of whack.

What’s important to remember here is to keep your naps on the shorter side. Thirty minutes is the sweet spot, and avoid leaning too far back in that recliner of yours while watching your show at night. Catching some Z’s at that point will only make it that much harder to hit REM when you need it most.