Melatonin - Another piece of the heath puzzle?

Having done a little research on melatonin I think this useful hormone may be another small thing to consider when trying to live a healthy, natural lifestyle.
Melatonin is secreted into the blood by the pineal gland in the brain. It is a natural anti-oxidant, helping to protect DNA and plays a big role in our sleep cycles helping us to get quality sleep and make us sleepy at night. What's important is the way our brain makes melatonin. When our eyes are exposed to light (specifically blue wavelengths), our production of melatonin is inhibited. This makes sense because if it wasn't for artificial light then we'd be producing sleep inducing melatonin after the sun goes down. Our modern way of living exposes us to light sources that wouldn't have been there during our millions of years of evolution meaning that we're not producing the amounts of melatonin that we naturally should be. Everyone living a LFRV lifestyle is interested in giving the body what it needs but we should also consider the things that we subject our bodies to that aren't so natural. For instance sitting in front of a bright computer screen is a major source of artificial light that can inhibit melatonin production. Bright lights in rooms at night and watching TV will also surpress melatonin production.
This may all seem a tad anal but if it can help at all in being as healthy as you can then whats the harm in dimming the lights a bit or using romantic candles instead of 100watt bulbs. You even save electricity too!

By the way if you're like me and like to use your computer then I found this handy little free program which cuts out blue light from your computer screen at night!
http://www.stereopsis.com/flux/

Tags: Melatonin, healthy, lifestyle, sleep

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Permalink Reply by Lucas on October 25, 2010 at 9:16am

I just downloaded the program you linked, that you much. What are great little program, it even calculates your location and starts dimming the computer at the same time the sun is setting in your area, very cool.

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Permalink Reply by Ryan Betker on October 25, 2010 at 10:20am

WOAH, awesome. It's like it's forcing you to go to sleep... hah!!
Even after looking at the screen for just 1 minute, my eyes lids feel like they want to start closing (in a good way)

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Permalink Reply by Lucas on October 25, 2010 at 10:30am

yea you are in the same time zone as me so yours has already dimmed, right? You can even turn the feature off if you want.

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Permalink Reply by Ryan Betker on October 25, 2010 at 11:02am

yep! It's already at 3400K and it makes me *close eyelids for a bit*... (10s later) *close eyelids for a bit*... hah, awesome!

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Permalink Reply by ednshell on October 25, 2010 at 3:47pm

Wow! I love it! It's night here and the change instantly relaxed me. Thank you so much for sharing! :)

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Permalink Reply by treehugger on October 26, 2010 at 1:26pm

I'm glad you guys like the program!

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Permalink Reply by Quill on October 26, 2010 at 1:55pm

That's a neat program, using it right now :D Thank you for the link!

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Permalink Reply by Paul Newcomb on October 26, 2010 at 2:21pm

this program is so simple yet so powerful. i work on my computer all day long, so this will really help me out :-)

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Permalink Reply by Soul on October 26, 2010 at 2:30pm

Great! Thanks for the info and link..
Blessings

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Permalink Reply by DURIANRIDER on October 26, 2010 at 9:15pm

Also we have to remember that the body only produces enough melatonin if we get enough carbs each day. Thats why fasters/undereaters/anorexic's/low carber's etc typically have such a hard time sleeping.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2004/carbs.html

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Permalink Reply by Lily on January 22, 2012 at 8:03am

wow !!!!!!!!!! this program is amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! now i see why i was having problems falling asleep lately!!!! you are a genius!! thank you for sharing!

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Permalink Reply by StyleStacker on January 22, 2012 at 9:22am

I'm so glad you bumped this! I was concerned it just use the computers dimmer and I keep mine on the lowest setting all the time but it actually adjusts it in a different way, I like it!