Do you often sleep with a ponytail?

Before you hit the sack, you probably have a bedtime routine that might include putting your hair up if it's long.

But this habit could do more harm than good. Anyone with long hair might think that sleeping with a ponytail protects it from getting tangled or damaged. It turns out that, this habit can trigger hair loss. It could even cause a health condition called traction alopecia.

Some early symptoms are small bumps on your scalp that look like pimples. If you ignore them and continue sleeping with tight ponytails, you might wake up to see even more hairs on your pillow. Apart from losing hair, people with traction alopecia might experience itching, redness of the scalp, and flaky patches.

The good news is all of those negative effects I just mentioned will go away if you stop pulling your hair up before bed and give it some time to grow back.

But keep in mind, it's not only about ponytails. Tight buns or braids or even sleeping with rollers can also be harmful to your mane. In other words, the best thing you can do is let your hair down at nighttime.

Your hair especially deserves a break at night if you style it a lot during the day. But if you want to get it out of your face before turning in, try wrapping it up in a silk or satin scarf or get yourself a sleeping cap. This will save your strands from tangling and breaking while you toss in bed.

But in fact, sleeping with a ponytail isn't the only common bedtime habit that can have a negative effect on your body or sleep. There are many other seemingly harmless things people do without realizing how it impacts their well-being. 

Here is a list.

• Go to bed hungry. If to shed a few pounds, you strictly follow the rule of not eating after a certain time, you might do yourself a disservice, while going to bed stuffed is bad. Doing the opposite isn't any better. In fact, having a pre-bedtime snack full of protein and fiber boosts your metabolism, which is crucial for maintaining a healthy weight.

• Sleeping on your stomach puts additional strain on your spinal cord and back, which doesn't allow your muscles to relax during rest. This extra strain on the spine might cause pain or numbness in different body parts. Also, sleeping on your stomach can be the reason for neck problems since it's in a twisted position all night.
• Doctors believe that sleeping on your back or side is the best option.

• Taking gadgets to bed means poor sleep. Since the blue light they emit slows the production of melatonin—the hormone that makes us sleepy. Staring at your device's screen also poses a threat to your eyes. Blue light can damage light-sensitive cells in the retina. The strain gets even worse when you do it in the darkness, which is a common thing right before dozing off for a lot of people. This might even lead to partial or permanent vision loss.

• Working out a hectic schedule and everyday responsibilities often leave you with only one option: working out right before bed. But while it's hard to keep your body strong and lean, you just might be setting yourself up for failure.

• Doing vigorous physical exercises makes you feel more alert and awake, making it hard to fall asleep, and if you don't get enough good-quality sleep, your body will produce fewer muscle-building hormones and even cause muscle mass to decrease. So if you want to achieve your fitness goals, work out as early in the day as possible.

• Do some stretching. Skipping a bedtime workout doesn't mean you should avoid all physical activity. In reality, light stretching can help you with warding off leg cramps at night. This type of muscle spasm, which can be really painful and disturb sleep, affects up to sixty percent of adults in the US alone, while experts are still not sure what exactly causes night leg cramping. They advise stretching the muscles regularly to lower your risk of getting them, but don't go overboard with the stretching, or you'll have to sleep with sore muscles.

• Leaving a glass of water near your bed, a lot of people put it there just in case they wake up in the middle of the night thirsty. Some prefer to drink first thing in the morning to start the day, but leaving water overnight might give it a bad taste. This happens when carbon dioxide starts mixing with the water. And let's not forget that left-out water could become home to dust particles or even a swimming pool for insects. Eww! Well, all this won't cause you any health problems. Drinking fresh or bottled water is a much better option.

• Sleeping with pets: you might think that the only disadvantage of this is having to deal with pet hair on your bed, but if your pet regularly visits a vet, you're safe since the risk of disease transmission is low. However, if your immune system isn't at its best, the chances for disease transmission rise. Sharing a bed with a pet is especially not advised for elderly people and those who have diabetes. On top of that, humans and animals have different sleep cycles. Pets wake up more often during the night, which can leave you cranky in the morning. Dogs, in particular tend to hog the bed and not leave you much room.

• Sleeping with wet hair—the chances are you've already heard that it can make you won't catch a cold just because you sleep with wet hair. But hair is weakest when it's wet, so when you toss and turn in your bed, it creates friction and causes breakage. Also, the pillow fabric absorbs not only water from your hair but also natural oils. That's why you'll wake up with dull and less shiny locks. Besides, water and warmth are all bacteria need to start blooming right on your pillow, which puts you at risk of a breakout.

I hope that you all enjoyed this sharing topic and found it helpful, and I'll share a new topic in my next one. Bye.