Our Magnesium Gel and Sleep: What to Know

Magnesium supplements, like our magnesium gel and spray, are often touted for their ability to help regulate blood pressure, uplift the mood, encourage muscle, nerve and heart health, and even boost the mood and energy production.

But another of the unique benefits that may come from magnesium supplementation is that it may even help you get better sleep.

Here’s a quick primer on magnesium as an essential element to overall health, and how it may promote healthier, more restful sleep.

Magnesium and Relaxation

One of the ways that magnesium may help improve sleep quality is simply by relaxing the body, and it may play a multifaceted role in doing so.

For one, magnesium is believed to help regulate neurostransmitters in the brain that regulate the stress response. By controlling these, it can help diminish the tenor and intensity of the stressful situations, and the body’s response to them.

Another thing about magnesium is that it may actually actively reduce cortisol levels. If you’re unfamiliar, cortisol is a hormone produced by the adrenal glands, which not only helps regulate blood pressure and sugar, but which regulates feelings of stress, mood, and wellness. Keeping cortisol levels in check can help make a person feel calmer and overall more well.

One of the body’s main reactions to the stress response is to inadvertently tense the muscles. Over time this tires the affected individual out, but not in a good way. Magnesium, as an essential nutrient in muscle and nerve function, can help regulate this response by alleviating tension on muscle tissue.

But beyond relaxation, magnesium has other roles to play with respect to sleep quality.

Magnesium and Melatonin Production

Melatonin is a hormone produced in the brain that is naturally secreted in response to darkness. This hormone helps regulate the body’s circadian rhythm, so that it can keep to a consistent sleep schedule. While melatonin likely plays other roles in regulating the body’s functions, the best known of these is its role in sleep.

Exposure to ambient light, as well as to high levels of stress, can counteract the desired effects of melatonin, or even suppress production. This has negative impacts not only on sleep onset, but on sleep duration as well as the overall quality of sleep.

What’s concerning here is that as many as 50% of Americans may be magnesium deficient, and studies have shown that those who are deficient in magnesium may also experience issues with melatonin production. Moreover, magnesium is believed to be directly implicated in the production of melatonin in the body.

On top of that, and notwithstanding whatever effects magnesium has on melatonin production itself, studies have demonstrated that administration of melatonin and magnesium (together) can help to improve sleep quality.

Magnesium and GABA Regulation

GABA, or gamma aminobutyric acid, is a neurotransmitter that plays several vital roles within the body. Among these are that it regulates motor control as well as cognitive function. Critically, however, it also regulates the mood as well as anxiety, and healthy levels of GABA are linked to reduced nervous cell activity and low excitability.

It should be clear where we’re going with this, because GABA also plays a role in sleep regulation. GABA is actually the main neuroinhibitor within the brain, and activating the GABA receptors leads to sleep onset.

Moreover, healthy levels of GABA are associated with increased SWS, or slow-wave sleep, a phase of deep sleep that is critical for repairing the body as well as consolidating the memory.

What’s important here is that magnesium may be implicated in the production of GABA within the body and the two are believed at minimum to have a sort of synergistic relationship. At the very least, studies show that magnesium stimulates the activity of GABAergic systems within the brain, catalyzing some of the effects of this critical neurotransmitter.

About Our Magnesium Gel

As you can see, while studies are still forthcoming, there is at least a favored relationship between healthy magnesium levels in the body and healthy sleep patterns, if only for the ancillary effects of magnesium in regulating neurotransmitters associated with sleep onset, duration and quality.

Our magnesium gel is easy to apply topically, and is best applied to the backs of the knees, feet, hips, neck, arms, and abdomen, or elsewhere as needed, wherever pain is experienced.

It contains USP-grade, highly bioavailable magnesium chloride along with seaweed extract and aloe vera, and is formulated to help magnesium-deficient individuals supplement their magnesium intake easily and effectively.

Try It for Yourself

At the end of the day, if you, like many Americans, struggle with insomnia, there are many potential avenues at your disposal to address the issue. Whether or not a magnesium supplement can help is for you to try - and of course, your doctor may be able to advise.

You can learn more about our magnesium gel and spray supplements via the previous links, and get in touch with us at Hello@RawRevelations.com for more information.