Everybody suffers from either poor quality or poor quantity of sleep at some stage.

South east London-based personal trainer Mike Fitzgerald of Root Fitness is on a mission to help you sleep better.

He said: “There are of course many factors that affect your sleep – nutrition, exercise, hormone balance etc but we can help ourselves by trying to implement some simple steps to give us the best chance of a good night’s sleep.”

So, how do we give ourselves the best chance of a good nights sleep? Follow Root Fitness’s step-by-step bedtime routine:

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Stop drinking caffeine at 4pm. Gradually move this forward to 2pm if you can.

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Eat your last meal three hours before going to bed.

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Turn off all electronics 60 minutes before going to bed, preferably stretch this to two hours if you can. This includes any screen – TV, laptop, phone etc.

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Try to go to bed, and wake up at the same time each day, e.g. asleep by 11pm, wake at 7am.

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Make sure your bedroom is as dark as possible, no lights, blackout blinds etc

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Read for 30 to 60 minutes, preferably fiction of some sort.

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Rather than ‘trying’ to get to sleep, make relaxation the goal. Try to be as relaxed and ‘heavy’ as possible.

Find out more at rootfitness.co.uk and like Root Fitness onfacebook.com/rootfitnessltd or find their page dedicated to help women going through the menopause, hotflushfree.wordpress.com