After 8 years of disrupted sleep since the birth of her eldest daughter, journalist Clémentine Sarlat finally regained peaceful nights thanks to four levers that she shares in episode 277 of her podcast “La Matrescence”
“By focusing so much on my daughters’ sleep, I neglected my own and my immense struggles.” This is how Clémentine Sarlat opens the new episode of her podcast, La Matrescence . A mother of three daughters, she spent eight years trying to soothe their nights… at the expense of her own. Added to this parental exhaustion is a state of hypervigilance and a painful separation, which plunged her into what she describes as “great distress” and a “state of extreme fatigue.”
“Each night, I slept less than 4 hours, never in a row, waking up every 30 minutes. I experienced something that I likened to hell,” she confides.
After months of chaotic nights, her sleep remained deeply disturbed. It was at this point that she received a consultation from one of France’s leading sleep specialists, Professor Pierre Philip, who offered her concrete solutions to rebuild her sleep patterns.
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Regaining control of your nights
To begin this rebuilding process, Clémentine Sarlat focuses on four key areas. The first involves identifying one’s circadian rhythm : what time does one naturally wake up, and what time should one go to bed to be truly rested? Like many parents, she had often pushed back bedtime to grab a few extra minutes of peace and quiet. A strategy that, in the long run, depletes energy.
The second key is regularity: going to bed and waking up at fixed times, including weekends . “Maintaining a consistent sleep schedule can help regulate your circadian rhythm, which impacts the quality and quantity of your sleep,” neuropsychologist Sanam Hafeez reminded the media outlet Very Well Mind in 2024.
Better understand your sleep thanks to monitoring tools
To monitor her sleep and its fluctuations, the journalist then decided to invest in a dedicated device, which she considered “revolutionary.” For her, it would be the Oura Ring — but other watches and trackers exist.
Thanks to this data, she learns to better organize her daily life: eating dinner earlier, adjusting her bedtime, synchronizing her nights with her hormones and menstrual cycle… but also identifying what, for her, really promotes deep and restorative sleep.
Read also: The politics of beauty sleep and rest: prioritising peace over productivity
Explore potential deficiencies
The final avenue explored was checking for potential deficiencies that could disrupt sleep. In her case, severe anemia and magnesium and zinc deficiencies may have played a role.
Without offering a miracle cure—nor encouraging self-diagnosis—Clémentine Sarlat primarily opens up avenues for reflection to understand the origin of sleep disorders that are too often minimized. Her experience reminds us that disrupted sleep is never a minor detail and deserves real attention.
Her final message is clear: don’t underestimate your sleep difficulties. Talk to healthcare professionals, who can help you explore different avenues and get back to more peaceful nights.
This story was originally published by Emmanuelle Ringot on the Marie Claire France website.
Translated and syndicated for Marie Claire Nigeria by Denise Eseimokumoh
