Dr. Andy Galpin: Ventilation in the room is critically important. People don't pay attention to this. One of the biggest reasons people wake up during the night is because they can't breathe through their nose. One of the biggest reasons people can't breathe through their nose is dander, pollen, allergens, something like that start to block it up, whether that's completely blocked or not. But then you open up and you start mouth breathing. Mouth breathing then means your tongue is a bigger issue, as well as your mouth can get dehydrated or get dry rather, and you have a little bit of a dry mouth. And you need to have a drink of water at night. These things can happen. This will wake people up a ton. You want to make sure that you have proper ventilation in your room.

Dr. Andy Galpin: One of the things that also happens in this is CO2. CO2 levels rise above 900 parts per million. This will significantly and dramatically affect everything from sleep onset, sleep quality, next-day perceived fatigue, next-day arithmetic ability. CO2 getting too high in a room can happen because your doors and windows are all closed. If you have multiple bodies, you and your partner, your dog is in there, all of you are now kicking out CO2 into the room, right? You're exhaling. If that room is small and again, lack of ventilation, that number starts to rise. If you are particularly sensitive to CO2 as well, which many people are, then that kicks off that entire cascade. You get pushed way more into sympathetic drive.

Dr. Andy Galpin: And again, the biggest issue is you will see a subjective and objective massive change in fatigue and energy and cognitive function the next day. People rarely think and talk about CO2 concentrations in your room. This is a classic case of like, I do all the things, I've listened to Matt Walker, like I do all of it and I still suck at sleep. We start thinking about what's going on in your physical environment.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Okay. So a CO2 monitor, I have one. So getting a CO2 monitor. What's the number?

Dr. Andy Galpin: 900 parts per million.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: 900.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: So you don't want to be above that?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Yep. You will see typically 1,200, 1,300 in people, like really consistently. That's not that bad. Most of the problems happen at like 2,000, 2,500, 3,000. So if you're freaking out, you're like, oh my God, Andy said 900 and I'm at 1,000.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Okay. Don't worry about it. So what do you do to improve your airflow? I mean, just open a window?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Okay. You have tons of combinations of things you can do here. On both ends of the spectrum. Number one, you can actually just become more resilient to CO2. So if you work on your CO2 tolerance, this will help, especially if you're CO2 intolerant. Outside of that, lower the amount in the room. If you can open up windows at night, that's great. If you can have less bodies in your room, that's great. Those two things are generally not very much of an option for people. Awesome. Can you get high ventilation in that room before you go to bed? Have your doors and windows open. Get that number down.

Dr. Andy Galpin: When I used to live here in LA, we— our house was probably, I don't know, 2,400 square feet, multiple level. And we're in LA, so our doors and windows are closed because air quality is just— it is what it is here. It would not be uncommon for us to just, by the time it's like 7 o'clock at night, have 2,200 parts per million. Like, you're like, oh my gosh, it's up there. And it would take us hours to open up windows and just like let the CO2 clear in the house, right? You're talking about 4 humans, 2 dogs, and even in a pretty big place, that fills up pretty fast. So can you start that process earlier? As earlier in the day, can you again open up windows in the house? If not, at least open up your, your sleeping space so that airflow can get in and out of that.

Dr. Andy Galpin: If you need to turn a physical fan on to do that, that's another option. And it will drop pretty fast by doing that.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Okay. What about people's nose that are closing up? I mean, you know, if you have a lot of pollen, let's say you have pet dander. I mean, do you, do you have to get these allergen pillowcases? Like, how do you, how do you stop your nose from closing up?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Okay, so a bunch of different things there as well. One, same exact answer. Try to get as much of that cleared out of there as possible before the nighttime starts right now. You'll particularly see this with people who are like, my nose is fine throughout the day and I just wake up at night. It only happens at night, only happens in my bedroom. When you lay down or something. Part of that's gravity.

Dr. Andy Galpin: Part of that's physically gravity, right? Like you're laying up here, you're standing up here, all right? And you go backwards and then it's going to sit in there. So like part of it is that. So number 1, do all the things I just talked about, cleaning the air out of there. If you want to get an air filter and then specifically put it in or above or around your bedroom, that is a great option. So you can go there as a next step. Third step is you can just use Flonase. You can use a very simple nasal dilator, right? So whether this is actually like a nose strip that you can put on, we use a bunch of different companies for this, or an actual, like, injection, right?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Like again, like a Flonase, and you can squirt it in your nose before bed, dilate your nose, you can stop having problems that way. So those are 3 or 4 different things you can try. We've used and we'll use all those things pretty consistently, and they're all pretty beneficial and they work pretty well. There's, there's some amount of just like, like morning gunk you'll have. That's normal. That's okay. But if this is consistently waking up with dry mouth and nose completely clogged, then I would do all those steps. Past that, then you got to really start thinking about special pillowcases and, and different solutions like that. But those are more expensive.

Dr. Andy Galpin: The rest of the stuff I mentioned is

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: So if you were going to, let's say, have the 3 highest impact behavior changes to improve sleep?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Yeah, I'd say have a consistent approach, timing, system, whatever you want to— routine, number one. And I want to be really clear. I know I'm running out, but that doesn't mean 45 minutes of breathwork and meditation. Like, that's not the routine. The routine can just simply be, I do the dishes and then I brush my teeth and then I check my— like, that is fine for the routine. It doesn't have to be this big, like, 90-minute, my phone's gone. And like, that's not what I'm referring to. Just do the same thing as much as you can in the same order, in the same routine.

Dr. Andy Galpin: Number 2, make sure that your physical environment—

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: What about temperature, sound, light?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Like, you're taking account of that. If you don't have a CO2 sensor or an environmental scanner, we like we send that out to everybody so they always have those. Just open up the ventilation anyways, so you can do those steps regardless of the testing. So that'd be my second biggest one.

Dr. Rhonda Patrick: Another one that you would maybe say pops off that's abnormal?

Dr. Andy Galpin: Yeah, honestly, like the wind-down cue is pretty popular. So making sure just because you're fatigued and you know you're going to fall asleep quickly, that you're still doing something to make sure that your parasympathetic system is actually turned on. That's a little bit different, right?

Dr. Andy Galpin: So we always say, like, turn on the off switch. We want to do whatever that takes for you. For some people that's reading; for other people that's not. Like, for me, reading doesn't do it. Breathwork will not do it. I actually have to have something that physically triggers my brain, like, gives me permission to let go for the day. That means I'm doing something that is so unproductive. I'm probably reading some blog that 4 other people read about what the Seattle Seahawks did with their 12th-string wide receiver. Like, it's something that is clearly not work-related for me. That is what I feel like is a waste of time. That is just a trigger for me to go, yeah, it's your time. You don't have to be productive. You don't have to answer anybody.

Dr. Andy Galpin: Like, all the input, everybody wants something from you all day. You're spent. So I'm doing that. I'm watching something non-inspiring or motivational on TV, whatever the case is. Right? Like that's hunting videos for me. That's like outdoor stuff. I'm like watching cool things like that. It makes me super happy and I check out. That doesn't work for Natasha. Like, it doesn't work for her at all. Whatever it is that cues you that your day's over, you give your brain permission to be done for the day. That's it. So that would be my 3 big areas that people can try.