Musician earplugs are highly popular these days with all the attention given to hearing damage that avid music lovers, rock stars and club employees were encountering without proper hearing protection. Alpine MusicSafe Pro earplugs are affordable music earplugs that allow you to choose the proper level of protection with three different attenuating filters: white for low level pub music, silver for music venues and gold for D.J.’s and others who are exposed to very loud music. I give these a top rating because they offer professional quality in protection, but at affordable rates for those of us who are not highly popular D.J.’s or rock stars!

Macks makes fantastic earplugs, none of which I’ve been disappointed with to date, but their Ultra SafeSound and Pillow Soft Kids earplugs are the most popular. The Ultra SafeSound earplugs are incredibly comfortable and versatile, perfect for drowning out a snoring partner or shooting at the range!

As adults, we learn to live with some discomforts that are necessary for safety (i.e. helmets), but kids are not always as easy to convince. I suppose that’s what makes the highly comfortable Pillow Soft Kids earplugs so popular! Kids don’t mind them because they are so comfortable!

Moldex earplugs typically reign supreme in industrial settings. Their dispensers are very popular with employers and employees alike because they make compliance so much easier. Moldex Spark Plugs earplugs offer a very high level of hearing protection, and just for fun (or compliance checks, I suppose), they are really colourful! The Moldex Mellows earplugs are perfect for folks that need hearing protection, but still need to communicate with each other. These are perfect for music venues as well as industry or construction where the equipment is not too terribly loud.

Heartech Silent Ear earplugs can block 32 decibels, making them perfect for situations that require high levels of protection. They are reusable, making them a popular choice for folks who want to save money. To boot, they are really comfortable with this neat, squishy gel-filled plug that fits comfortably in your ear canal and blocks an incredible amount of sound. Even the noisiest sleeping partner can be easily tuned out!

Overall, there are many great earplugs on the market today, but I can see why the above remain on top!

Cheers!

Meghan

The subjects in the study both ate healthy, low calorie diets to promote weight loss. Both groups (sleep deprived and well-rested) lost weight during the study, but the sleep deprived group lost mostly lean body mass with only 26% of their weight loss being fat. The well-rested group experienced a fat loss of 57%!

In another study, a control group that received 10 hours of sleep per night and ate a normal diet didn’t gain any weight while the sleep restricted group gained weight while eating the same diet.

The bottom line is that adequate sleep is beneficial to your weight loss efforts. Adequate sleep is really quite important to any area of health, so it’s important you do what you can to ensure a good night’s rest.

If you are distracted by noise at night (snoring partner, yapping dogs), you have a several sleeping earplug options. Foam earplugs are the most comfortable and you can purchase them in different sizes for smaller ear canals. Women tend to have smaller ear canals and obviously, children do as well. Reusable sleeping earplugs also work quite well, and they can be used for other purposes around the home (studying, mowing the lawn etc.).

Maybe noise isn’t the issue. Some people can’t stand the silence of night. If you need soothing music or sound to lull you to sleep, your solution may be a sound pillow. This is my favourite new product because I happen to be a big music fan (surely you’ve learned this by now!). My husband, on the other hand, does not like to listen to music while falling asleep, so the sound pillow was the perfect solution. He doesn’t hear a thing!

Your difficulty falling asleep may have nothing to do with noise, lack thereof or otherwise. Perhaps it’s light! I love my black satin shut-eye shade. It’s really comfortable, and I even seem to wake up with less crinkles, creases and puffiness around my eyes. You know what they say. As we get older, those little sleep lines stay on our faces longer throughout the day and eventually, become permanent!

If you still have trouble sleeping, you might consider changing your evening routine. I find that watching too much television before I go to bed keeps my mind working overtime. Instead, I started reading for a bit and taking a warm bath in lavender water (add a few drops of lavender oil to your bath). Afterwards, I climb into bed and sail off to sleep listening to my favourite artist of the day on my sound pillow!

Sweet Dreams!

Meghan

I’ve been using my sleep earplugs for quite some time, but I still had a problem. The morning sun! I like to sleep in a bit when I can, mostly at the weekend. It helps me catch up on sleep I may have missed over the week due to a hectic schedule. I’ve tried different shades over the windows, but they seemed to clutter up my windows and shrink my rather small bedroom. Macks Black Satin Shut Eye Shade was the perfect solution, and I’m so happy that my mother sent it to me!

The luxurious black satin is not only attractive, but it’s very soft and comfortable with a padded nose bridge that keeps the shade from pressing against my eyelids. If you work at night, this is a must have for sleeping during the day. I’ve noticed one other benefit that they don’t even use in their advertising. Because the padded nose bridge keeps the mask from pressing against my eyelids, my eyes look less puffy and creased in the morning! Could this be a small anti-aging benefit to the mask?

In addition, she sent me something that is helping me drift off to sleep to my favourite music, Mack’s Sound Pillow. This ingenious creation lets me plug my iPod into the 2 speakers found in the comfortable standard size pillow. I get to drift off while listening to my favourite piano music or on occasion, Keith Urban singing into my ear! And because my husband cannot hear the pillow (so your sleep partner is not disturbed), he doesn’t really need to know why I’m smiling! (he-he)

You know what else? I’ve found another use for Mack’s Sound Pillow! When my son has one of his famous temper tantrum meltdowns, I tell him it’s music time. Within a few minutes after he lies down on the sound pillow, he calms down and we’re able to actually talk about what he did wrong. It’s been an immense help!

Mack’s Sound Pillow can also be used for noise therapy for people who suffer from tinnitus (painful ringing in the ear). Tinnitus is usually the worst when the environment is completely silent like it often is at night. The sound pillow can provide noise and eliminate the problem. Noise therapy is also great for autistic children. Talk to your child’s team of medical caregivers to see if your autistic child would benefit from Mack’s Sound Pillow.

The fact is that hearing loss can occur at decibel levels that we are exposed to constantly. Continuous exposure to 85 decibels or more can cause permanent hearing loss or damage as seen in tinnitus (constant, painful, ringing in the ears).

Whether you are listening to an iPod or mowing the lawn, you might be incurring permanent hearing damage. Some of your kid’s toys can have a decibel level of 150!! Yikes! I guess it wasn’t just annoying background noise after all!

Women’s earplugs are designed to fit your smaller ear canals and seal out the dangerous decibels while allowing you to hear sounds. Sorry, you won’t be able to tune out the 200th ‘Mum, I want…’ of the day. You will be, however, able to mow the lawn or protect your ears from your teen’s blaring rap music.

Speaking of which, what about that blaring music? I love music and used to enjoy listening to it quite loudly, but I’ve since learned that it was quality I was craving, not hearing damaging noise! Musician’s earplugs filter the sound, reducing dangerous decibels and distortion, allowing a better quality sound into your ears.

If you do (or your teen does) listen to music via an iPod or other personal music device, you might consider investing in custom earphones. Remember that damage occurs at 85 decibels. A personal music device can reach decibel levels of 100 or more causing damage after just 15 minutes of exposure on a daily basis.

Does your spouse snore? Noisy dog next door? Sleeping earplugs can drown out the noise and allow you to sleep. I know that I need all the energy I can get, and a sleepless night is more than irritating. After missing just one night of rest, trying to keep up with all that I do can really put me behind and ruin my week!

Sleep is important for our health. It’s when our bodies replenish and rejuvenate from the day’s events. Chronic sleep deprivation because of noise can lead to irritability, fuzzy thinking, fatigue, sluggishness and even premature aging!

We live in a noisy world. Traffic, office chatter and industrial sounds seem to surround us whenever we are out and about. Home is a noisy place too sometimes. Protect your ears and those of your children’s and enjoy a more peaceful life. Do it for your health and your sanity!

Cheers for now!

Meghan

A while back, we moved to a different house and sleeping became very difficult for me. Our new neighbours and their barking dog who I swear, barked louder than any dog I’d ever heard, kept me up at night. My husband had started snoring again because he’d gained back some of the weight he lost. I thought I’d lose my mind!

Adequate sleep is so important for our overall health. Sleep deprivation can cause a host of health issues such as obvious fatigue, sluggishness, cloudy thinking and irritability. Over time, sleep deprivation can also manifest into very serious health problems such as weight gain, diminished cardiovascular health, poor neurological health and decreased immunity.

Sleeping earplugs may be necessary if there’s nothing you can do about the noises that are disturbing your sleep. I tried some that I found at a local drug store, but they were so uncomfortable that although the noise was blocked, I couldn’t keep them in for very long because the sleeping earplugs were now distracting me.

I have small ears, so finding a pair of earplugs that fit comfortably and sealed out the barking dog and my snoring husband wasn’t easy. A friend told me about custom earplugs that are made by having an impression taken of your ears (sort of like a dental impression but with different material) and then a lab designs the earplugs so that they fit perfectly.

This sounded good, but having this done through a healthcare professional would have been quite expensive. Fortunately, ProGuard Custom Sleep Earplugs offers an affordable solution that was really simple. Macks Pillow Soft Earplugs are even more affordable and work for many different ear types.

My husband has since lost the weight and quit snoring, but Barney the dog next door is still barking away and I’m so thankful that I don’t have to let him disturb my sleep! My energy levels are back to normal and I don’t have to worry about lack of sleep affecting my health anymore.

In my search for a sleeping solution, I found a lot of helpful advice on improving sleep quality. For instance, did you know that when you shop for a new mattress, you should take your sleeping partner with you and try out the bed? Well, there’s only so much you can do to test a mattress in a public store, but in all seriousness, you should lie on the bed together for at least 5 minutes, switching sleeping positions.

Another little trick is to make sure your room is ‘sleepable.’ Not only should you have soothing, tranquil colours for your bedroom decor such as blue or green, but it’s a good idea to eliminate ‘work’ related items. Many of us keep a computer or piece of exercise equipment in our bedrooms, but the mere site of these items when you are trying to fall asleep may subconsciously stimulate your brain because you associate work with these items.

Hope this helps!

Cheers for now!

Meghan

P.S. For a peaceful night and better health, try ProGuard Custom Sleep Earplugs or Macks Pillow Soft Earplugs. http://www.earplugshop.com/shopping/categories/sleep-snoring-earplugs/.