With the holidays fast approaching, a lot of people are going to be traveling and posting up in other’s homes. This also means that hosting duties will be in full swing for many — whether it’s the family home welcoming the kids home from college, or friends traveling across the country to share in the festivities.

If you have promised to host this year, you might already be feeling the anxiety of it all. In fact, recent surveys have found that hosting can actually be pretty bad for your sleep schedule, with the average host losing around 2.5 hours of regular sleep a night.

For those that rely on a good night’s sleep each night to function as a productive, friendly human being in this world, opening up the home might be approached with a little more caution.

There are a few reasons why it’s so hard on sleep health to host, and thankfully there are also ways to protect yourself from burning out. So, let’s take a closer look at why hosting is exhausting and what you can do to remedy it.

Stress of getting ready

Opening up the home to guests — either family or friends — can take a lot of effort. Often the host will want to do a full clean of the bathrooms and the room they will be staying in, and a freshening up of everything else.

This might include washing all the bedding, vacuuming, or generally tidying up the personal things that lay about when no one else is around. Hosts want their guests to be comfortable and this might mean giving up their own bed or investing in a new mattress for the spare room.

Lots of hosts will also stock the fridge and the liquor cabinet, make sure the yard is looking fresh, and decorate for the season. It is exhausting! It’s actually the lead up to the guests’ arrival that is the most stressful as the host wants to put their best foot forward.

Adjusting sleep schedules

Some guests will be traveling from different time zones, perhaps from halfway around the world and their sleep schedules will be different than the hosts. Also, having guests usually means that you are staying up later than usual, catching up and maybe celebrating the visit over drinks.

Sometimes you sleep in later, or the hosts will get up early to put coffee on and start breakfast. If the guests are sleeping in the living room, then it might be challenging to do any of your morning routine because you don’t want to wake your guests.

If you want to make sure that your sleep health is not compromised by hosting duties, there are a few steps you can take to make sure that everyone is getting the rest they need. Here are some tips.

Plan ahead

See what your guests needs are — what time do they normally go to bed and wake up? What do they need to be comfortable in the morning? You can get the coffee set up in the morning and show them where the breakfast food options are, or direct the to the nearby cafe so they can get what they need if they wake up before you.

Lay down some ground rules

Having company can mean late nights, but that can take a toll. So it might be a good idea to limit the festivities to one big night, and plan for some downtime in between. Maybe pepper in a movie night or some fun activities during the day so that you are exhausted in the evening.

Enjoy!

It can be easy to build up resentment when guests stay over, so it’s a good idea to remember that it will only be for a few nights so you might as well make the most of it. We can all remember a recent difficult time when we weren’t able to see family or friends and you never know when life can change quickly. So enjoy the time together! It is precious.

Having company is wonderful, but it can certainly throw sleep schedules off track. You can always plan an exit strategy and see what nearby hotels have free rooms, but having guests over to sleep on your comfortably mattress and enjoy your home is really a special gift.