EXTREME Night Owl

[xisnotx]

So am I the only one who has completely given up on keeping regular sleeping hours?

I don't have any recognizable sleeping patterns...all I do have is 4 hours in the day where I have to be up. I'll force myself out of bed (if I happen to be in bed) for those four hours...but everything else is scheduled around that. I can be going to bed at 7 am or 7 pm. I just go to bed when I'm tired. I wake up when I'm no longer tired. If I have an obligation I always schedule it so it can be done within the next waking block. If that isn't possible ( ie it has to be done within the sleeping block that I will probably be asleep for next..)I just put it off. If it's really that important...I'll get up for it...but nothing is really ever that important. Everything can be rescheduled (except those things that can't be...but the key is to limit that).

My sleeping blocks can last anywhere from 4 to 15 hours.....and my waking blocks can be anywhere from 12 to 24 hours. I figure in the end I probably average around 8....but I have gone many "days" where I only get 5 hours of sleep each sleeping block...and I have completely crashed and gone on 16 hours sleep binges.

It's one of the reasons I want to live in huge city. I want to get a job where I can continue this. Get up...get bored...go to work...get bored...do something else...get bored....go back to work...get bored....get tired....do something else...do something else...go to bed. Rinse and repeat.

But waking up at a set time everyday...that's so depressing.

It get's messy when you have too many obligation that all sneak up on you...especially when they are scheduled like 6 to 8 hours apart. But I just find ways too make it work because I know if my schedule is that intense for a week or so...the next couple weeks are going to be blissfully obligation free...

A goal in my life is be able to fall asleep for however long I like and be up for however long I'd like and still have a happy family, a good paying job, and a decent social life. I think it's more probable that something like that would happen in a big city...and an open minded partner of course..

 

[Fluffywolf]

Delayed sleep phase syndrome

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_syndrome

I suffer from that. My 'biological day' or something lasts ~27 hours So every day if I go to sleep and get up about my day when I do, my sleeping patterns keeps moving 3 hours ahead each day. This was hell when I was still in school. (Always tired during schooltime, not starting to feel awake until the evening, not being able to get to sleep again at night, rinse and repeat.)

Now I work at irregular times, one day I start at 3am, sleep 2/3 hours in the afternoon and get home at 10, other days I start at 12pm and get off at 8, or I start at 20pm and work through the night to 9am, etc. As long as I have on average one full day a week completely to myself, I seem to be able to manage it fine. And whilest I had the hardest time getting to sleep at desired moments and waking up in time in the past with regular work schedules. I don't have any issue with that anymore. Now I can go to sleep and set my alarm whenever, and if the week is catching up with me, I'll sleep it off in my free day. :>

If I go to sleep at 22pm, and need to get up at 3am, it just works now. It's like I mentally prepare for the workload I have to do the next day, so my body just shuts down relatively easy in preparation. And I feel relatively awake when I need too. And only feel tired whenever I actually have the chance to nap or sleep.




Still, it does take me a good 30 mins to an hour to get to sleep on average, I think that's just what being NTP is about. But the time you lie down you'll get rest as well.

 

[strychnine]

It is almost 8 am here. I have tried to sleep once, but I couldn't fall asleep, so I got back up and here I am. It was not like this even a few months ago. These days my brain is always running in every direction at like, warp speed. In a good way. It isn't negative like it once was, either. And the latest running was not even about MBTI, which is wonderful, haha.

i used to stay up til 5-6am in the morning be at yoga by 9am,
up until last month. i was able to that because i was sleeping
twice a day. 6-9am and nap around 6-8pm.

now i'm sleeping once a day. and can't make it past 1 am.
get up at 5.30am. the quality of energy is much lower than when
i was sleeping twice a day.

YES. I think this is called biphasic sleep, it was wonderful when I did it (two years ago, I maintained it for about 4 months, one semester). Your post has inspired me to re-adapt to the schedule soon, probably in May at the latest, and then I can have a much more energetic/productive summer. I totally agree about the energy boost too!

 

[mrcockburn]

So am I the only one who has completely given up on keeping regular sleeping hours?

I don't have any recognizable sleeping patterns...all I do have is 4 hours in the day where I have to be up. I'll force myself out of bed (if I happen to be in bed) for those four hours...but everything else is scheduled around that. I can be going to bed at 7 am or 7 pm. I just go to bed when I'm tired. I wake up when I'm no longer tired. If I have an obligation I always schedule it so it can be done within the next waking block. If that isn't possible ( ie it has to be done within the sleeping block that I will probably be asleep for next..)I just put it off. If it's really that important...I'll get up for it...but nothing is really ever that important. Everything can be rescheduled (except those things that can't be...but the key is to limit that).

My sleeping blocks can last anywhere from 4 to 15 hours.....and my waking blocks can be anywhere from 12 to 24 hours. I figure in the end I probably average around 8....but I have gone many "days" where I only get 5 hours of sleep each sleeping block...and I have completely crashed and gone on 16 hours sleep binges.

It's one of the reasons I want to live in huge city. I want to get a job where I can continue this. Get up...get bored...go to work...get bored...do something else...get bored....go back to work...get bored....get tired....do something else...do something else...go to bed. Rinse and repeat.

But waking up at a set time everyday...that's so depressing.

It get's messy when you have too many obligation that all sneak up on you...especially when they are scheduled like 6 to 8 hours apart. But I just find ways too make it work because I know if my schedule is that intense for a week or so...the next couple weeks are going to be blissfully obligation free...

A goal in my life is be able to fall asleep for however long I like and be up for however long I'd like and still have a happy family, a good paying job, and a decent social life. I think it's more probable that something like that would happen in a big city...and an open minded partner of course..

Oh wow. That's sounds pretty chaotic. Do you plan on the duration of your sleeping/waking blocks so that you can schedule your activities/obligations accordingly?

How do you handle work and/or school? I'd think that regular schedules would be necessary.

 

[xisnotx]

Oh wow. That's sounds pretty chaotic. Do you plan on the duration of your sleeping/waking blocks so that you can schedule your activities/obligations accordingly?

How do you handle work and/or school? I'd think that regular schedules would be necessary.

Not really. I think my body handles it. If I know that I need to be somewhere at some point in time...I mentally tell my body to be ready for it. My body then tells me if it wants sleep now...or later...with the knowledge that it won't be able to sleep for a certain time block.

Work isn't a problem..I hardly work anyway. I guess I got lucky and got a job where they are pretty flexible about the hours that you can choose to work. So if I know I want to work...I just call and ask when the next available time I can work is. If it falls within the next probable sleep block then I just say I can't do it. I guess I fill in a lot as well. And like I said..I hardly work anyway..so I only need the schedules to line up around 3-4 times out of a possible 20ish times per week to fill my "quota"..I'm not sure how exactly it's coordinated lol..( I get so bored sometimes that I call in too much and they tell me I'm hogging all the hours)

As for school...that's the 4 hour block that I need to be awake for. I guess I just tell my body that it's going to have to be awake for a four hour block but it can be asleep for however long before or after that. And my body is like..."well at least you told me..."

I went to bed at around 3am last night...woke up at 10ish...about to finish my obligatory waking period..(I should be doing something else)...and after that I'm going to tell my body that I'm going to need to be up by 9am Wednesday for another 4 hour waking period...and it will tell me if it needs sleep before then (which it will) and how much (I'm guessing like around 6 hours)...and when..(towards the later half...I'll probably fall asleep at around 1am and wake up around 7am).or maybe I'll take a 4 hour nap after class...and be up until 5ish am and then take another 3 hour nap before 9am Wednesday...or something....at this point I'm not sure...I could easily end up doing something that keeps me away from sleep.

 

[mrcockburn]

oh man... I've been a zombie all day, partially because I stayed up till 4am last night, messing around reading things. And then had to wake at 6am for class.

Bright daylight seems to make me even sleepier, does this happen to anyone else?

I took 30mg of Adderall and downed 500mg of caffeine. No energy boost, just nausea.

knowing me, I'll get an energy boost around 8pm tonight. Hopefully. Because my deadline for a client's project is tomorrow.

 

[Orangey]

Bright daylight seems to make me even sleepier, does this happen to anyone else?

Yes, which is why I've been known to fall asleep even in a crowded, sweltering bus in the middle of a sunny day.

I took 30mg of Adderall and downed 500mg of caffeine. No energy boost, just nausea.

Ugh, yeah, taking adderall in that state does away with most of its benefits, and it tends to make the come-down side effects more extreme and difficult. Though I guess it does make me stay awake.

 

[Octarine]

Install a timer on your electricity supply, so that your house doesn't receive electricity when it is dark outside. You'll adjust to a normal sleeping rhythm within a few weeks.

 

[entropie]

I am a night person, definitly. I have made a sign I am wearing in mornings for my estj boss saying "No I dont have a bad mood, I am just not awake yet" .

Not to many years ago, when I signed up on this board, I tended to be awake til 5 am and to work on little sleep. On weekends then I slept insane hours. Nowadays I think getting up early enables you to get a lot more shit done, in job and at University. I always thought the time before lunch is the shortest one, but if you are in your office at 7 am, you wonder how long a day is and how much time you have. It#s very important for me to have at least 5-6 hours of sleep, otherwise I wont function properly, but if you get up at 6:30 am, it's no problem to go back to bed around 11-midnight