7 ms·

I'm glad that I finally have something (albeit thin) to point people to when they feel the need to lecture me about my sleeping habits. As long as I can rememb

I'm glad that I finally have something (albeit thin) to point people to when they feel the need to lecture me about my sleeping habits. As long as I can remember I've been happy with a mix of 4 and 6 hour sleeping sessions, two or three days of 4 followed by one night of more sleep (typically 6 hours) and then back to 4 hours again. Under the recommendation of my peers and physicians I have attempted to do 8 hour nights but the results are that I feel worse in the morning, and each night I attempt to sleep 8 hours waking up gets harder and harder. Over the years I've developed a few theories as to why I need less sleep than is recommended and someday when I get around to finishing my EEG project I'll gather some data to back them up, but for now I'm just making the most out of the extra time I have the same way someone with a different biological advantage might. I will also mention that (as mentioned elsewhere here) there are definitely people at the other end of this curve who's performance is shockingly better if they get more than the "required" 8 hours of sleep per night, and I believe that we could all benefit by recognizing this fact and adjusting our cultural expectations to accommodate these patterns as well. I think with a little flexibility on both ends we'd see a significant increase in overall productivity and quality of life. In other words "When hungry, eat. When tired, sleep." - http://users.rider.edu/~suler/zenstory/whentired.html http://users.rider.edu/~suler/zenstory/whentired.html

Homunculiheaded 16y ago
I've had a similar experience, since I hit my teenage years I rarely sleep more than just a few hours a night. At that time I would typically sleep 3-4 hours a night, and then really crash on the weekends. But as I got older I needed less and less weekend sleep. Whenever I try to go to bed earlier or sleep in to get close to 8 hours (even for extended periods of time) I find that I'm just as tired, if not more so than if I had gotten less sleep. The only thing that I've found does make a difference is a short nap in the middle of the day, I find 1/2 hour in the day can easily make up for several hours at night. But that's where the cultural problem is, I've had office jobs where I could get away with taking a nap, but it would still be frowned upon, which is always a bit sad since it make it clear that many offices cultures would prefer the illusion of busy-ness over actual increased production.
- jasongullickson 16y ago
  Absolutely, if I can go "lights out" for 30 minutes during the day (between 1:00pm and 2:00pm works best for me) I can eliminate the need for the "catch-up" sleep.
  - jules 16y ago
    I've tried this but I am unable to fall asleep unless I'm extremely tired (and I do mean very tired, one night without sleep is not enough). How do you fall asleep within half an hour?
    - jasongullickson 16y ago
      I remove myself from my "work" situation (when I worked a rigidly scheduled job, I'd take a drive to a nearby park) and just lay back and relax. If the weather is cooperative having the car windows down and some nature sounds to listen to seem to help but I imagine listening to anything that you don't have direct control over (as opposed to music, other forms of entertainment, etc.) would work. Also a large lunch at a Mexican restaurant never hurts...
    - CamperBob 16y ago
      You may not actually need to sleep. I find that just lying down for 30-60 minutes in a dark, quiet room provides ~80% of the 'recovery' value of a real nap.
cynicalkane 16y ago
For me, If I get all the sleep I want, I'm lethargic and unenergetic, but if I get less sleep I'm tired all day (but strangely more energetic). It's like there's no happy medium. I wonder if anyone else has this problem, and if there's a solution.
- kroger 16y ago
  I'm just like that. I can sleep for 10 hours but I wake up feeling rested but lethargic. There seems to be a sweet spot where I'm rested enough (but not lethargic) and with a good energy level. The sweet spot seems to be between 7 and 7.5 hours.
- de90 16y ago
  Do you exercise most days? Do you at least a similar wake up\sleep time for a month? And another obvious about drink enough water\food? All have a huge impact for me. I can go on much less sleep when I do hard exercise that day.
  - ghshephard 16y ago
    Re: Hard Exercise - Bizarre. I work a mostly sedentary silicon valley lifestyle, with the addition of 2-3 miles walking a day, and typically get 5-6 hours of sleep a night, going to bed around 2:00 - 3:00 AM and getting up around 9:00 AM. Recently, though, I started a linear progress novice strength training program (Squats, Dead Lift, Bench Press, Overhead Press) - three times a week for 40 minutes. My sleep patterns immediately shifted, and I am incapable of waking up without at least 8 hours of sleep on off days, and 10 hours of sleep on the days that I lift heavy. For the first time in my life, ever, I'm finding myself going to bed at 10:00 PM at night so that I can get up by 8:00 AM the next morning.
    - cynicalkane 16y ago
      I've done Starting Strength. Starting Strength is raw lifts involving the entire muscle toolchain until you can't do anymore. It works your body in a total, basic way that most Americans haven't ever done. So you'll be sleeping alot as your body gets used to it. You'll notice incredible increases in everyday strength--as if the entire world, including you, lost a significant fraction of its mass over the course of a few months--and the desire for sleep will subside. Of course, I still have my original sleep problem...
bconway 16y ago
Did you read the entire article? Nobody knows how many natural short sleepers are out there. "There aren't nearly as many as there are people who think they're short sleepers," says Daniel J. Buysse, a psychiatrist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and a past president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, a professional group. Out of every 100 people who believe they only need five or six hours of sleep a night, only about five people really do, Dr. Buysse says. The rest end up chronically sleep deprived, part of the one-third of U.S. adults who get less than the recommended seven hours of sleep per night, according to a report last month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
- Groxx 16y ago
  The following paragraph: >To date, only a handful of small studies have looked at short sleepers—in part because they're hard to find. They rarely go to sleep clinics and don't think they have a disorder. While I think it's over-diagnosed, ADD is an excellent example here. When it was first getting attention, people being diagnosed were rarities. That skyrocketed when more people were watching for it. Similarly, stress, nervous, and depression disorders once actual treatments appeared, and there was a reason to get diagnosed and treated.
liuliu 16y ago
The problem of "when hungry, eat. When tired, sleep" is: In modern societies, our inner evolutionary traits still work, but the environment changed. For example, some food are more satisfying than others, and we feel less full when we indeed have enough (sugar/fat for example). The same is true for "tiredness". With TVs, iPads and mattresses, we may well be tired but we just cannot feel it strong enough. The distortion may be the single biggest problem for modern people IMHO.
- jasongullickson 16y ago
  Yes you make a good point (one I have experienced myself). I spent a lot of time as a teenager learning to become aware of the subtle signs your body gives you to indicate what it needs to remain balanced (I got these exercises from a Marine hand-to-hand combat booklet if you can imagine). It takes practice and discipline (and it's easy to overlook when you're busy) but it is possible to "tune-in" to these subtle signals. It also helps to remove yourself from "modern society" now and again. A few days in the woods away from artificial stimulus goes a long way in this regard.
dfischer 16y ago
Do you use an alarm?
mzl 16y ago
The problem with "when hungry, eat", is that hunger is not really a good indicator for sustenance needs for humans. Living in western countries, we are surrounded by easily obtainable and addictive foods and nutrients. If we let hunger control our eating, especially in this kind of environment, most people tend to over-eat. Combined with recent results that caloric restriction and potentially intermittent fasting may be very healthy choices, I think it might be likely that hunger is really a maladaptation in modern society. I do fully agree with the part "When tired, sleep". Unfortunately it is very hard to apply if I also want to maintain a working home-life with a significant other that has a different sleep-pattern.

Homunculiheaded 16y ago

I've had a similar experience, since I hit my teenage years I rarely sleep more than just a few hours a night. At that time I would typically sleep 3-4 hours a night, and then really crash on the weekends. But as I got older I needed less and less weekend sleep. Whenever I try to go to bed earlier or sleep in to get close to 8 hours (even for extended periods of time) I find that I'm just as tired, if not more so than if I had gotten less sleep. The only thing that I've found does make a difference is a short nap in the middle of the day, I find 1/2 hour in the day can easily make up for several hours at night. But that's where the cultural problem is, I've had office jobs where I could get away with taking a nap, but it would still be frowned upon, which is always a bit sad since it make it clear that many offices cultures would prefer the illusion of busy-ness over actual increased production.

jasongullickson 16y ago
Absolutely, if I can go "lights out" for 30 minutes during the day (between 1:00pm and 2:00pm works best for me) I can eliminate the need for the "catch-up" sleep.
- jules 16y ago
  I've tried this but I am unable to fall asleep unless I'm extremely tired (and I do mean very tired, one night without sleep is not enough). How do you fall asleep within half an hour?
  - jasongullickson 16y ago
    I remove myself from my "work" situation (when I worked a rigidly scheduled job, I'd take a drive to a nearby park) and just lay back and relax. If the weather is cooperative having the car windows down and some nature sounds to listen to seem to help but I imagine listening to anything that you don't have direct control over (as opposed to music, other forms of entertainment, etc.) would work. Also a large lunch at a Mexican restaurant never hurts...
  - CamperBob 16y ago
    You may not actually need to sleep. I find that just lying down for 30-60 minutes in a dark, quiet room provides ~80% of the 'recovery' value of a real nap.

cynicalkane 16y ago

For me, If I get all the sleep I want, I'm lethargic and unenergetic, but if I get less sleep I'm tired all day (but strangely more energetic). It's like there's no happy medium. I wonder if anyone else has this problem, and if there's a solution.

kroger 16y ago
I'm just like that. I can sleep for 10 hours but I wake up feeling rested but lethargic. There seems to be a sweet spot where I'm rested enough (but not lethargic) and with a good energy level. The sweet spot seems to be between 7 and 7.5 hours.
de90 16y ago
Do you exercise most days? Do you at least a similar wake up\sleep time for a month? And another obvious about drink enough water\food? All have a huge impact for me. I can go on much less sleep when I do hard exercise that day.
- ghshephard 16y ago
  Re: Hard Exercise - Bizarre. I work a mostly sedentary silicon valley lifestyle, with the addition of 2-3 miles walking a day, and typically get 5-6 hours of sleep a night, going to bed around 2:00 - 3:00 AM and getting up around 9:00 AM. Recently, though, I started a linear progress novice strength training program (Squats, Dead Lift, Bench Press, Overhead Press) - three times a week for 40 minutes. My sleep patterns immediately shifted, and I am incapable of waking up without at least 8 hours of sleep on off days, and 10 hours of sleep on the days that I lift heavy. For the first time in my life, ever, I'm finding myself going to bed at 10:00 PM at night so that I can get up by 8:00 AM the next morning.
  - cynicalkane 16y ago
    I've done Starting Strength. Starting Strength is raw lifts involving the entire muscle toolchain until you can't do anymore. It works your body in a total, basic way that most Americans haven't ever done. So you'll be sleeping alot as your body gets used to it. You'll notice incredible increases in everyday strength--as if the entire world, including you, lost a significant fraction of its mass over the course of a few months--and the desire for sleep will subside. Of course, I still have my original sleep problem...

bconway 16y ago

Did you read the entire article? Nobody knows how many natural short sleepers are out there. "There aren't nearly as many as there are people who think they're short sleepers," says Daniel J. Buysse, a psychiatrist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and a past president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, a professional group. Out of every 100 people who believe they only need five or six hours of sleep a night, only about five people really do, Dr. Buysse says. The rest end up chronically sleep deprived, part of the one-third of U.S. adults who get less than the recommended seven hours of sleep per night, according to a report last month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Groxx 16y ago
The following paragraph: >To date, only a handful of small studies have looked at short sleepers—in part because they're hard to find. They rarely go to sleep clinics and don't think they have a disorder. While I think it's over-diagnosed, ADD is an excellent example here. When it was first getting attention, people being diagnosed were rarities. That skyrocketed when more people were watching for it. Similarly, stress, nervous, and depression disorders once actual treatments appeared, and there was a reason to get diagnosed and treated.

liuliu 16y ago

The problem of "when hungry, eat. When tired, sleep" is: In modern societies, our inner evolutionary traits still work, but the environment changed. For example, some food are more satisfying than others, and we feel less full when we indeed have enough (sugar/fat for example). The same is true for "tiredness". With TVs, iPads and mattresses, we may well be tired but we just cannot feel it strong enough. The distortion may be the single biggest problem for modern people IMHO.

jasongullickson 16y ago
Yes you make a good point (one I have experienced myself). I spent a lot of time as a teenager learning to become aware of the subtle signs your body gives you to indicate what it needs to remain balanced (I got these exercises from a Marine hand-to-hand combat booklet if you can imagine). It takes practice and discipline (and it's easy to overlook when you're busy) but it is possible to "tune-in" to these subtle signals. It also helps to remove yourself from "modern society" now and again. A few days in the woods away from artificial stimulus goes a long way in this regard.

dfischer 16y ago

Do you use an alarm?

mzl 16y ago

The problem with "when hungry, eat", is that hunger is not really a good indicator for sustenance needs for humans. Living in western countries, we are surrounded by easily obtainable and addictive foods and nutrients. If we let hunger control our eating, especially in this kind of environment, most people tend to over-eat. Combined with recent results that caloric restriction and potentially intermittent fasting may be very healthy choices, I think it might be likely that hunger is really a maladaptation in modern society. I do fully agree with the part "When tired, sleep". Unfortunately it is very hard to apply if I also want to maintain a working home-life with a significant other that has a different sleep-pattern.