Odd sleep patterns - TTLG Forums

scumble on 18/1/2008 at 02:54

It seems the arrival of the new baby has thrown me into a strange routine. I'm wide awake at 3am, and it's so quiet I can hear the slug in the orchid plant over there crunching on its leaves.

At the moment I sleep from 9pm to 11:30 pm, then get up for a few hours because Theo needs attention. It is a bit pointless to try and sleep until he gets settled, so I end up getting back to sleep between 3 and 5 am.

The interesting thing is that it doesn't seem to have affected my ability to stay awake during the day too much. I had to have a nap for about 20 minutes today in the early afternoon, and that kept me going.

I'm wondering if I've fallen into some sort of polyphasic sleep pattern, although one is supposed to keep a fairly rigid schedule of naps.

It gets me thinking about sleep a bit more. How much does a person really need? How many people function normally with unconventional sleep schedules? It does seem that it's possible to waste an awful lot of time being asleep when it isn't of much benefit.

Anyone else stuck in a weird sleep pattern?

jtr7 on 18/1/2008 at 04:03

Man, I wish I could find that article I read back in the eighties about unconventional sleep patterns. It claimed that Leonardo DaVinci had settled into a routine whereby he would sleep an hour-and-a-half every 24 hours. He would power nap for 15 minutes or so every three or four hours. According to the article, among some volunteers to test this, one guy was able to do it, and loved it. He was also an artist, and I knew I would love to be able to do that, but it takes me about an hour to fall asleep. :(

I've accidentally power napped a few times in my life, and it was great to wake up more energized in 20 minutes than after a full night's sleep.

The Alchemist on 18/1/2008 at 04:06

Power nap? The fuck is a power nap?

If I ever fall asleep at any point of the day other than late at night, weather I get an hour of sleep or four hours of sleep, I wake up feeling terrible. I wake up with what feels like a mild hangover. I hate naps.

MSX on 18/1/2008 at 04:23

Quote Posted by The Alchemist

I'm with you Alchemist. For myself I'd assume that my body releases too much of the paralytic agent. Which is funny because I used to sleep walk as a kid. In fact till I was about 14 I'd sleep on the weekends only. I suppose the two were related.

Now I'm a 5am till 10am kind of guy. Five hours seems to be enough with a few extra on my day off. So I assume scumble that hours of sleep needed is entirely subjective.

Lambda on 18/1/2008 at 04:31

Quote Posted by The Alchemist

I'd have to, unfortunately, agree with this... T.T

Shug on 18/1/2008 at 04:35

A 'powernap' is just a 15 or 20 minute block, and yeah, it does work. The key thing is to make sure you don't sleep on your side as for most people, that's just signalling to your body that you're ready to conk out for a proper sleep, hence you wake up feeling worse after an hour or two. Allegedly you're meant to lie on your back and prop your legs on a chair but I imagine just lying on your back in bed would be fine

I imagine some dames are used to that but probably more in blocks of 2 minutes rather than 15

jtr7 on 18/1/2008 at 05:58

It's called a "power" nap because it's actually very effective, unlike regular naps. Like I said, I've only experienced it accidentally, as in, I closed my eyes and woke up a short time later feeling well-rested. I've never been able to do it at will, but I know a few who can. One of them experienced it for the first time while hunting deer. He hunkered down to stake-out a deer trail, and he nodded off while watching and waiting. He felt so refreshed he was shocked, but happy it happened. He felt better after those 15 minutes then he had in months.

(http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=power+nap) Power nap.

But back on topic. Scumble, you haven't described anything unusual. I'm not a father, but I'm a night-person. I love waking up at lunch time, and staying awake into the wee hours.

Ko0K on 18/1/2008 at 07:54

The shortest power nap I ever took probably lasted about two or three minutes. It happened when I was on a ski lift, and I was so amazed how refreshed I felt afterwards. I would love to be able to have a few of those a day instead of hours of tossing and turning in bed. Insomnia sucks.

Vasquez on 18/1/2008 at 07:55

I think your brain is just adjusting to the new situation, scumble. When the motivation is good (like your bebe, congrats btw :) ) I'd guess it's much easier to change the sleep pattern quite painlessly than if you should do it for work or something.

Shug, I didn't know that sleeping on the side is somehow different, that's interesting! I power-nap often during the fall and winter, usually late in the afternoon (after sleeping 8-10 hours previous night, thanks for the global warming and black winters :rolleyes:) It's very refreshing, if you don't oversleep. Sometimes it's not even sleep, really, just very deep relaxing.

scumble on 18/1/2008 at 11:44

Quote Posted by jtr7

But back on topic. Scumble, you haven't described anything unusual. I'm not a father, but I'm a night-person. I love waking up at lunch time, and staying awake into the wee hours.

I can't really afford to wake up at lunchtime! That's more of a studenty schedule I'd say. In this case I'm getting much less sleep than that, as I still have to get up before 9am, largely because of my 2.5 year old Seb. In fact, what's happening is that I awake shortly after 8am.

Quote Posted by Vasquez

Obviously my hand has been forced to a certain extent, but I'm more inclined to fine-tune this pattern into something sustainable, as the 11pm to 2am slot is really quite good for doing stuff that I don't have time for during the day.

I tend to spend a lot of time just trying to get myself to sleep, maybe an hour or more of lying awake under a quilt with my brain still churning away. There doesn't seem to be much point wasting that energy on a detailed observation of the ceiling. I've actually got quite a bit of reading done that I wouldn't have managed otherwise.