Question about sleep.

[Dan208]

This has happened to me a few times over the past few months, most recently this morning, and it got me thinking. I went to bed around 11:00 last night and woke up shortly after 5:00 this morning, about an hour before I had my alarm set to go off. I got up and took the dog out and was wide awake, but since I like sleep so much I went back to bed. I layed there for a while before finally falling back to sleep. My alarm went off at 6:00 and I had to drag myself out of bed.

So this is my question: When something like that happens, no matter how much or how little sleep I've gotten, is it my body's way of telling me that I've had enough sleep for that night and that I should get up?

[notanartmajor]

Probably not. I've had it happen at times when I know good and well I'm tired and need more sleep. Just sometimes your body signals ALMIGHTY AWAKENESS at odd times.

[Nik]

Sleep is something I've fought with my whole life. I had difficulty going to sleep when I needed to and difficulty getting up when I needed to. When I started working for myself, I decided to let my body decide when I slept and see what happened--no scheduled bed times, no alarms. It turned out that I naturally would sleep 6 to 9 hours and feel rested and energized for the whole day, but my days were longer than 24 hours. Apparently, my body has a non-24-hour clock and once I stopped fighting that, finally I could sleep and get my needed rest. Everyone's body clock is different, so I think it's quite possible that after 6 hours, your body had enough sleep, provided it wasn't anxiety or something interrupting it.

[Dan208]

Thanks for the replies. I think that the next time it happens, I might just roll with it to see how I feel later in the day.

[Siferiax]

I've had times where I would wake up too early and feel wide awake and just went with it. Then a few hours later I would crumble.

I also had days were I really had to drag myself out of bed, but a few hours later was very energetic.

Unfortunately we don't all have the luxury of winging it like Nik does, haha. But that would totally be what your body would want.

Few things I noticed:

- when I'm afraid I'll wake up too late/sleep through my alarm, I will wake up at various points during the night/morning. As if I try to make sure to wake up on time. It's pretty exhausting business.

- When I keep to going to bed at the same time each night and keep my alarm at exactly the same time, my body sorta adjusts to the schedule, waking roughly at alarm time, sometimes as close as just 1 minute earlier.

Though going back to sleep after being active, I've noticed anyway, is a killer for feeling awake. Either immediately turn around and try to sleep more (even when wide awake) or get out of bed and don't get back in.

[Nik]

Fortunately, I don't think non-24 is common enough for most people to have to worry about it. But there's not really a magic number of hours that applies to everyone, despite what they say. The important thing is to get enough sleep so that you feel rested, so just figure out what works for you.

[Siferiax]

Fortunately, I don't think non-24 is common enough for most people to have to worry about it. But there's not really a magic number of hours that applies to everyone, despite what they say. The important thing is to get enough sleep so that you feel rested, so just figure out what works for you.

Can't agree more!

[Dan208]

Fortunately, I don't think non-24 is common enough for most people to have to worry about it. But there's not really a magic number of hours that applies to everyone, despite what they say. The important thing is to get enough sleep so that you feel rested, so just figure out what works for you.

I agree. Both my wife and I tend to do better on less sleep than more. A lot of the time 5 hours makes me feel better than the recommended 8 hours.