Who needs sleep? Well, you're never gonna get it...

[KGB]

Who needs sleep?  Tell me what's that for?

 

So, my life is such that I have to work out in the early mornings if I'm going to do it at all (full time day job, two small children, etc. etc.).  I have been getting up at 4:45 in the mornings and heading to the Y.  I love it.  I love doing something by myself, for myself.  I love the early time of morning, before the sun is up.  I love that the gym is not super busy.  I love how I feel the rest of the day.  It's great.

 

What's not great is not getting enough sleep because I'm getting up so early.  My kids are in bed by 8, but then on any given night there's housework-time and down-time, husband-time, book-time, Downton-Abbey-time, craft-time (well, I wish there was craft-time), general-insomnia-time, "Mommy-I-Need-A-Glass-Of-Water"-time, etc. I try to get to sleep around 10, but even that's only 6.75 hours, and often I'm awake past that and sometimes have to skip the gym because I was up too late.  All the fitness stuff I've been reading calls for 8-9 hours.  I just don't see how that's possible.   

 

How much sleep do you get?  How much sleep do you need? 

[Silo]

Ideally, I'd get 8-8.5 hours but I am pretty good with 7.5. Getting more sleep is something that I am working on. Fitting everything in with kids is definitely a challenge. I miss the days when my daughter went to bed before 8. 

 

A few ideas:

 

• Can you and your husband take turns doing bedtime duty for the kids? That way you could try a later workout time just to see if it works for you. Or, one of you could be doing the housework while the other is putting kids to bed so you could get to bed earlier.
• Can your kids help with some of the housework before they go to bed? (putting away their toys, putting away dishes, etc.)
• Can more of the housework be put off until the weekend? We do general maintenance (wash dishes) during the week but the majority of housework happens on Saturday mornings at our house.
• Is there any part of your exercise routine that could be done at home instead of at the Y. This could reduce the number of days you need to get up early so you could get more sleep overall.

[Jittersthe.Clown]

Being in the same boat as you (two kids, usually in bed by 8, but the daughter is up till 9-10 because she can, duties around the house, and an early riser), I have no helpful advice to you except that I've found the more I work out, the less sleepy I've been during the day.  If you find a fix, please let me know.

[matty_mcfly]

Agreed.  I have to work out in the morning though, not as early as you.  I'm usually in the gym before 6:15 which is awesome for all the same reasons you listed.  Haha like Jitters, I have no helpful advice here but I'm usually in bed around 11 and sleep by 1130 (depending on what I put OnDemand) and I'm up around 5:30. 

 

I usually don't get sleepy until I hit the hour plus commute to work and then back at the end of the day.  I often wonder how much the lack of sleep is affecting my recovery and ability to hit the gym.

 

You are not alone! lol

[KGB]

Well, it's good to see that I'm not alone. 

[TaraTheMiddle]

You're definitely not alone. I have a 16 month old, my husband is deployed, I work full time, and I am trying to get a career in writing off the ground. Fitting in my work outs AND enough sleep is just impossible. Either housework, work outs, or sleep end up getting shorted and most often it's the sleep. 

[KBLynx]

Oy sounds like my life! I'm up around 5-5:30 and need to have the kid ready and out the door by 6:20am. I work 7am-4pm then pick my daughter up from daycare. 2x a week we go straight to dance class for her, then off to crossfit for me, home by 8:30. That leaves...negative time for house work and sleep! Let alone time to eat. I usually get to bed around 10pm and end up with about 6-7hrs of sleep. I would really like more but not quite sure where to fit that part in...

 

It's hard, but I try to catch up on the weekends and get lots of naps in when I can.

[Sleepless]

There's a reason I go by Sleepless, I have really bad insomnia, so I get 5 hours a night if I'm lucky. I've been a bad sleeper my whole life and come from a family of insomniacs and while I know it's not exactly healthy, I can function like this; and, well, when I was going to university it made life easier since I could stay up really late working on papers or studying and still survive the next day.  

[I-Jo]

I average between 5-6. 

 

I go to bed around midnight/1 AM and get up between 6 and 7 often waking up at least 2 times in the night. 

 

I'm a self induced insommia person- I love sleep- but I hate going to bed. :/  just so much to do. 

[krusteh]

I never get enough sleep either. I am still in training following medical school. residency, fellowship, ugh second fellowship ( year 12 of crazy hours). I work 80-100 hours a week. it used to be much worse. I wake up at 3:30 to 4 am try to work on some flexibilty stuff and maybe eat something before rushing to work by 5 am. no down time typically until i get home. typically about 8 pm. then to the gym for 1.5 hours. home about 10 pm. then reading for work, preparing for cases, writing manuscripts, or preparing presentations if need be...then bed! though I am always on home call so invariably get called through the night and semiregularly have to drive into work. i get about 0-5 hours a night. my weekends off i spend mostly sleeping.

[Nosehair]

For those of you suffering from insomnia, magnesium supplements have worked magic for me. I now sleep like a normal person! yay

[The Swedish Ninja]

I go to bed around 9:30 and wake up (without alarm) at around 4:30, that is 7 hours. I too have read that "you need 8 hours of sleep, or else….." but actually I´m not sure. 

First of all, there are individual differences. For instance, I have never, in my whole life, woken up after 8 am, and that´s even if I go to bed at 5:am. I can´t sleep longer, even if I try. Of course, I´m a bit tired during the day, but not so that it affects me much. On the following night, I usually catch up with around 8,5 h of sleep.

Second, it depends on what you do in the day. Are you working by a desk, not stressing, being outside part of the day --> less need of sleep. But if the opposite is true, then you probably need more sleep. 

 

The question you must ask yourself is how tired you are, both when you wake up, but also during the day. If you have a hard time getting up and also are tired during the day, then in some way you have to get more sleep. Either by going to bed earlier, getting up later or resting during the day. I understand that this is hard, so here are a few ideas:

- Eat food that gives you nourishment and/or take supplements (vitamins, protein etc) I tend to sleep shorter when I eat healthy

- Do you fall asleep at once? If not, cut out TV/phone/coffee in to close proximity to bed time

- Try a app, sleep cycle, or something similar. These focus on your current sleep mode and wake you up at a time when you sleep "light". This is how it works: Say you want to get up at 5 am: The app will wake you somewhere around 4:30-5:00, depending on where you are in your sleep cycle. The point is that you can actually feel less tired getting up earlier than sleeping longer if this only means you go into a deeper cycle. (makes sense, if not, read about it by someone who can explain )

 

Wasn´t really a solution to you problems, but perhaps it helps a bit