Is there anyone who is getting enough sleep?

[Guest Gnome Chomsky]

It's funny when people say "I'm usually good with 6-7 hours sleep" like that isn't the scientifically recommended amount that 90% of the population gets. That's like saying "I can function on only 2000 calories a day."

[RunnerGrad]

It's funny when people say "I'm usually good with 6-7 hours sleep" like that isn't the scientifically recommended amount that 90% of the population gets. That's like saying "I can function on only 2000 calories a day."

 

It just means that people are saying that they are about average.  There are plenty of people who can get by on less sleep (or fewer calories) and plenty of people who need more sleep (or more calories) in order to be healthy.  I don't see anything funny in people stating that they match up with the average.

[jlr1228]

Honestly, there are days where I just simply choose sleep over reading/writing/whatever else on my to-do list. I don't function well if I don't get sleep and when I am exhausted it is stupid to try and work anyway. So I just go to bed and finish my work in the morning. - I will say I am a morning person and usually turn in quite early. But I get up and work in the morning and I can accomplish more in a shorter amount of time in the morning fully rested then if I were to try and stay up late and do it. So, ultimately I think it is about finding your "prime time" and making it work. And choosing sleep - make it a top priority. 

[Guest Gnome Chomsky]

It just means that people are saying that they are about average.  There are plenty of people who can get by on less sleep (or fewer calories) and plenty of people who need more sleep (or more calories) in order to be healthy.  I don't see anything funny in people stating that they match up with the average.

I was referring to someone who called themselves a night owl and said they can manage on 6-7 hours sleep. It came off as "I can function on 'only' 6-7 hours sleep." I hear people say stuff like that all the time, like it's hard to do. 

[fuzzylogician]

I was referring to someone who called themselves a night owl and said they can manage on 6-7 hours sleep. It came off as "I can function on 'only' 6-7 hours sleep." I hear people say stuff like that all the time, like it's hard to do. 

 

Those two things are totally unrelated. I'm a night owl and do my best work at night (I can't write before 2pm at all, and I am most prolific between, say, 10pm and 4am). That said, I need at least 8.5 hours of sleep to function well, preferably 9. I can sustain myself on less sleep for quite a while, but I know it really affects my overall health and happiness so I'll sacrifice a lot to get enough sleep. 

[Guest Gnome Chomsky]

Those two things are totally unrelated. I'm a night owl and do my best work at night (I can't write before 2pm at all, and I am most prolific between, say, 10pm and 4am). That said, I need at least 8.5 hours of sleep to function well, preferably 9. I can sustain myself on less sleep for quite a while, but I know it really affects my overall health and happiness so I'll sacrifice a lot to get enough sleep. 

So you don't have to be anywhere until 2-3 pm every day? 

[rising_star]

I'm also a night owl. I requested not to teach before 10am and that's always been accommodated, which means I can go to bed soon-ish (seriously, headed there within the next 20 min), sleep 8 hours, and still have time to get breakfast, walk the dog, and do random small things before I teach. Also, because I write better in the afternoon and evenings, I teach in the late morning so that all the earlier hours of the day aren't a total waste.

 

Oh, and I do sleep 7-9 hours per night pretty much every night. We all make sacrifices. I mostly avoid social media because I spend 1-2 hours a day at the dog park. Time logs are really helpful for understanding where your time is going. If you've never done it, the simplest way is to set a timer to go off every 20-30 minutes and then write down what you're doing at that time. Almost everyone I know that's done it finds they're spending more time on the internet or watching TV than they realized.

[seeingeyeduck]

I did that albeit more informally for a few months and realized that indeed I was spending a lot of time online. I halved that as a result and am pretty happy. Though I suppose I've slipped a bit with grad decision season!

I also realized that life (errands, cooking, planning, socializing) takes almost as much time as work. I thought I could increase my research/work hours but realized that would actually make life somewhat unpleasant, so it helped me not be unreasonable with my workaholic fantasies...

[fuzzylogician]

So you don't have to be anywhere until 2-3 pm every day? 

 

Well as it turns out most people don't keep a similar schedule to mine, so I've had to learn to adjust. Being an academic allows me a lot of freedom. I try to be in bed by 1am on weekdays and I've been fortunate to be able to have a flexible schedule so I almost never have anything before 11am. Now that I'm dissertating and not doing much else, though, my hours have shifted back a bit. 

[Pitangus]

This past semester I've been sleeping from about 3 AM to 7 or 8 AM out of stubborn refusal to go to bed earlier. I do the bulk of my writing between 10 PM - 2 AM, and even if I don't have anything that needs finishing I just like staying up. I was thinking I might burn out on this schedule, but so far I just like the feeling of having longer days. I do sometimes have a hard time dragging myself out of bed in the morning, but once I'm up and showered I feel fine. I sleep about 8 hours on Saturday and Sunday, so that helps as well. 

It reminds me of when I worked a dawn-to-dusk field job and preferred to sleep less in order to feel like I had more downtime after work. 

[Guest Gnome Chomsky]

This past semester I've been sleeping from about 3 AM to 7 or 8 AM out of stubborn refusal to go to bed earlier. I do the bulk of my writing between 10 PM - 2 AM, and even if I don't have anything that needs finishing I just like staying up. I was thinking I might burn out on this schedule, but so far I just like the feeling of having longer days. I do sometimes have a hard time dragging myself out of bed in the morning, but once I'm up and showered I feel fine. I sleep about 8 hours on Saturday and Sunday, so that helps as well. 

It reminds me of when I worked a dawn-to-dusk field job and preferred to sleep less in order to feel like I had more downtime after work. 

This sounds exactly like me. I get (no exaggeration) 2-4 hours sleep Sunday through Thursday night and 7-9 hours sleep Friday and Saturday night. I've been doing this for 6 years. 

[Pitangus]

The one thing I do have to be wary of is not cutting my wakeup time too close to when I need to be somewhere, because if I jump out of bed and into the shower after <5 hours of sleep I can get nauseous. I'll usually set my alarm for 5-10 minutes before I plan to actually get out of bed, so that I can take the time to sit up and stretch before getting on my feet. 

Fortunately I don't drink coffee and don't like to eat in the morning, so I don't need too much time after I wake up.

Edited April 22, 2014 by Pitangus

[Guest Gnome Chomsky]

The one thing I do have to be wary of is not cutting my wakeup time too close to when I need to be somewhere, because if I jump out of bed and into the shower after <5 hours of sleep I can get nauseous. I'll usually set my alarm for 5-10 minutes before I plan to actually get out of bed, so that I can take the time to sit up and stretch before getting on my feet. 

Fortunately I don't drink coffee and don't like to eat in the morning, so I don't need too much time after I wake up.

Yeah, same with me. I drink coffee but not in the morning. I'll have a cup or two a week from Starbucks in the afternoon, but it's more because I like to read at Starbucks. I don't rely on coffee for energy. And I agree with you about the nausea. I never really understood it. Lots of times if I pull an all-nighter for an exam, I get the gags. My stomach is doing back flips for some reason. And on the days I only have one class, I'm literally in the car 45 seconds after my alarm goes off. I get right out of bed, slip my feet in my sandals, grab my backpack and get in the car. 

[WriteAndKnit]

I'm a morning person, so I'm asleep by 10:30 at the latest and usually up by 5:00 (and on the bus to campus around 6 am). I also tend to schedule my non-class/non-paid-work time by the half hour, and don't work on any given project/assignment for more than an hour at a time; at the very least, I take a quick walk and fill my water bottle/get another cup of tea before getting back to what I was doing (if I don't switch projects). 

[maelia8]

This sounds exactly like me. I get (no exaggeration) 2-4 hours sleep Sunday through Thursday night and 7-9 hours sleep Friday and Saturday night. I've been doing this for 6 years. 

 

Hats off to you for being able to function successfully that way. if I get less than 8 hours of sleep (and I prefer about 9), I don't function properly, with our without caffeine. Even if I get 6-7 hours of sleep for only two or three days in a row, I find myself falling asleep in the afternoons, regardless of where I am and what I am doing, and I feel groggy all of the time and get really bad headaches. Staying up until 1am is a huge challenge for me, and I'm usually in my pajamas by 10pm and asleep by 11pm. In undergrad I had to stay up late a few times to put the finishing touches on something or finish and especially large chunk of reading, and although I could still do good work after 10, my body really hated it and I'd like to avoid it during grad school if at all possible.

[Maleficent999]

I can function on 5-6 hours of sleep if I'm working out regularly. It seems sort of counter-intuitive, but once my body starts working more efficiently I find I can sleep a bit less and still have enough energy. Strangely, if I sleep more than 8 hours I feel like I have a hangover all day. I'm a morning person so on weekends I'm still usually asleep by 12 at the latest and up by 7 or 8 even if I don't set an alarm. 9AM-4PM are my favorite hours of the day to do productive things and still be happy about it. If I'm working on an assignment due Friday at 10AM anytime past Thursday at 4PM I feel really stressed and panicked and end up not being very efficient. This isn't very healthy I realize, but I have some anxiety issues (obviously) so I just do my best to avoid those situations. Thankfully I'm really good with time management so far in my life. Hopefully I can continue it in grad school. For instance, I figure out due dates and test dates at the beginning of the quarter and write them all in my planner. If I realize I have one or two weeks with a lot of deadlines, I try to figure out the weeks I'll have a lighter load beforehand and do one or two of the projects early--even if it's 3-4 weeks early--just so I can check it off my list. Sometimes that isn't possible because we won't learn the material until a week or two before the assignment is due or the test date. At that point I'll do as much as I can but still try to finish it early rather than at the last minute. Especially if I have several exams, I'd rather be studying during the week than working on a paper I could've finished over the weekend prior.