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HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: The other morning I woke up at 6:30 AM. Just–bang. Awake.
Go to sleep, I told myself. But my brain said no.
Finally, I just got up and started working, and when it got to be 8:30, the time I usually get up, I had gotten SO much done!
Whoa, I thought, this is a genius thing. I should get up earlier!
Thing is, we usually go to sleep at about midnight. So long term, this getting up early thing is not going to work.
In fact, I am happiest writing late at night. I really fly through the pages! It might be because of all those years as a reporter, working for the 11 PM news–my brain's metabolism has gotten very comfortable with that rhythm.
Still though, I am working on getting up a bit earlier. I am really delighted to have that extra time.
How about you, Reds and readers? What time is your wakeup call? And has it always been that way?
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RHYS BOWEN: I’m an early bird. I usually wake around 6:30 and I like working in the morning. I’m also asleep by 10 to 10:30. I think having to get 4 kids off to school or to swim practice at 6 am has conditioned me to wake early. The only problem has been if I wake at 4 or. 5 I can’t get back to sleep.
LUCY BURDETTE: Pretty early here too! I’m usually up by 6:30 or seven, and if I sleep until eight for some unknown reason, I feel like I’ve missed half the day. I like to be asleep by 10 or 1030. My brain is much fresher for working in the morning, although lately I’ve been getting a surge at 5 o’clock. Which is no use to me because that’s when I make dinner and we eat supper and watch the news and sometimes a show. By then it’s too late to work! Plus, I do need time to read for fun…
HALLIE EPHRON: I’m an up-with-the-sun person. Which is very inconvenient when sunrise is before 5 AM. Like Rhys, once I’m awake I cannot get back to sleep. I suppose it would help if I went to sleep later, but when you get up at five you’re pretty tired by ten. It’s a vicious cycle.
I wish I could say I do something useful with those early hours, but no. I read the day’s papers and start on a crossword puzzle or two.
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DEBORAH CROMBIE: Hank, I’m on your schedule. I’m doing well if I get to bed by midnight, and am usually up around 7:30 or 8:00. I like being up in the mornings, but I have a really hard time getting to bed. Partly this is because I live with the Uber Night Owl–when Rick worked dispatch for the police department, he preferred the 11 pm to 7 am shift– and partly because my brain just seems more active in the late afternoon/evening. I’m actually doing better at morning writing than I used to, though.
JENN McKINLAY: Up at 6 in bed by 11. I try to sleep more than seven hours but I just can’t. I’m always eager to start a new day. Every now and then I’ll sleep 8 hours and I’m so refreshed I don’t know what to do with myself! It’s a wonderful thing to have a comfortable bed, a roof over your head, and plenty to eat. I try to be grateful every day.
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HANK: And here we will pause for applause. Exactly, Jenn. Exactly.
How about you, Reds and readers? Lark or nightingale? And have you changed over the years?
How about you, Reds and readers? Lark or nightingale? And have you changed over the years?
I'm more of a nightingale . . . if I go to bed too early, I just toss and turn and just can't get to sleep. Of course, if it is a workday for John, then I'm up at six to get him off to work, and then I'm likely to go back to bed for just a bit . . . .
ReplyDeleteOh, that’s one of my favorite things, when you just get to go back to sleep for a little bit…
DeleteAnd Joan, I was just thinking, how really lovely it is that you are here at the blog. You are such a treasure. Xxxxx
DeleteAaww, thank you 😊
DeleteSince menopause I’m sleeping more hours. There was a study saying that women going through menopause need more sleep in terms of eight to ten hours of sleep. The usual rule of thumb was seven to eight hours of sleep, which I used to sleep.
ReplyDeleteThese days I do not always get enough sleep. Sometimes I wake up at 3 or 4 AM then cannot go back to bed until 8 am.
You can say I’m a lark. I’ve become accustomed to waking up early in the morning since my school days.
it's so annoying when sleep is disrupted! hope that all settles down Diana
DeleteOh, the waking up in the middle of the night...so frustrating!
DeleteUgh, the dreaded waking at 3pm. That is one of the things that the estradiol patch has definitely helped with. Although I used to get a lot of reading done in the middle of the night.
DeleteI'm a complete and natural lark. In bed by ten or ten thirty, and always awake before six (today's 5 was a little early, but I've never gotten enough sleep in June since I moved to New England - it just gets light too early!). If I sleep until six-thirty, it's because I was awake for an hour or two at three o'clock, which occasionally happens.
ReplyDeleteMy mornings are my best creative time, and I'm working by seven every day. On my solo writing retreats twice a year, I also write in the afternoon and the evening. The first time I sat with my laptop in lamplight staring out at the dark window, I understood night creativity. - it's just me and my story. But that's not going to happen at home...
June is lovely, but just brutal on sleeping in New England! We're experimenting with sleep masks...
DeleteI have long slept with a pillow over my head after my first wake-up in the wee hours, and always with silicon earplugs...
DeleteRoom-darkening curtains or blinds, maybe? It helps a lot.
Deleteyes, night writing is really magical.. It's just a different kind of quiet..
DeleteI have both room darkening shades and also use a satin sleep mask. I've been using both for so many years it would probably be impossible to sleep without them. A full or almost full moon is every bit as bad.
DeleteI always find that the elastic on the sleep mask eventually bothers me if I wear it all night, so I am more likely to keep one under my pillow and pull it on at the first sight of dawn light creeping around the darkening curtains.
DeleteLike so many of you, I am usually asleep by 10 to 10:30 and up with the sun. The further north, the more exaggerated the length and shortening of days. In Connecticut, June sees sunrise still in the 4 o'clock hour. I made my bedroom curtains to be really good at blocking the sun, so if they are pulled down tight, I can sleep until 6 or even until 7 on rainy days. I can get a lot done in the early hours, but try to be quiet until Irwin is up. I have been a lark my whole life.
ReplyDeleteSo you've stayed consistent. I was a definite night owl in teens and twenties
DeleteLike Judy, I have been a life long lark, although my bedtime shifted in college years, I’ve always considered not being awake at 7 am “sleeping in” and being awake at 2 am “up all night”. Elisabeth
DeleteI think this is so fascinating--yes, I have always been a night owl, too.
DeleteMy natural tendency is lark. Lately it seems more like a burn the candle at both ends and nap in the middle of the day kind of schedule. Morning and evening are the best times to do anything in the summer heat and humidity.
ReplyDeleteYes, Brenda, the heat in FL is a whole different animal!
DeleteSummer has a different metabolism, that's for sure! And we should talk about naps, too. I never take naps. Well, sometimes on book tour, because I often have to get us SO early. But 20 minutes, tops.
DeleteI've been a power napper since my sons were little. I can lie down, go deep into sleep, and pop up awake in fifteen or twenty minutes. SO refreshing.
DeleteJenn is right and that’s a good thing to think when we get up.I’m a night owl who does love early mornings. I usually am in bed by 11 and sometimes up at 6. When I was working I got up at 6 so I could read the paper with my coffee and cereal before hustling into the shower etc. Now retired I like getting up earlier to read all my emails and blogs with my first cups of coffee. In the summer it’s the bird song that wakes me even before the sun.
ReplyDeleteLove the birdsong, even if it wakes me!
DeleteANd aren't the birds hilarious? They are SO determined to be loud!
DeleteAround here the birdsong is quiet compared to the frogs at night. I would love to know what decibel they use - bores right through the brain at times! It is great to herald spring, but tone it down - just a bit, please....
DeleteFrogs! Talk about determined!
DeleteThank you, Jenn, for the gratitude and the goodness you just added for my day. Elisabeth
ReplyDeleteAgree. That really stopped me in my tracks.
DeleteI add my thanks here for Jenn's reminder.
DeleteI’m a morning woman and I’ve always loved getting up early because it’s the time I have the most energy and efficiency.
ReplyDeleteI usually get up around six and go to bed at ten. Sometimes it’s earlier in the summer because of the light and the birds concerts.
However, since retirement, I decided I wouldn’t get up in the dark because I did it for so many years when working ( and then coming back home in darkness). So, in winter, even if I wake up earlier, I get up around seven or when I spy the first light of the new day.
Getting up in the dark is just so bleak! It simply feels so wrong...
DeleteI found living in Scotland hard. Hard to go to sleep in summer when it's still light until one or two in the morning. Hard to get up in the winter when it's dark until nine!
DeleteAll the comments about too early light in New England, bring back memories of the year I lived on Kodiak Island in AK. Too far south for “midnight sun”, but far enough north so that over night was prolonged twilight. My life just shifted with nature: summer less sleep needed, in bed by midnight up at five with the same “energy” as in winter when it was in bed by seven up at five. (At 7 it had been dark dark for 3 or 4 hours.) Of, course I was 50 years younger then and more flexible. Elisabeth
ReplyDeleteYes, it's just fascinating how the like affects us. Remember that song from A LIttle Night Music? ("Perpetual sunset is rather an unset-ling thing....")
DeleteBefore using the cpap machine, I was awake at 4am, but since using the machine, I wake at 6am. I prefer the early mornings.
ReplyDeleteThere are so many possibilities!
DeleteAll my life I was a natural nightingale. It drove my mother crazy when I was growing up. If she knew I was still up at 1 AM reading or doing homework she would stand at the foot of the stairs and yell to me "Go to bed!" Considering I had to be up by 6:30 to get ready for school she was right to be concerned;~ I never slept more than 4 or 5 hours or so nightly. My trick of stuffing a towel along the bottom of my bedroom door to hide my table lamp's light was eventually discovered and for the rest of my life while living at home Mom and I battled over my lack of a good night's sleep. I knew she was right of course because once I was on my own my natural nightingale tendencies to tackle projects in the early morning hours; i.e., I would think nothing of popping a load of clothes into the washing machine at two in the morning, started to catch up with me. Now that I'm retired I find myself caught in the middle of being both a nightingale and a lark. My body's alarm clock now goes off at 6:00 am even if I had only drifted off to sleep at 1 or 2 in the morning. And so I get up. It's now 7:10 am and I've been up an hour. I've done my banking, paid a few bills, watered the outdoor plantings and had my first cup of coffee in the courtyard. Plus checked in with Jungle Reds. :) I accomplish a great deal in these early hours but by 7 at night I am exhausted, fall asleep while watching a show after dinner and then wake up at midnight wide awake and ready to go again. Loading the dishwasher at 1:00 in the morning is a sign I am now caught between the nightingale and lark worlds. And tired in-between. I know it is a matter of breaking myself of bad habits but part of it is also biological too. What used to take an act of congress to wake me up at 6:00 in the morning is now just the opposite. And yet I still feel the pull of staying up long after midnight too.
ReplyDeleteI hear you! And it is just so unpredictable. I am always putting in laundry late at night.. but I have to say I leave retrieving it until morning.
DeleteI've always been an early riser, usually between 4:30 and 5:30 AM. 5:30 feels normal and comfortable. 4 is a wee bit too early, and 3 AM... that's when I'm tormented by My Life Mistakes, Greatest Hits. However any time after 6 feels late — practically noon. Our whole family is one of early risers. My daughter, who stays up late and can sleep ALL THE WAY until 7 AM, long ago learned to pack books when she visits friends on weekends because they often sleep until 9. (Selden)
ReplyDeleteWe each have our ways! ANd oh, that worry time. And in the morning , you think--it's all fine ! Why did I worry?
DeleteAh, Jenn, thank you for the reminder that life is good. It's so easy to lose sight of that fact these days.
ReplyDeleteAll my life, since my earliest memories, I have struggled with sleep, which was not made any easier by my mother trying to make me do so. Growing up in the early 1950's with the polio scourge, she forced us to take naps in the summer until I was in my early teens. Naturally, I rebelled, especially when my mind was so busy and wanting stimulation.
When my children were small, and first husband the cop worked nights, then second husband traveled six months of the year, the only time I could have quiet "me" time was after the girls were asleep. It's a time-honored tradition in my family for the mother to stay awake at night--my grandmother read until the wee hours, after having nine children. My mother, at 96, still messes around and doesn't settle to sleep until midnight most nights. So my normal bedtime is between midnight and 1 AM, assuming my insomnia doesn't kick in. You would think that meant waking up at 8 or 9, but nope. I usually wake between 6:45 and 7:30. (Yes, some days include a nap.) Like Selden's daughter, I am often the only one in the house still bopping around.
We have been back from Europe for over two weeks, so I had jetlag for a few days, then my mother got sick with pneumonia, and was in the ER three times--always in the middle of the night--before they admitted her, where she has been for the last week. She is being transferred to a skilled care facility today, and the relief was so huge that last night I finally got almost nine blissful hours of sleep, a rarity for me.
The arms of Morpheus, a lovely place to be, as long as you CAN fall asleep.
Karen - sending love to your mum and to you. I hope she is getting good care and getting better.
DeleteWishing all good care to your mom! So worrisome, but great to get OUT of a hospital.
DeleteThank you both. She is remarkable. So frail and weak, but has fought like hell to get better.
DeleteBest wishes for a speedy recovery for your mom.
DeleteAlso sending best wishes for your mother's recovery and hoping she is soon home again.
DeleteThinking of you both..xoxo
DeleteThanks, everyone!
DeleteANyone have any tricks for getting back to sleep?
ReplyDeleteI count backwards from 1000, slowly, with the rhythm of my breath, and make my body heavy.
DeleteIf I need to calm my brain down, I’ll name all of the countries. Otherwise I count backwards like Edith, but for weird reasons I start at 252.
DeleteI’ve tried something I read recently: I think of a five letter word that has no repeated letters (e.g., stone) and then try to name ten nouns that begin with each letter. S: spoon, stove, sloth, etc. I usually fall asleep before I finish all of the letters. Not last night, unfortunately…. — Pat S
DeleteI count backwards from 200 or I turn on the BBC radio so I can just barely hear it.
DeleteYes, counting is good--I usually start at 100, though. Optimist me. I also think about watching pelicans fly. I know, I know, but it works.
DeleteI listen to the sleep stories on the Calm App. I’ve never finished the journey on the Orient Express
DeleteI am an early bird; these days I am often awake at 4am and up by 5am. If I wake during the night, I'll listen to my little radio (with an earbud) and that will often (not always) send me back to sleep. I have also learned how to nap in the afternoon, which I experience as an unbelievable luxury of retirement from full-time work.
ReplyDeleteYes! My first years after retirement included a lot of napping. I had decades of sleep to catch up on.
DeleteANd when you wake up, you are not groggy for the rest of the day? What's the secret to that?
DeleteI used to be a nightingale, but I'm a bit more of a lark now. I tend to wake up around 6:30 or 7:00 if I don't set an alarm, but I'm not very productive for the first hour or so. I need coffee in my system first!
ReplyDeleteAs for getting back to sleep, when I wake up in the middle of the night, I put my earbuds in and listen to an audiobook. For some reason, that always helps me go back to sleep, even though they're books I want to listen to. I think it quiets my mind to get lost in a story. The trouble comes, then, the next day when I have to figure out where I fell asleep and get back to the right spot in the book. But it's well worth it to me if it helps me sleep!
Yes, that is indeed the rub! ANd I always wondered why they put chapter headings in audio books, like a table of contents--until seriously, a few days ago! When I realized it was to help you find your place in situations like that!
DeleteLark here! Early morning is my favorite time. It's 5:18 right now and I've had first breakfast and read HCR. I try to be in bed at 9 or 9:30.
ReplyDeleteOf course at 9-1-1, I worked all sorts of crazy shifts. When I was on graveyard, and got done at 7:00 am, I generally went straight to bed after work, but would feel guilty for sleeping all day when I woke up at 2:00 pm. I never got enough sleep.
Oh, I cannot imagine working that shift. YOu are a rock star!
DeleteI am past sleeping in the chair by 9:30, so take a cat (or two) and go to bed to read. That lasts maybe for 15 mins and then I am gone – usually with the tablet and glasses on… In the morning, I am awake with the sun, and just love being able to see what colour the paint is on the wall (4am right now). I don’t get up until 7:30-ish. May nap in between or catch up on the book. Come winter, we both enjoy sleeping until 8 – sun doesn’t get up until after 7:30. We have no curtains or drapes anywhere and never have –I guess we live with the light.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, are you people in the eastern states freezing? There are no gardens planted in our region as the soil is too cold (and so are we. I have not put my parka away and usually have at least a vest on. Plants are border-line freezing. It does not go above 50 at night and not much more during the day. I am beginning to think that the tomatoes, should they ever get in the ground will have enough time to mature.) This el nino for the rest of the world leaves us freezing – it did so before about 10 years ago. Brrr! My 300 geraniums have all turned purple.
Nope, the chilly spell we had is over. Tomatoes are in the ground, basil is already going to seed, and my lettuce crop is all ready AT ONCE (eating SO many salads). I'm sorry it's so cold for you up there. We've also gotten some good rains in the last week, which our dry soil desperately needed.
DeleteWell, it's downright hot now. ANd they are saying we are still in drought even though it has poured. My tomatoes are not in yet, yikes.
DeleteDuring high school and college I thought of myself as a night owl but honestly, I was just so enthusiastic about life that I routinely went with the least sleep possible. After I got into the work world I became more of a lark since I always worked in settings that required an early start. Then when my son was small, I started setting the alarm for 5:30 a.m. and taking a walk before everyone woke up as that was the only time I could consistently count on getting it in. After a few years, when my son was old enough to be left alone, my husband started joining me on those walks and that was our pattern all the way to retirement. We would watch the start of the 10:00 news each night up until the 10:16 weather drop, then off to bed and up at 5:30 for our walk.
ReplyDeleteNow, after a few years of retirement, bedtime has drifted closer to 11:00 (or even a little after) and waking is in the 7:30 to 8:00 range. I was shocked as this developed, but it seems to be what our bodies like. Truth be told, when we get up at 8:00 I always feel a bit embarrassed, like there's something wrong with sleeping that late. (Completely ridiculous, I know, but the product of a lifetime of conditioning.) But I can honestly say I feel deeply refreshed when I wake up most mornings now.
My story is much like Susan. In college, as little sleep as possible. Those were the days of shared computers, so I often up in the middle of night when they were available.
ReplyDeleteWorking life saw me up at 4-4:30, so consequently falling asleep on the couch by 9. In retirement, I am enjoying sleeping more. My husband is a night owl, normally sleeping until 8:30. I would get up earlier, but am enjoying finally getting to snuggle in the morning after 35 years.
My system is wired to nightingale. Even if I get in bed by 9:30 or 10:00, I find too many things to do before actually turning the light out. I often stay up until 2 or 3, but I don't get up until 10:30 or 11:00 most days. Of course, if I have an early appointment, I try to do a bit better, although I was up at 7:45 this morning and didn't get to bed until 2. My good excuse is that I was packing for us going out of town for a few days this morning. I told husband I'd be ready by 10:30, so I need to get in the shower pronto. When I was working, teaching or otherwise, I did have a work schedule of getting to bed no later than 11 and getting up by 5:30, but those days are behind me and my natural inclinations can take over. My husband goes to bed usually around 9 and gets up at 5 or 5:30. Our kids were one of each. My daughter is a lark and my son was a nightingale like me. I have lately started thinking maybe I should try to get what most others consider a "normal" schedule, the lark one, but then I think again and decide why does it matter. People do really have different biological clocks.
ReplyDeleteMy son is a lark and I remember getting a bit miffed at my otherwise truly beloved sister-in-law when he was little and she talked about his early rising like it was a character flaw. When he moved to Japan that natural tendency seemed to double down. As he acclimated to the time zone, he settled into a pattern of waking about 5:30 a.m. and has never been able to shift it any later. This makes life difficult for him on the rare occasion when social obligations make him want to stay up late, but otherwise seems to be working out ok for him.
DeleteI’m a definite nightingale. When my son went off to college, we both started going to bed earlier (TV off at 10:00, in bed by 10:30). That was great when I was still working because I was getting more sleep. My husband still goes to bed by 10:30, but I am usually sitting up in bed, reading books on my iPad until after midnight. He is still working so he gets up and leaves before I am out of bed. Then there are nights like last night. I couldn’t fall asleep for the longest time. Woke up at 4:00 to use the bathroom and have still not fallen back to sleep. I got up at 6:30, knowing I will be heading back to bed after my husband goes to work. I end up wasting so much of the day. I’ve realized that when I was working, I was moving around a lot and when our dog was alive, I was getting fresh air and exercise when we’d go for a walk. I need to take myself for a walk. — Pat S
ReplyDeleteTaking ourselves for a walk is a good answer for many things.
DeleteI used to get up by 5:30 for work, but what's my excuse now, after 10+ years of retirement? No idea, but my usual wakeup time is around 6:00 but occasionally a little later. And if I didn't wake up by myself, I'm sure my 17-year-old cat, Sasha, would let me know it's time for her to be fed! I try to get to bed sometime between 10:00 and 11:00 p.m.--7 hours of sleep seems perfect for me. I have a regular routine in the morning, which I enjoy. It includes feeding Sasha (of course), then getting on the computer to read and respond to email, enter some sweepstakes, read Lesa Holstine's blog (and contribute reviews on Thursdays), read the Jungle Red Writers blog (again, of course), check TVline.com for what's happening on TV that I might like, do a little (hopefully very little) doomscrolling, and check NetGalley for new books to request. I typically take a 1-mile walk around the neighborhood, weather permitting, take a shower, and have breakfast. Then I'm ready to face the day!
ReplyDeleteUp by 7am, easier with full daylight in the summer months. It's tough to fall asleep before 10pm, because it's light until 9:30.
ReplyDeleteMy day job involved routine communications with people in the Middle East, so I'd get up at 4:00am to walk the dog, shower, etc., to be in the office by 6 EST. Imagine my surprise when I retired to find that I'm not naturally an early bird at all! Now, I wake up when I wake up - no ****ing alarm! - and read in bed until 8:30, and at the keyboard by 9. Retirement is good!
ReplyDeleteYes, I love not having an alarm. Although I can set an alarm in my head, and knock on wood, it always works. Which is so incredible, isn't it? How does it know?
DeleteI'm definitely a nightingale, or an owl, as I usually describe it. I'm married to a lark who gets up early every day. Being retired I have no schedule. I go to bed late and then read until I can't. I dream hard and weird which maybe is why I have trouble waking up at a decent hour. The years I had to get our boy to school and me to work were murder on my owl self. I was born late at night, around 10:00 or so. Maybe that's why I'm an owl?
ReplyDeleteI dream hard, too. Does that make you rested, or more tired?
DeleteSame here Pat! I start dreaming and deep-sleeping around 4 am so I’m not ready to wake up before 7.
DeleteBorn a lark, still a lark. I can remember waking up long before anyone else and standing by my mother's bed, until she would wake enough to send me back to bed. Even in retirement, no matter how late I'm up, I wake around 6:30 or so. Now, though, I can roll over and try to sleep until 7:30 or thereabouts. Any later than that, I've had a rough night or I'm sick.
ReplyDeleteI don't know - in the middle? I used to be a night-owl. Stay up until 11pm or later and in college I never scheduled an 8:00am class after my first semester as a freshman.
ReplyDeleteNow, I'm in bed by 9:30-ish. I read for a while and turn the light off around 10. Usually asleep by 10:30. My alarm is set for 7:00am, but I'm waking up earlier - between 5:30 and 6:00, although sometimes I can snooze for a bit. But I'm usually out of bed no later than 6:45. Partly because if I sleep longer Koda starts worrying that he won't get breakfast!
But I can't be productive that early. I can do mindless things, like check Facebook or email. But the brain really doesn't get into gear until at least 9:00am.
Yes! Me too. I cannot “people” before 9 or 10 am…
DeleteI have always been a night owl, as was my mother. My father was early to bed…
ReplyDeleteI have been reading the JRW blog for a number of years and have been amazed that so many of you post your comments in what I consider the middle of the night.
I very seldom go to bed before 1:00-1:30, if I do I usually wake up several hours later.
At one point I used to go to bed around one and then stayed up until 2 or 3 just reading, not doing anything productive.
Although I still go to sleep later than most people, I tend to wake up lot earlier than I used to but stay in bed for a while. I set my alarm but find I am always waking up before it starts ringing.
Lately l have been hearing birds singing outside when I have been ready to go to sleep.
It sounds as if they are right outside, perhaps they have a nest. Obviously it is dark so I can’t see them, but they seem to have such interesting song patterns I would like to know what they are.
Usually I fall asleep right away. When I don’t, I try to come up with varieties of different things alphabetically such as breeds of dogs, animals in general, fruits and vegetables, etc
I have also done different types of fish, flowers and geographical places I have been to and what I saw there. Last night I was going through the Supreme Court justices. I came up with eight of the nine and was about to give up on the last one when it just came to me.
My mother would go through the states alphabetically.
Owls and larks, if we can find common ground then anyone can right? I am between a lark and owl. I do get a second wind most evening and enjoying a long wind-down routine every night. I have learned to keep my evenings low-key so I can fall asleep more easily. I don’t love getting up before 6:30 or 7 though. It still feels like the middle of the night before 6 am. I have been using a sleep mask for a few years. It works for me! I can’t handle any light at all-windows, night lights, etc and this really takes care of that issue. Once that mask comes down it is lights-out! I do wish I was more of a lark but after decades of getting up to into the office it just never sunk in.
ReplyDeleteSleep mask! I really should use one so I dom't wake up with the sun.... but when I do, it itches and that keeps me up.
DeleteFROM JULIA! JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: God, I love sleep. I love sleep SO much, and I’m always sorry to hear about people who can’t even quite make 7 hours. I need - are you ready for this - ten hours in bed. No, I’m not Rip Van Winkle; I’ve ascertained I’m awake about 12%-15% every night (thank you, Fitbit) and ten hours between lights out and up-and-at-’em gives me a solid eight and a half hours, and I NEED that amount of shut eye. I feel absolutely zero guilt about my self-indulgence; with three kids, various jobs and a morning lark husband, I estimate I was chronically underslept for thirty years.
ReplyDeleteMy only issue is that I’m a natural night owl, and if I were to listen to my circadian rhythm, I’d be turning in at 1am and not rising until 11. Sadly, the world does not look kindly on this. I try to keep a strict schedule of bedtime at ten, and I really have to work at it, because the slightest slippage - a dinner party, perhaps, or a hard-to-put-down mystery-and it’s a week’s effort to reset my body clock.
When I think about the days I used to pull all nighters — studying or bartending — and I am boggled. How? I am for 11, but a good book will trick me into staying up until midnight. Also, I’m a power mapper! Mid-day I take a 20 minute siesta and it’s glorious!
ReplyDelete