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The sleep thread

windhoek

windhoek

The Phoolosopher
I've been reading Why We Sleep by Mathew Walker and in it, he speaks at some length about the all the benefits as well as the dire consequences of getting less than 7.5 - 8.5 hours of sleep a night; 7 hours a night is cutting it fine, as it were, while anything less, Walker suggests, is simply not enough.

In the TED talk below, he suggests going to bed at the same time every night as regularity can help establish a good sleeping habit and also to sleep in cool conditions (18 degrees Celcius) as being the two main things we can do to improve our sleep. In his book, he also suggests cutting out/cutting down considerably on alcohol and caffeine intake as well as avoiding strong light in the evening - especially blue' screen light from gadgets.

I'm going to see if I can tweak my sleep efficiency by going offline at 9 o'clock so that I get at least an hour of non-screen time before going to bed between 10 and 10.30.


Right, time to sign off for the evening, but I look forward to seeing what happens - both in this thread as well as in bed :)
 
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I’ll watch that later as my sleep pattern is a total mess at present and I suspect may be making me a bit ill. I can’t sleep properly at night, wake up too early, and end up catching a bit in the afternoon to make up for it. Being self employed running a site that involves staring at screens on and off all day/night likely doesn’t help, and neither does a rather sick allergic cat who scratches and over-grooms all the time (considerable vet bills yet to provide a lasting solution there). I do have my iPad set so it goes to the more restful ‘night shift’ colour palette at 9pm.
 
At 70 years old I sleep between 6 and 7 hours a night, from around midnight to 6 or 7 am, which seems quite enough.

Wasn't it Napoleon who said 6 hours sleep for a man, seven for a woman, and eight for a fool?
 
About 6 a night here. Much better than a huge bout of insomnia some years ago where two or three was normal. Stress plays a massive part for me. Still have a tendency to wake at three and not be able to go back to sleep.
 
I can't sleep very well at all. If I get 3 unbroken hours it's a miracle.

It's been like that for the last 15 years - a bad back, stress and being a light sleeper all conspire to make my life a misery.
 
I was hooked on xanax for 5 years because sleep was a problem. Coming off it when I returned to UK was hell. No sleep for about a week

Surely sleeping pills are better than not enough sleep. Been on 5-6 hours broken sleep most of my life. If I could get Xanax as easily as I could in Thailand i'd go back on it
 
I had a year of hell coming off tramadol getting no more than two or three hours a night due to RLS and twitching anxiety, then being exhausted in the day and sleeping for two or three hours in the day.

Now I sleep much better, 7-8 hours a night.
 
windhoek said:
.. the dire consequences of getting less than 7.5 - 8.5 hours of sleep a night; 7 hours a night is cutting it fine, as it were, while anything less, Walker suggests, is simply not enough.
Click to expand...

I'm doomed then, cos I don't get anything like that; I sleep ok, I just don't go to bed very early.
 
About 7 here max, I wake at like 6 am every morning, weekends, week days, makes no difference.

Of course cutting out booze has a massive effect I have had a number of no booze months. What I have noticed is a. in gerneral I sleep better and dont wake in the middle of the night so much, and b. if I am stressed or whatever then I will still have a bad nights sleep and be useless the next day.

Cutting out booze considerably helps me in terms of un-interrupted sleep, and the ability to lay in. If I have even a single pint then the next morning I wake early and I just have to get up. Most annoying!

Also these self help types of people really get on my tits.
 
A great and fairly terrifying book.
windhoek said:
I've been reading Why We Sleep by Mathew Walker and in it, he speaks at some length about the all the benefits as well as the dire consequences of getting less than 7.5 - 8.5 hours of sleep a night; 7 hours a night is cutting it fine, as it were, while anything less, Walker suggests, is simply not enough.

In the TED talk below, he suggests going to bed at the same time every night as regularity can help establish a good sleeping habit and also to sleep in cool conditions (18 degrees Celcius) as being the two main things we can do to improve our sleep. In his book, he also suggests cutting out/cutting down considerably on alcohol and caffeine intake as well as avoiding strong light in the evening - especially blue' screen light from gadgets.

I'm going to see if I can tweak my sleep efficiency by going offline at 9 o'clock so that I get at least an hour of non-screen time before going to bed between 10 and 10.30.


Right, time to sign off for the evening, but I look forward to seeing what happens - both in this thread as well as in bed :)
Click to expand...
 
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For the last 20+ years, I have almost never slept more than 5 hours at night, typically midnight to 0500. I have gradually increased the amount of afternoons I take a siesta (I’m now 67): I used to say I needed at least 3 / week, now it’s 5. Siesta can be anything from 20 mins to 2 hours, but usually about an hour, during which I doze than sleep.

If I feel reasonably awake, I’ll often get up at 5, make a cup of tea & do an hour’s Vipassana meditation, then go back to bed with another cuppa and read for another hour (otherwise I meditate at 7).

I have been asking recently if people wake up feeling deeply rested and refreshed, as I can barely remember the last time I did - used to be normal for me. I would be interested to hear how many others do ?

PS. I almost always fall asleep at night very quickly.
 
Going to bed at the same time every night is a bit difficult when you don't get up at the same time every morning, especially if the minimum is 7 hours.
 
richgilb said:
I was hooked on xanax for 5 years because sleep was a problem. Coming off it when I returned to UK was hell. No sleep for about a week

Surely sleeping pills are better than not enough sleep. Been on 5-6 hours broken sleep most of my life. If I could get Xanax as easily as I could in Thailand i'd go back on it
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Posh git, what was wrong with temazepam? Rich, better to confront the monsters of your id than anaesthetise yourself to their presence.
 
Bugger, I’m off to a bad start. I did an open mic night on Thursday, eventually got to bed at 1.30AM, very broken sleep and back up at 7.30AM. Friday night I had a meal and drinks with friends and got to bed at about 1.30AM again, up at 8.00AM yesterday after more broken sleep... had a gig last night where some tosser from outside of the area harassed one of my singers tried to set about him when asked to move away and then tried to fight me when I apprehended him, he lost... very quickly, but that had me wound up after I got home (at 2.00AM), so I finally got to bed at 4.00AM and had to be back up at 8.00 as I had a live sound job for a charity event, worked from 9.00AM until 6.00PM today, got home at 6.30PM and then mowed and edged the front lawn and watered and dead headed my flowers, had tea at 8.30PM and then sat outside on my garden bench with a coffee (well two) from 9.30PM until about 45 minutes ago... and now I’m starring at an iPad!o_O
 
I made a concious decision to (as much as possible) avoid stress as number one life priority. Above how much money I could make, how many new customers etc. I was finding my mind was overactive at night worrying and making me ill. I have managed to reduce stress, although occasionally shit happens. But mind is quiet at night, and during the day too if I can help it. I sleep fine now thankfully.
 
TheDecameron said:
Posh git, what was wrong with temazepam? Rich, better to confront the monsters of your id than anaesthetise yourself to their presence.
Click to expand...
Huge difference! Wake up with a straight head on Xanax, wake up feeling stoned for half the day on that other stuff.
 
Well, I reckon I got 6-hours max there. In bed at 10.15pm and up at 4.30am. The sleep cycle that's missing is the REM cycle: the dreaming cycle that's like top quality compost for creative thinking among other things. Admittedly, it was always going to be tricky as I went to bed with the mindset of undertaking a double-blind test as I was thinking about sleep in an unnatural sort of way rather than just going to bed to sleep. I'll carry on going off-grid at 9 o'clock though and see how things go, see if I can improve my sleep by switching stuff off at 9. As it is, however, I'm gonna need a siesta!

Fwiw, I haven't used an alarm clock to wake me up in years as I'm a natural morning lark and 5.30-6.30 is my usual time for waking up regardless of when I went to bed, the time of year, etc.
 
Do you need less sleep as you get older? I certainly seem to and I’ve always assumed it was natural.
 
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