Advice for the Late Risers

Disclaimer: I recognize that this is in no way medical advice that I am seeking, I should speak to my doctor, etc. etc. However, doc and the resulting sleep study have indicated that sleep studies emphasize deficiencies, so these resources haven't done much aside from putting my wallet on a diet.

Backstory: I have always been a night owl. By "always," I mean back to when I was 10-11. I can work all day through the night no problem, but mornings have always been hell. I have long required an orchestra of alarms to transition to wakefulness. To say that I am a heavy sleeper is an understatement; I am usually out within a few minutes.

I have been with the same company for almost 12 years now. Until my current position, my shifts were variable; in the same week, I would work as early as 5, and as late as 1 am. Past supervisors have shown leniency for my morning issues, knowing that despite not showing up on the minute, I will assuredly be there, and I will do whatever it takes to get the job done. As a supervisor myself, I found people who were happy and willing to work those earliest shifts for me. Now, I am not thriving, and the book is getting thrown at me. This is fine, I understand that policy exists for a reason.

I'm to the point that I have to put this job behind me. In preparation for the next position, how have others overcome troubles waking up? I've tried about every truck under the sun; changing diet, exercise, going to bed earlier, regulating caffeine intake, but there are some days where alarms do nothing for me.

What say you, internet? Surely I'm not alone.

Do you snore? I ask because, as a snorer myself, I can vouch for the fact that it does effect the quality of your sleep, to the point that it may not matter how early you go to bed. I am also a night owl, and would have no trouble staying up until 3:00 am every night, if my stupid life would allow it.

I am curious to know as well.

In worked nights in high school, perma screwed my sleep cycle. I have a cheap sony AM/FM alarm clock, I set the radio to random with the volume cranked all the way up, across the room, the sudden explosion of sound usually gets enough adrenaline flowing for me to be awake enough to know to stay out of bed.

I have alarms set for 05:10 and 05:20. After that it's a 15 minute dash for the door.

I don't like mornings and thrive at night. My sleeping problems have ben smushed by my neurologist, so that was part of my battle. Beating your wife, throwing things, doing situps, and freezing in strange contorted positions all in your sleep is apparently not normal. Who knew?

Have you done a sleep study?

I recently did and we found I have at least moderate sleep apnea. Once the full results are in, I'm sure I'll be going on a CPAP at night (they put me on one during the sleep study because of my O2 levels, and I felt much better the next day).

In reply to z31maniac:

Yes, $900 for the worst sleep of my life, which wasn't representative at all. Felt like I was inhaling a probe. Doc said, "nothing conclusive."

The "snooze" alarms need to be out of reach on another device, preferably as far away from you as it can be while in the same room. What exactly is the work issue? Do you sleep in everyday or do you manage it just fine with the occasional drastic oversleep?

Mitchell wrote: Felt like I was inhaling a probe.

Some phrases just make me giggle. That right there is a good example of one such phrase.

MrJoshua wrote: The "snooze" alarms need to be out of reach on another device, preferably as far away from you as it can be while in the same room. What exactly is the work issue? Do you sleep in everyday or do you manage it just fine with the occasional drastic oversleep?

Yes, I have significantly improved my timeliness (by minimizing the amount of time it takes to get ready), but I do occasionally oversleep. I have found that my sleep cycles are about 90 minutes, so I set my first alarm approximately 90 minutes before the absolute latest time I can get up and be on time to work.

So, my problems are two-fold:

1. I sleep through alarms. Loud, loud alarms. That I can hear from the outside of my house. At my last place, my alarm was in the back of the house. I forgot to turn it off, and I could hear it from the street. Sounds are internalized, becoming incorporated within dreams. My current alarm has a vibrating thing that goes between the mattress and box spring: The vibration becomes earthquakes, passing trains, helicopters, white noise, whatever.

2. I can operate in partial consciousness enough to "kill the sound," but not enough to internalize what the sound represents, i.e., that I need to get up. Note that dreams continue from where they left off when I snooze/turn alarms off, even if the alarm is across the room.

My best alarm is the one that wakes my girlfriend up, so that she then kicks me (not literally, she's great) until I get up. Long distances make that a challenge.

Maybe you can rig your alarm up to a set of hydraulics that dump your ass on the floor. Would that wake you up or would you doze back off?

True story: Back in high school, I glued push pins to the snooze button. It still didn't work.

I have the same problem. I've never been fired for being late but I'm there every day. I have broken a few time clocks with my fist.

It doesn't matter how loud or where in the house or how many alarms I set. My mind simply doesn't recognize it as a sign to wake up.

I've found nothing that helps.

this on a timer

I assume the problem is waking up in the dark. Have you looked into an alarm clock that helps your body "come around" to "day" by gradually increasing a light until the room is fully bright. I'm not sure where to find one now but I remember Sharper Image having them a few years back.

Circadian rhythms are tough to trick but feeling more awake will be worth the experimenting.

I had a friend with a very very similar situation. What helped him was A) melatonin, and B) a dawn simulator. He had a very bright halogen worklight hooked up to an automatic rheostat that brought the light up slowly over about 90 minutes. This was set to the same time every day so his metabolism could try to stabilize at the right time. He kept the blackout shades closed so that the changing seasons didn't fubar that fragile stability.

Good luck.

Light hasn't worked either. One of my alarms was an X10 unit hooked up to a few lamps.

Another sleep story: I was a cross country runner back in the day. Not a competitive one, but that's neither here nor there. Before a race, I once laid down on the sidewalk in broad daylight, with thousands of people walking around, and took a refreshing nap.

How did I get through college? Slowly. If I had something big in the morning that I couldn't miss, I would sleep at a desk in the library overnight.

I have an app on my phone called Sleepbot. The idea is that you keep the phone on the bed and it tracks your movements while you sleep, gauging the right time to wake you up. you set a range of time, ie: 7:00 - 7:30, and it picks the best time to wake you within that range. I find that it does work well for me and I often do feel more rested, even when it wakes me up within the earlier part of the range. I haven't tried hooking it up to speakers, as I don't have quite the issue that you do waking up. I do enjoy looking at the graphs of my sleep patterns, and seeing when I typically toss and turn throughout the night. It even records your sounds, so if you like to say interesting things in your sleep you can laugh at them later.

Is it possible to change your schedule so that you come home from work, go to sleep, get up so you have several hours to do all your home stuff, then go to work?

While I am an evening person.. I have never had a problem getting up in the morning. To the point where I have a this nice Sony CD alarm clock.. in the past 5 years I have never heard the CD play.. just the sound of it spinning up is enough to wake me

Yes, I am an extremely light sleeper

I used to have that problem as well. I changed it by getting up at the same time every morning. Work day, off day, vacation day. At 6:00am I'm getting up. The alarm clock is set for 6am, I'm usually awake at 5:30. If I stay up till 2:00am, I still wake up at 5:30 and get out of the bed at 6:00. Eventually, you can throw out the alarm clocks. I don't set them on the weekends anymore. I'm still up at 6.

For a alarm that is guaranteed to wake you up, use one of these and a simple light timer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZlX5QdOHBQ

Mind actually came off a fire truck, so it was pretty loud.

Put the light timer on the other end of the house and mount the siren on the ceiling. You will have to get up.

Oh, and your neighbors will hate you.

Another thing, tell your girlfriend to actually kick you. Hard. That's what my wife did. I think she actually enjoyed that part.

Don't hit the snooze, don't stretch, don't "just lay there for 5 more." Feet need to hit the floor the instant you hear the alarm.

It took about 3 months before I could switch to a regular loud alarm clock and another several years before I started waking up before they went off.

Make a schedule and keep it. Don't sleep in again, ever. Seriously, even when you can, don't.

Mitchell wrote: In reply to z31maniac: Yes, $900 for the worst sleep of my life, which wasn't representative at all. Felt like I was inhaling a probe. Doc said, "nothing conclusive."

Sucky.

Mine gave me an Ambien so I didn't have a problem sleeping hooked up to everything or after they put the mask on.

z31maniac wrote:

Mitchell wrote: In reply to z31maniac: Yes, $900 for the worst sleep of my life, which wasn't representative at all. Felt like I was inhaling a probe. Doc said, "nothing conclusive."

Sucky. Mine gave me an Ambien so I didn't have a problem sleeping hooked up to everything or after they put the mask on.

Mine spent 30 minutes telling me what sleep apnea was until I told him I was diagnosed with RBD. He didn't know what it was.

Get a two year old. Never sleep late again.

mndsm wrote: Get a two year old. Never sleep again.

FTFY