John: The End of the World!

Almost. Last night's nap turned into a 12 hour sleep-o-rama. How? I can't tell you, I've got no idea. If I did this on purpose this would be called a reboot. A reboot is when someone sleeps for as long as they can every couple weeks while doing a biphasic sleep pattern.

Otherwise I've been doing very well. I went roughly three days before that without even needing an alarm clock, which felt really good. (I still set my alarm clock, but usually woke up minutes before it went off)

I've noticed that I have naturally fallen into that eating pattern I set up. Delicious.

John: Getting there! (13)

Today I woke up without an alarm at 5:45. I think I feel asleep something like 2:50 last night so that is two cycles, assuming mine are 87 minutes if I did the math right. I went to sleep a little earlier last night because I was thinking that my cycles might be longer than 90 minutes, turns out they aren't. Excellent.

Tomorrow is the two week mark, that is exciting. We will probably stop tagging the day numbers then.

John: Food/Nutrition Plan

I've read some stuff about polyphasic and it said it is better to eat smaller meals more often. I've been kind of confused about when and what to eat since I started this but it does seem more natural to eat throughout the day, more like animals. I've started devising a plan that will hopefully help me eat healthier.

Sleep: 3-6
Breakfast (6:20-7:30a): A bagel and maybe tea
First lunch (9-12): A sandwich probably
Second lunch (12-4p): Apple and maybe a bagel

Nap: 5-6:30
Dinner (7-8p): Dinner with family, small portion
Tea (10-11): Tea and maybe an apple
Supper (12-2a): Eggs? Grilled cheese?

This does sound like a lot of food but the portions would be small and I am awake quite a lot during the day. I'm going to stop doing fast food during the week.

John: 12

I woke up at six today. My normal alarm went of and didnt do anything then my cell phone went off and actually woke me up. I'll be using that from now on. I slept in warm clothes without a blanket so I had no reason to jump back in bed. I called Nick up and he was either awake or I woke him up.

Feels good.

John: Wack nap

So I woke up from my nap at seven. At first I thought this was a bad thing but then I realized that I didn't really fall asleep till 5:30, so this was an even hour and a half. I woke up and left the room and, upon reentering, noticed that my alarm was going off. This means that my alarm clock is dying and that I woke up naturally, kinda.

Mixed news, I guess.

John: Big Number 10!

So yesterday I ended up skipping my nap, not because I didn't have time but because I couldn't fall asleep. I slept the normal 3-6 without any problems except a little groggyness in the morning. I feel pretty normal right now but I am looking forward to my nap.

John: What?!

So it's 10:15 and I just woke up. My alarm was set for 5:25 (I tried to move the 3-6 portion forward 30 minutes or so, turns out that didn't work) on both my cell phone and normal alarm clock. I don't remember turning either one off. Let's see if this messes everything up. I read about some other people who did this and they said they would give themselves a couple extra cycles on the weekends, kinda like sleeping in. Maybe this will just be like that. This was three extra cycles, two if you count the one I missed on friday.

Good news: I do feel energized. The only problem is that I don't know if I'll be able to fall asleep for the nap this evening. Also (relatively) good news: This was probably the best time I could have over slept because it was a weekend and the only plans I had were with Nick.

John: Bastards!

Doorbell disasters dominated my dormir. Dammit!

This morning was good but this afternoon wasn't. My nap was interrupted 45 minutes in, waking me up and making it impossible to go back to sleep. Depending on how I feel tonight I might try to make it up tonight.

John: Seventh Day, Bad Streak

I'm bad at this. Today was my third or fourth consecutive time sleeping in on the 3-6 portion. Dammit!

Other than that I've been doing well: nap works out well, falling asleep quickly, feeling energized throughout the day. I will be brainstorming about different ways to make sure I wake up.

John: Sixth Day, Afternoon

Ahh! What an idiot!

This morning I woke up at six (the music didn't play but I still managed to get up). I woke up very easily but convinced myself I could just lie under my blankets for a second without falling asleep. I couldn't. I was woken up 45 minutes later.

I felt pretty good today, lots of energy for the most part.

I think I should also mention that both Nick and I have developed a habit of having fourth meals, usually around 1 in the morning.

John: Fifth Day, Approaching Midnight

So I had my nap from 8:45 to 10:15. I got in bed 15 minutes early because I wasn't too tired. I ended up falling asleep sometime around 8:45 which worked out.

I used Brian Eno, fairly quietly. Now I just need to wait and see if this messes me up for the rest of the "day."

John: Fifth? Day

Morning was hell. I had my cellphone and normal alarm set and it still took someone else to wake me up. Next time I am going to use a combinate of a normal alarm, cell phone, and music alarm on my computer. If that doesn't wake me up nothing will.

I read somewhere online today that a person sleeps better if there is white noise in the room. My computer fan provides some but I am going to try sleeping with some really ambient Brian Eno.

I digress. I was zombie-like even after I got out of my shower but, by the time I got to school I had recovered. By 9 I was completely alert, and, aside from a few times I got a bit sleepy, I've been fine all day. I am at work now so I probably won't get to my nap until 7:30 or so which could be awful. We will see.

Overall, I feel pretty good most of the time, enough to make it still worthwhile.

Also, I don't think we have mentioned this: Nick and I are stopping our soda drinking as well. I almost grabbed a orange soda at work out of habit, but I remembered.

John: Fourth Day

Waking up this morning wasn't horrible, although I did have to be woken up by a person. I got slightly tired around 12:30 as I was watching a fairly dry movie. By 1:15 I was alert again. I was playing with the idea of going running but I think I'm going to read now.

I got a lot of work done last night post-midnight. Just as before, I am staying completely awake and alert until about 2:30. Tomorrow will be interesting because I have work that takes up the time I would usually nap.

One thing that is important to remember: The reason that the sleep is more effective as two parts is that when we sleep we get the most REM sleep (the part of the sleep cycle that rejuvenates our minds) out of our first two sleep cycles then they start to get less and less effective, but, when we break up the cycles, we can achieve two "first cycles" in a day. This results in more energy from less sleep. Humans used to sleep this way, animals (as far as I know) still do too.

John: Approaching Third Midnight

Had a solid nap today, exactly 90 minutes. Then I washed my face and had dinner, that'll take some getting used to. The real test will be to see if I can be productive tonight. I will update you about that later.

John: Third Day, Morning

Last night I didn't get tired until around 2:30, which felt really good. I was even watching a movie in the dark (Babel, which I haven't finished yet, good so far) and I wasn't tempted to sleep until probably 15 til 3. I got into bed (on the floor, actually) with ten minutes to fall asleep and probably used 5 of it. My alarm was set for six but I woke up at 8, because someone woke me up. I don't remember turning off my alarm, so two things could have happened: I slept through it (maybe it stops buzzing at some point), or I semi-consciously turned it off. Eitherway, I need to work on a better alarm system. Once I was awake this morning I was very alert right away, that's new.

I think my body has started changing. My sleep is more on/off now that it ever was, instead of fading in and out.

John: First Successful Nap

Oh yea! I got in bed with the covers at about 10 til 5. I didn't fall asleep right away, I remember seeing 5:17 on the clock, but I did fall asleep. I feel rejuivanted. Had to brush my teeth, they felt gross. I'm off for the evening, I am hoping the energy I have now will die around 3, instead of 11:30 like last time. Only time will tell.

John: Second morning

This was tougher than the first. I set my alarm for 6 but ended waking up at 7:30. Three total cycles. I don't even remember turning off the alarm, weird. I slept on the bed today and I think that was some of the problem of getting up. For now on I will try naps on the bed and the three hour sleep on the floor.

John: Second midnight

Ahh, the second midnight. I'm tired and I've got to stay up for two more hours. Why tired? Well, I didnt manage to get my nap. Since I was doing stuff tonight I decided to try and do the nap from 3:30 to 5 but I couldn't fall asleep. I did briefly go into a state of semi-consciousness that was very very strange. When I tried to do my nap I was sleeping on the floor again. For the next couple of days I am going to try to sleep my naps on the couch and my bigger sleep chunks on the floor.

Looking back on it, I had a lot of energy today. During school I worked well and was able to get stuff done. I came home and ran errands and didn't get sleepy or tired until about 2:30. I went home and did my want-to-be-nap and felt refreshed (just from lying down) until very close to midnight. All on three hours of sleep! I will keep you updated.

John/Nick: First Day, Afternoon

John: I'm feeling good. Today felt like a normal day except I was more awake in the morning. I did get a litte tired every once and a while throughout the day, but that wasn't anything too bad.

Nick: I'll go ahead and cover the morning as well in this post, as my internet wasn't working this morning so I wasn't able to comment. So my sleep last night: pretty terrible. I tossed and turned all night, but I was able to wake up naturally without the assistance of my alarm, making me think I completed at least one sleep cycle, but I doubt I got the two in. It wasn't very difficult to wake up, though, as I think I woke up right after the completion of that one sleep cycle. It basically felt like a normal day up until around 11:00am when I started to get pretty tired and now, at 1:44pm I'm pretty much burnt out. Definitely looking forward to my 90 minute nap at 6:30. Five more hours to go!

John: First Morning

Morning... I might have to redefine that. For now it will be the time that follows the 3 to 6 sleeping. Verdict so far? Well, last night was really good evidence in favor of the 90minute sleep cycle. I woke up after three hours of sleep feeling like I had been awake for an hour, completely alert. I went and took a shower like I normally do to wake myself up but I don't think that will be neccessary anymore. Energy? Yes, so far, feeling quite good.

I slept on the floor, with a blanket and a pillow. This is something I have done before, I like it for some reason. I'm not sure if I will be able to be as strict with my naps as Nick, so maybe he will serve as the control in our little experiment. Its 6:30 now and I have time to do stuff before school.

And about last night: For me it was actually pretty easy to stay up (not the case for Nick). The real problem is boredom. Nick and I now have stuff we can work on, but I imagine this would be a lot harder if we didn't.