To sleep or not to sleep?

Morning Glory

Obsessive cook
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Maidstone, Kent, UK
How much sleep do you need? How much sleep do you get? When do you sleep? I like a good 8 hours (uninterrupted please) but I never go to sleep before about 2 am and often later. I don't get up until around 10.30 am. There are some members here who seem to survive on very little sleep it seems. What are your sleep patterns?
 
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...that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous melatonin,
Or to take Ambien, against a Sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them: to die, to sleep...

I paraphrased a bit there. :typing:
 
I seem to average out about 4 hours sleep at night, plus 1 or 2 during the day, but every now and then I have a marathon sleep in of 12 hours or more (presumably to catch up). Last night, after being on here, I disappeared out into the kitchen and made a week's worth of yoghurt; then I played some computer [word] games while the dishwasher was busy. It was about 5.30 before I turned in. The mutt had pinched my duvet and the pillows, so I ended up sleeping at the bottom of the bed with just a throw over me :o_o:. I woke up at 10. There has been motorsport on most of the day, and it finishes at 6 p.m. so then I shall have a quick nap before dinner. After that, who knows?
 
As to sleep, well I wake up several times during the night so anywhere from 8-10 hours.
 
Two to Three a day. Tend to listen to the radio after 03:00 more now.

Early morning walks seem to attract attention from the police.
Is that all you need or do you have insomnia? I wonder how you get by energy wise. I listen a lot to the radio so am curious what station(s) you listen to. (I don't even know what country you are in). I live in London and listen a lot to talk radio stations where people phone in with their views, e.g. LBC, talk radio, Radio 5 etc.

I used to need around 10 hours sleep but, as I've got older, 8 hours suffices. Any less and I feel somewhat below par and may have to resort to more Vit B Complex! It prevents me getting irritable (it's an established nerve tonic) and also gives me energy.
 
Is that all you need or do you have insomnia? I wonder how you get by energy wise. I listen a lot to the radio so am curious what station(s) you listen to. (I don't even know what country you are in). I live in London and listen a lot to talk radio stations where people phone in with their views, e.g. LBC, talk radio, Radio 5 etc.

I used to need around 10 hours sleep but, as I've got older, 8 hours suffices. Any less and I feel somewhat below par and may have to resort to more Vit B Complex! It prevents me getting irritable (it's an established nerve tonic) and also gives me energy.
Stemmed from working split shifts. Up, kettle on, wash, cuppa, then cycle to work. Setting off just before 05:30, home around midday. Repeat at 17:00, home around midnight.

Radio stations, radio two, RTE radio 1, TnaG and a few local ones.
 
I've had to learn to get by on a lot less since my back went. I can't sit for any length of time, nor can I stand for any length of time, and you have guessed, I haven't been able to lie down for any length of time. Until I moved to Australia I would sit in my OAPs chair as I called it (a riser recliner - the sort you see in OAP homes that can lie flat or throw assist the occupant with standing. That allowed me a whole load of different options, but we couldn't bring it to Australia for a number of reasons not least of all I still needed it whilst it would have been in transit.

So now I try to get by. Sleep wise I go to be around 9-9:30pm and wake at intervals during the night - usually 2 or 3 times, though just recently the Drs here have changed some of my meds (over to synthetic morphine and increased the dosage) which has meant that I have, for the first time in 2 1/2 years actually slept through to the alarm at 5:30am (it was 6am until daylight saving ended here in Australia at the weekend, but the chooks need feeding and letting out and the sunrises at 6am currently so...). I don't get anywhere near like the 8hrs you're meant to get and periodically collapse as I did on Saturday (and I mean literally). My hubby put me to bed around 11am and I didn't wake (except for my medication alarms) until 6pm, got up, fed the chooks, put them to bed and then ate as well, then went back to sleep until 10pm when hubby woke me for more meds, and slept through til 6am.... usually I am a touch better than that and pick up on the warning signs but missed them this time.

I would love to be able to curl up on my side again and get some sleep, but my ribs (I broke 11 in a fall back in November) and my back (November 2014) prevent me from doing so! I can't even sleep on my own side of the bed at the moment because I still can't roll into the sitting position (anyone with a bad back who has had either surgery or physio will know the 'thing' I'm referring to) because my left ribs haven't healed properly get!
 
I would love to be able to curl up on my side again and get some sleep, but my ribs (I broke 11 in a fall back in November) and my back (November 2014) prevent me from doing so! I can't even sleep on my own side of the bed at the moment because I still can't roll into the sitting position (anyone with a bad back who has had either surgery or physio will know the 'thing' I'm referring to) because my left ribs haven't healed properly get!

I know exactly what you mean - I broke my pelvis a few years ago and ribs many times. The ribs I broke at the same time as you (in November) are now healed though and I can sleep on my side. Why haven't yours got better yet - that is a very long time?
 
Why haven't yours got better yet - that is a very long time?
I have a couple of issues - the first is my adrenal gland problems when leave me on steroids permanently. Now these steroids are replacing what my body does not produce and it is not know if this causes the standard 'steroid issues' or helps. I do know that when you injury yourself your body automatically produces enough of this steroid (cortisol) to help with healing, something my body can't do. So I take extra for the assigned period of time and then drop back down to what is believed to be correct. I say that because basically they have studied and taken measurements of people and worked out an average dose. What happens if your body is at the upper end of that scale, but you are given the average dose? No-one can answer me that question!
Then, the second issues is that I managed to break them again a couple of times. The first was when I was getting the heart scan done. I had to lie on my left hand side for the scan to be done and at the time it was only known for definite that I had 2 broken ribs (and those were on the left). I did point this out. I was at the 3 week mark at the time. As I tried to sit up after the scan I felt them go. I nearly collapsed from the pain and the lady doing the scan had to get my husband to come and help me. Then just before Christmas whilst I was taking it easy and watering the veg plot with the hose pipe, I leaned forward and the left ones went again. After that I had the bone scan done which revealed the 11 breaks.... I am still getting pain from the lower left - that side has always been a problem and whilst the right hand side feels completely normal now, the left side was the side with the floating fracture - something that should have been operated on, but then I should have been in hospital on an epi from mid chest down and kept on a respirator for a period of time had I ever actually gone to hospital in the first place! (That is standard treatment for anyone with more than 6 broken ribs by the way. - pain management!) I can only guess that a mixture of lower left lung issues (had it all my life and if I am going to get a lung infection, as opposed to a chest infection) that is where it will be, my steroid issues, slow healing and the re-breaks have all added up to me not healing very well. Plus I'm not very good at doing nothing!
 
I should be getting 8 hours because I make more silly mistakes when I'm tired but at the moment I am having lots of restless nights with the overheating thing some of us females get and when I'm not throwing the duvet around apparently I'm randomly kicking my legs rhythmically for long periods!
Small problems I know, compared with some of you.
 
I should be getting 8 hours because I make more silly mistakes when I'm tired but at the moment I am having lots of restless nights with the overheating thing some of us females get and when I'm not throwing the duvet around apparently I'm randomly kicking my legs rhythmically for long periods!
Small problems I know, compared with some of you.
Cycling in your sleep?
 
I should be getting 8 hours because I make more silly mistakes when I'm tired but at the moment I am having lots of restless nights with the overheating thing some of us females get and when I'm not throwing the duvet around apparently I'm randomly kicking my legs rhythmically for long periods!
Small problems I know, compared with some of you.

View: https://youtu.be/jEBc6KBC_i0
 
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