Sleep question

[Omegasox]

I typically go to bed anywhere between midnight and 2:30am, yet always wake up between 4:30am and 6am. 2 hours of sleep can't be good for you, I realize that. However, on nights where I wake up after 4 hours of sleep, is that detrimental to your body if it is happening on a daily basis?

The moment I initially wake up, I'm up. There's no going back to sleep. My body has decided it's time to get up. Thing is...I'm wide awake. No grogginess, no struggling to get out of bed; I'm absolutely ready to go. Most people would consider the ability to function off 4 hours of sleep phenomenal, but I'm wondering if it is not allowing my body enough time to recuperate. I've seen numbers indicating that deep sleep or REM is only established no sooner than 90-120 minutes into sleep. That means I am only getting 2 hours of, what I would think, is quality sleep a night. If I'm not busy that day, I'll sneak in a 1-2 hour nap later in the day, but does that even help at all?

I've tried every product known to man that is OTC. Ambien fucked up my equilibrium so bad I had trouble getting to the bathroom (I'm talking wall-hugging) so I had to drop that. Not to mention scrips are expensive from what I've seen for sleeping pills.

But what I am really curious about is if this is detrimental to my body if it's occurring day after day. Is it taking my body longer to repair after a hard day at the gym?

 

[Powerbuilder333]

Having no medical background, all I can ask is do you doze off during the day? And when you do go to bed to you fall asleep within a few minutes? If no to the first question, and yes to the second question then I wouldn't be worried.
Otherwise I'd advice you to seek help - LOL. That's not to say I would seek help.
I fall asleep quickly at bedtime. Even if I sleep 8 hours, sometimes I'll start to doze off in the late afternoon. I've had girl friends tell me I snore. One insists I have sleep apnea. To get it diagnosed and treated requires going to a sleep clinic (or so I've been told), and I'm not prepared to go through that yet...
Good luck.

 

[Tatyana]

I think it has been pretty much established that the optimum amount of sleep for most people is 7 hours a night.

Obviously people are different, however, too little or too much, it is thought to have an impact on our well-being.

Have you tried going to be earlier if you are waking up so early?

How old are you if you don't mind answering?

 

[Omegasox]

I only get home from work between 10-11:15, so I have time for my last meal of the day then a half hour of TV before I try and lay down. Going to bed earlier is out of the question, unfortunately. On days I've had the opportunity to go to bed by say 10pm, I'll wake up at 3am.

And I'm 28 years old.

 

[lexus12]

Ask your Doctor for a script of Restoril, its an old medicine for sleeping
and is cheep as hell I think 30 are less than 10.00. It's not too strong but
better than Ambien. Doctors now days want to prescibe the latest meds
which are usually expensive and the old stuff works just as well and is
cheep.

 

[guest username]

Ask your Doctor for a script of Restoril, its an old medicine for sleeping
and is cheep as hell I think 30 are less than 10.00. It's too strong but
better than Ambien. Doctors now days want to prescibe the latest meds
which are usually expensive and the old stuff works just as well and is
cheep.

Actually we prescribe the latest meds mainly because patients are asking for them. Patients are bombarded with all these happy, feel good commercials in direct-to-consumer advertising.

Recently I wrote a COPD'er a script for doxycycline for his COPD exacerbation. It's cheap ($4 at many pharmacies), generic, etc. He actually told me "Doc, can you write for Avelox? I've seen the ads and I think it would work better." $4 v. $120 for a course. I convinced him that doxycycline will work just fine.

 

[lexus12]

I agree, I never thought i would see the day when prescription
medicines would be advertised on TV. It seems like every time I'm at
the Doctors the Pill reps are there stocking them up on samples etc.


Anyway I not a Doctor just was putting my 2 cents in on his question.

 

[blz]

Could be a deeper issue here. Depressed people usually have this problem of early morning awakenings. How has your mood been?

 

[iggy]

try some melatonin bro....
i couldn't sleep at college ever second semester.
then i got some melatonin and it would give me really good sleep
felt like it kinda increased my test a small bit to.
no proof it did though.
look it up on wikipedia if your interested.
it's naturally produced by your brain so i would rather take that then anything a doctor would give you because they probably will have at least one side effect.

 

[Tatyana]

I usually sleep really well, except when I had some exam stress and REALLY needed to sleep, and then I couldn't.

I found that herbal remedies with things like valerian, hops........either Kalms or Nytol, worked really well, and I didn't have any foggy head in the morning.

 

[musclemom]

If you go to bed at an earlier time and STILL wake up around the same time I say get some ear plugs or a white noise machine and some heavy duty black out curtains and make sure your sleeping area is staying at a comfortable (cool)temperature. Something could actually be startling you awake, which is why you are physically UP. This could be anything, from a car or truck that goes by at a certain time, or a bird singing or dog barking. Give yourself a dark, quiet, cool environment for sleeping and see if you don't get a few extra hours in.

Going to bed on a full stomach is bad, so if you're not getting home until 11:00ish then yes, you should be going to bed after 2:00 or so. But for most adults, four hours of sleep is insufficient. It is possible you have been operating at a minimal level for so long you don't know what it feels like to be rested.

Assuming your sleeping area is perfect, your bed is comfy and you still only sleep 4 hours, the questions Powerbuilder brought up were absolutely valid. The only other questions to ask would be do you feel rested and do you dream? If you aren't weary during the day, sleep soundly, awake feeling rested, don't feel like you need to mainline caffeine to function, and have dreams that you occasionally remember then there really is no reason to worry about it. While 7 to 8 hours is common, people do operate at both ends of the spectrum.