Are you a lark or an owl?

Age,no dog walking needs and decreasing mobility have led this old body to fall asleep or stay awake at random.
I try to keep to a discipline of in bed by midnight and rise about 0700.
Last night we were wide awake at 0400,up and pottering for an hour then back to bed and slept till 0900. It can be infuriating but the more I worry the worse it seems to get. Temazipam is not the answer.
I get to read a lot.
Old age gives you many new problems to deal with.

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I went to bed at 10:30 last night, early for me.

Woke up about 2am and couldn’t get back to sleep.

Listened to some music, with a cup of Clipper Sleepytime tea and a glass of water.

Then did an hour of stretching and light weights with music - very relaxing and enjoyable, then back into a deep sleep.

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I also find if I go to sleep earlier I tend to wake and then can’t get back to sleep.

I’m pretty relaxed about waking in the night.

I usually roll over and breathe slowly and deeply and often drift off again.

But if I feel awake, I just quietly get up and listen to music on very low volumes.

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I think that is very true. Sometimes, typically it seems when I absolutely have to get up on time - say 6:30 to catch a ferry, but i stead of getting to bed a bit earlier than usual something has delayed me going to bed until even later than normal, say 3:00, I then lie in bed willing myself to sleep and it takes an hour of more - instead of the usual 5 min or less.

It is also a matter if conditioning: a few weeks ago I was on holiday where for 10 days we we had to wake at 5 and be ready to move by 5:20. By thd third day I didn’t need the alarm. However after that it was two weeks before my waking shifted a more civilised 7 or so!

The “Boss” and I are both owls. She retires at about 1.30 to 2.30, and surfaces at 11.00. I retire at 2 or 3 am and rise at 10am. I seem to need less sleep than she does!

Of course, before I retired and the kids grew up and left home, it was different. Sleeping times had to accommodate the needs of children and work.

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Can I be both. Generally up later than everyone else but for some reason won’t sleep past 7 even if up past 2. When I do try to goto bed early I can’t sleep and end up tossing and turning until past midnight. Mrs G is alseep within 5mins of hitting the pillow at any time. Most annoying as even when up very late my minds still active for a good half hour before I get to sleep.

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Unless I’m drunk (heaven forbid), I have to read for a half hour or longer no matter what time I go to bed. Kindle app, brightness way down.
My wife can be asleep within 5 minutes. Never been that lucky.

But the slightest hint of music downstairs, she’s awake. Hence, headphones essential!

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I’m usually asleep within 5 mins of trying to read something, same goes for audiobooks.

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:owl:

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I was born at 2 o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. Have a guess! :sunglasses:

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Working life was little sleep, rise around 5:45-6 am and work to around 7 pm, eat with the team , leave around 10-11 pm bed by 12 ish. Repeat.
Now retired bed is around 11:30 ish, poor sleep pattern but not wake until around 9 am winter, 8 am summer. I can occasionally nod off around 4 pm if not occupied with something.

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I suffer from dreadful insomnia so am up all hours – this morning I went to bed at 5:30am and awoke at 10am… every now and then I become extremely exhausted and collapse into bed at 11pm and sleep for up to 10 hours! My very worst time is the afternoons… I’m no good for anything then.

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I’m an owl, but in recent years have started waking early (for me, around 7am), and then just chilling in bed for a bit before getting up.

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I am a lark here and an insomniac so rarely get more than 6 hours sleep. My alarm is set for 0600 but I cannot remember the last time I needed it as I am awake well before then. There was a BBC documentary about sleep a couple of weeks ago and the value of a good night sleep cannot be understated as poor sleep can cause a higher risk health problems (heart attacks, weight gain, diabetes, Alzheimer’s); just something else to keep me awake at night!

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Ah I do have the additional joy of Mrs. H. and her FitBit. Whenever it tells her she’s had a great nights sleep I can guarantee she was up three or four times… because she woke me. In between times it can light up the whole bedroom for no obvious reason and then there’s those moments when her wrist is in my face and I go from fast asleep to full on interrogation horror in a fraction of a second. Her tendency to wear an array of eye masks with amusing faces which are amusing only during the day and not when the FitBit has decided to enter interrogation mode also doesn’t help.

If ever there was an example of technology taking us backwards.

When I wish to sleep I remove things rather than leave them on.

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My son is now a rugby union and football playing 16 year old. His mental health has suffered terribly during the pandemic. Theoretically his immunity has been back to normal for some time but in practice we still see him as prone to being knocked for sux by things others would sweep aside in a day or two. The pandemic hasn’t helped in that respect. He literally post the first half term in sixth form to a cold I shook in 3 days.

That aside he now has no difficulty in being teenage and sleeping for 12 hours at a time, which is just really rubbing it in my face :slight_smile:

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Definitely a lark. Conditioned by doing a paper round from age 11 until I started work then had to be in the office by 7am with an hour’s commute.

My first job was aligned to the working hours of Parliament so I was often still working at 10pm. I have absolutely no idea how I coped with 15 hour working days for seven years back then. I now need my beauty sleep. Always tucked up by 10pm now.

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Lark here too, dictated by work routine, I have always viewed lateness in all its forms as a weakness! and skulking about at night as having a link to rather dubious activities! :0)

:rofl: regarding the thing lighting up all the time…

Mrs AC drives me potty with her jarring choice of alarms on the phone at 6am which scare the hell out of me when I’m not likely to get up for another 90 minutes. She swears someone else sets these annoying alarm sounds, but I don’t believe it.

All these wearable devices are still in their relative infancy but I’m sure they’re refining the algorithms quickly.

My several year old Apple Watch does bizarre things - it will vibrate at 3am telling me to stand to help reach my stand goal (12 of 24 hours) when I’d rather be horizontal for hours at this time of morning! No idea if this might be due to it thinking I’m active if I’ve gone to bed post midnight or if it’s just stupid.

At other times it’ll congratulate me on reaching an activity target for the day, generally when I’ve done nothing at all energetic in the last 30 minutes, presumably simply as it exceeds a ‘burned calorie count’ for the day which will include resting metabolism calories.

The one I really hate is when it tells me my ‘activity rings have closed’ immediately after I’ve used the lavatory - sometimes I think someone’s snuck in a cheeky algorithm for the motion sensors :laughing:

Just realised the unintended pun in the last paragraph. :rofl:

Maybe there’s an Austin Powers activity algorithm…