ManLife Is Getting Up At 5:00AM Worth It?

You're not alone. My circadian rhythm is off--I could be tired as heck and when it hits the late hours of the day my body decides it's time wake up and go racing.

 

I cannot tell you the last time I got a solid 8 hours of sleep - or even a solid 7 hours.
I almost always wake up after 2.5-3 hrs to go pee, and then 2.5-3 hours after that again...
Sometimes I can get right back to sleep, but most of the time, it takes anywhere from 45 min to 2 hours...

I can be dead-tired and go to bed at midnight-1am - and I will lie there until 3-330am, sometimes 430am...

If I take a 3mg melatonin I can sleep up to 5 hrs at most before I have to get up and pee, but I HATE having to rely on a pill to sleep...

I KNOW I am not getting much REM sleep... and that's not good.

 

I've started to do the 2-3 hour wake up and go pee, too.

 

Sucks getting old....

I go to bed generally around 2:30-3am, if I don't want to get up to pee at 5-6am
I cannot drink ANYTHING after about 7pm....

 

Circadian rhythms shift as we age. Older people get sleepy earlier than they did when they were younger. We tend to go to sleep earlier and awaken earlier. I used to be a “night owl”. Now I’m barely keeping my eyes open at 9-10 pm. So I googled what the problem might be and learned it’s a normal physiological phenomenon. Nothing’s wrong with me ‘cept gettin’ old.

And I’ve since become a much earlier riser. It’s a myth that that older people need less or more sleep. We still need about the same amount of sleep those under 65.

 

The evolutionary theory to go along with "old people go to sleep early and get up early, while young people stay up late and sleep in" correlates that to the lessening of night vision ability as we age..

So, you need the young (good night vision) members of the tribe to be "on duty" during the dark - then us oldsters take over early in the morning.

Good theory, but who knows?

Kevin

 

Good thinking. Let's put the youngers on point and us oldsters can bring up the rear.

 

When I was working, my alarm clock radio was set to turn on the news at 6am.
I'd be at my home office at 8am or the plant at 9am.

Now that I'm retired, I most often sleep a few hours at a time on the couch, and my 'alarm clock" is when the DVR reboots at 5AM.

 

Have been an early riser for quite a long time. For the past few years, I wake up at 5:30 a.m. 7-days a week with no need for an alarm and I try to be asleep by 10 pm. Really like being up before anyone, enjoying my morning coffee, catch up on overnight news and then a morning workout and into the office.