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Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

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Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#51

Post by whatusername »

X-Istence wrote: post #44
fabiandesimone wrote: post #37

I just received my Wakemate a few days ago. My sleep has been improving ever since. I'm slowly starting to feel less groggy every morning therefor enjoying more my days. This, inevitably makes me be more productive during the day which in turn makes me spend more energy feeling more tired earlier, thus going to be at more reasonable hours. A good vicious cicle if you will. Also, I started swimming for about 45 minute…

When I still used to live with my parents we had a pool as well. Even if I went swimming an hour or two before bed I would just become more refreshed and more awake and still not go to sleep. For some reason swimming triggered my brain to wake up and start working on more new problems. So this advice may not work for everyone.

Try jumping in the pool and swimming first thing. :) I love waking up like that.

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#52

Post by _b8r0 »

gte910h wrote: post #14

I had issues with sleeping when others do for a long while. I do not anymore (although get out of sync again about 2x a year). 1. Caffeine and you: You have a certain sensitivity to this drug. You may also be misusing it. Generally speaking, it's a late morning, early afternoon only drug. Late morning is the only place it starts working as its an adenosine antagonist, and you don't start getting adenosine in any real…

All great stuff. The other thing you can do is try to reset your body clock by going to bed early, or (if you're brave) skipping sleep for a night, then going to bed early next evening. The former is better as the latter messes you up for a few days but if you have the time will be quicker. Then keep going to bed at around 8-9pm, you'll be up before 6am quite easily.

I'd also recommend drinking lots of water and a large glass before bed.

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#53

Post by hnhg »

jarin wrote: post #46
pg wrote: post #3

Getting lots of exercise makes it easier to fall asleep at night. The ultimate solution, however, is to have a small child.

Let me just preface this by saying that I think kids are great (and this is not taking into consideration the other benefits of having kids, like happiness and sense of purpose and things like that), but if your goal is not just to get up early for the sake of getting up early but to get up early in order to get things done, it seems like having a kid would not necessarily be a net benefit time-wise as the reason you…

I can't tell if you're trolling or not, but I believe the suggestion of having kids wasn't intended to be taken seriously.

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#56

Post by lbk »

Looks like you have DSPS .

There's a good wikipedia page on it ; go read that , read the whole thing . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_syndrome

I got my diagnosis 3 years ago , after a melatonin-test . I had to do 24 saliva samples at 24 consecutive hours , they tell you from the graph whether your melatonin production is off .

The 'fix' is to take melatonin , as a pill , same time every night . For some that's close to a cure , for others it isn't (it drags my sleep phase about 50% towards a normal phase , if i take it further than that the fatigue kicks in again ) . Once you get diagnosed a doctor would start you off at 5mg , you can lower the dose later on .

So go get diagnosed , unless you think you can diagnose yourself .

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#57

Post by lbk »

lbk wrote: post #56

Looks like you have DSPS . There's a good wikipedia page on it ; go read that , read the whole thing . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_syndrome I got my diagnosis 3 years ago , after a melatonin-test . I had to do 24 saliva samples at 24 consecutive hours , they tell you from the graph whether your melatonin production is off . The 'fix' is to take melatonin , as a pill , same time every night . For…

I need to stress this some more .

Most of the advice in this thread is about sleep hygiene . That's important but it wont rid you of DSPS if you have it .

Then there's some comments about playing with 'zeitgebers' , by fasting , or light-therapy , or dark-therapy (F.lux, you can even wear blue-blocking sunglasses) . These will help you influence your sleep phase .

But the thing is : all of this doesn't do enough for the more serious cases . Those just need melatonin .

And yes if you tend to go into a 27-hour cycle in the summer , you're considered a serious case .

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#58

Post by daviddavis »

gte910h wrote: post #14

I had issues with sleeping when others do for a long while. I do not anymore (although get out of sync again about 2x a year). 1. Caffeine and you: You have a certain sensitivity to this drug. You may also be misusing it. Generally speaking, it's a late morning, early afternoon only drug. Late morning is the only place it starts working as its an adenosine antagonist, and you don't start getting adenosine in any real…

To expand on number 7, the best way to maintain an early morning routine is to eat within 1 hour of waking. I went from a night owl to a person that wakes up every morning at 5am to run 5k and work out. Now on the weekends I can't sleep in past 7am.

Re: Ask HN: how to become a morning person?

#60

Post by hugs »

pg wrote: post #3

Getting lots of exercise makes it easier to fall asleep at night. The ultimate solution, however, is to have a small child.

Same here. I was a "top of noon" riser for years, then I got married and had a kid... Now my two boys are 5 and 7, they both wake up reliably between 5 and 6am everyday. Also, relatedly, though, they go to sleep at 7pm. To deal with such an early rise, I often fall asleep at 7pm, too. If you still want lots of sleep, go to sleep early. Simple advice like that is often hard to follow.
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