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Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

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Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#21
post #17

As a tangent, I got a new bed couple of weeks ago. My old one had been around for ages and was well past it's expiration date. It cost a small fortune but Jesus Herbert Christ on a tandem bicycle has it made a difference on how I feel during the day. I fall a sleep faster, wake up more well rested. First few mornings I was just sort of confused by the feeling of waking up profoundly physically relaxed. Felt very weir…

Is there anything special about your new bed that’s causing your better sleep or just the fact that it’s new and not saggy?

Nothing special. Like it's modern mattress technology and all, which has apparently improved quite a lot sine back when I bought my old bed.

But overall it's just much better suited to my body. I'm pretty tall so I need a relatively firm mattress to avoid sinking into it and sleeping all banana-shaped, but with this bed the core is firm but the top layer is soft. Hard to explain, but it's amazing.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#22
As a founder I’ve slept irregularly for 15 years. My solution that kinda works is if I’m tired after a night’s sleep, I sleep a few more hours later in the day.

My cofounder in one venture you never know when he is awake or asleep as he refuses to set an alarm.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#23
post #2

Couldn't a poor sleep pattern just be a symptom of an illness?

Sure.

But you might just work retail, do shiftwork at a factory, or work in any number of places that require weird hours. Healthcare, plowing snow, train conductor, and anywhere that you wind up on-call just to name a few.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#24

I've wondered if my kids will literally kill me through sleep deprivation.

Having more than two people in the house who can act as parents is a game changer. Definitely one place where modern society has slipped up, though there's some change in that with families like mine.

Do you care to elaborate?

I've been thinking about this a LOT over the years. I feel like children were meant to be able to roam around and find different adults to glom onto until they're too annoyed and then move on to the next, all the while learning different specialized skills and niches to find one they fit in with.

I can't help but feel that more-than-2-adult households would have a huge advantage in this era.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#25

As a tangent, I got a new bed couple of weeks ago. My old one had been around for ages and was well past it's expiration date. It cost a small fortune but Jesus Herbert Christ on a tandem bicycle has it made a difference on how I feel during the day. I fall a sleep faster, wake up more well rested. First few mornings I was just sort of confused by the feeling of waking up profoundly physically relaxed. Felt very weir…

How did you chose your new mattress? I've had a hard time knowing from the short impressions in a mattress store if that mattress is really what I want or just feels nice for 5 minutes in a store

Went to several stores and tried a whole bunch of mattresses. Tried several dozen beds and got input from a bunch of different salespeople. Was like a 2-3 week vetting process before I found something great.

A bit of a hassle, but well worth it though.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#26
I'll keep saying it: sleep apnea is vastly underdiagnosed and undertreated. I had so many weird symptoms for so long, which all gradually started to disappear as I started to get my sleep apnea treated.

Unless you're fat, doctors will rarely even consider the possibility. And once you do get a polysomnogram, the usualy course of action is to throw a CPAP machine at you and send you on your way, without much followup. This, predictably, leads to abysmal compliance and the perception that PAP-therapy is awful or innefective.

And while I'm on my soap box, I really wish the PAP-manufacturers would dislodge their collective head from their collective arse. Trying to lock down machines and preventing patients from accessing their data (and settings) is plain evil. And maybe put some money into R&D for better machines? There's literally hundreds of millions of people with sleep apnea, there's bound to be a market for better devices ...

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you chose your new mattress? I've had a hard time knowing from the short impressions in a mattress store if that mattress is really what I want or just feels nice for 5 minutes in a store

Went to several stores and tried a whole bunch of mattresses. Tried several dozen beds and got input from a bunch of different salespeople. Was like a 2-3 week vetting process before I found something great. A bit of a hassle, but well worth it though.

What kind of mattress was it in the end? Springs? Memory foam? And how hard?

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#28

I've been going through another episode of sleeplessness lately. Just like it had before, it has serious detrimental effects on my overall wellbeing. I'm less trusting of others, more inclined to shirk social situations, more sensitive to antisocial behaviors in others. I struggle with telling cause from effect, because these things literally stress me out even more, exacerbating the sleep problem. I just _feel_ the…

Have you considered talking to your dr about a little sleeping pill or mirtazipine?

I had a serious episode of ptsd after a natural catastrophe and I couldn't shut both eyes for months. Meds became a life saver.

Sleep. It's underrated.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#29

As a tangent, I got a new bed couple of weeks ago. My old one had been around for ages and was well past it's expiration date. It cost a small fortune but Jesus Herbert Christ on a tandem bicycle has it made a difference on how I feel during the day. I fall a sleep faster, wake up more well rested. First few mornings I was just sort of confused by the feeling of waking up profoundly physically relaxed. Felt very weir…

I’m always baffled that so many people don’t make new or comfortable beds, sheets, pillows, etc. a critical priority. Generally speaking, a third of your life will be spent there, invest in the best you can afford.

Re: Sleep habits may have long-term benefits

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, say sleeping well adds 6 months to your life, then not sleeping well "killed" you 6 months earlier.

If you sleep for 20 extra minutes every day, that's a full extra year sleeping over a 72 year span. (If you exclude 1/3 of the time as sleep, that's a year and a half of extra awake time.) If you gain 1.5 years of extra time awake but lose 0.5 years of life, did you win or lose time?

Yeah possibly! I wasn't making that point. More the lies, damn lies, statistics point.
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