Day 14 - Pre Core

In bed by: 9:00pm

I'm a little late for core sleep tonight after the Mensa folding party and dropping off a friend's car. I began to feel the effects of napping on the bus (I suspect I didn't fall asleep quick enough, therefore the alarm woke me up too early or during REM).

I have been reflecting on these last few weeks and have some interesting (I think) observations and additinoal lessons-learned that I'll share tomorrow... after I go get some good core.

Day 11 - Pre Core

In bed by: 8:15pm

A great ending to an interesting day. 

Feeling sleepy, yet no-longer abnormally so, my wife and I were able to get to bed a bit early after eating a scrumptious meatloaf dinner while finishing up a contraption on which we were collaborating in Minecraft, an auto harvesting wheat/carrot farm.

Lesson Learned:

Perfect naps and/or a recovery schedule can salvage even the worst days, ensuring that you don't have to suffer those nasty sleep-deprivation symptoms that you experience on a fluctuating/interrupted schedule. Oh, and exercise makes a big, positive difference too.

Day 10 - Post Nap 2

Alarm: 7:30am

Refreshing nap overall; got to sleep 10 minutes past schedule due to puppy turning a large white candle into multiple, sticky snow fortresses around the house, but was lulled away quickly to REM by the ambient sounds of a light rainfall; I was not further uninterrupted, and did not sleep through the alarm.

I am starting to feel much better now, both physically comfortable and mentally alacritous. Hopefully the coming of the weekend will mean adhering to the schedule better, not worse.

Lesson Learned:

Getting off schedule in polyphasic sleep is inevitable. Doing so does have powerful and immediate consequences, but it's predictable, not too severe, and still worth the reward. 

It does, however, take awhile to get back to normal, so don't rush it. Try instead to even out the return to schedule over the next two or three naps, and you'll be feeling better again soon.

Day 8 - Post Core

Alarm: 2:20

I remember waking up early twice, neither in a good way. I think that it was some kind of subconscious anxiety about sleeping through my alarm. Reviewing SleepBot, I can see that happened at 1am and 1:25am.

Waking up was fairly difficult this morning; I nearly fell back asleep as I laid in bed after turning off my alarm. After finally getting up I had some pretty intense, sharp pressure around my temples not unlike caffeine withdrawals, that and a severe sensitivity to light.

Most symptoms were gone 30 minutes later, but now that it is 1 hour later, there still persists a very faint, tunnel-vision-esque headache that I really hope disappears after Nap 1.

Speaking of Nap 1 and schedules, we are not adjusting any of the naps times because our core was off by so long. This is because I am beginning to recognize think that schedule consistency will be the key to success in this endeavor.

Lesson Learned:

A consistent sleeper is a happy sleeper.