Thursday, January 17, 2008

Sleep for wussies? I think not!

This morning, as I was feeding BD her morning repast of strained pears and rice cereal, I overhead this story on NPR about sleep:

Dr. David Dinges says most people will show serious impairments if they are deprived of sleep for even a few days. The problem is most people assume they are fine when they are not.

"People will often say, 'I am good to go,'" he says. "It is that disconnect between your ability to introspect your alertness and impairment and how impaired you are cognitively, which is why we think many people believe they are doing fine when they not doing so fine."
I could've told ya'll that one. But I'm a lover of sleep. Sleep and I have a great relationship. You might say that me and Sleep are OTP, but that would offend my husband (even though he might also reluctantly agree).

One of my favorite quotes is this:

"Sleeping more than five hours feels like a waste of time. You could be reading or on eBay," Evangeline Morphos, a Columbia University professor, told me.

No offense Evangeline, but I'd rather sleep than surf eBay. I'd rather sleep than watch TV or read the Internet. If people are downing pots of coffee and yelling that sleep is for wussies, I don't quite believe them. Try doing five hours of sleep without the meth/caffeine and then get back to me.

The funny thing is that I didn't realize how valuable sleep was until Benevolent Dictator came into my life. In the past, I ran on six to seven hours of sleep on weekdays, with it going up to about 10 hours on the weekends. I didn't mind it at all, I saw it as part of who I was.

But that's because I could control how much sleep I got. I also got an uninterrupted stretch of sleep. With BD? Not so much. In the beginning, I got three hour (or less) chunks between feedings. Recently, she's been going for longer stretches, but it doesn't match when I go to bed. I go to bed around 11p.m. -- she goes to bed around 7 p.m., with her longest stretch being in the beginning.

While you get used to the chunk sleeping, it's still not great. I get up, feed her (which can take up to 30 minutes, unless I pass out as she feeds), put her to bed, then crawl back into my bed, where it takes me a bit to drift off to the Land of Nod. At least now the chunks of sleep are getting longer, which helps. Not to mention a nap during the day so I don't collapse at 9 p.m.

I just find it strange when people think I sleep too much. It's what I need to function properly. With the birth of my daughter, I learned that if I don't get enough rest, I become more depressed, more irritable and more angry. I don't like that, so I value my sleep time.

Not to mention, if I get enough rest, I'm more productive during the day -- I entertain BD more instead of resenting her from letting me nap, I can cook a meal, take a shower and handle day-to-day chores.

So yeah, you won't hear me bitching about how I need to learn how to sleep less. Maybe manage my awake time a little better, but not sleep less.

3 comments:

K. said...

I hate to say it, but I kind of adhere to Evangeline's worldview. I get mad at myself for sleeping more than 5-6 hours if I'm not on vacation. I feel like I could be doing something with that time ...

QuietlyGoingMad said...

I'm the flip side of K's coin. Give me a good 10-12 hours of sleep and I'm a very, very happy little girl.

But unlike many people-I operate on 'farmer's time' as my family calls it. I'll go to bed at 7 p.m., and I'll be up at 7 a.m.. I want to be out of bed early and get all my shite done in the early hours of the morning before all the crazy people come out. Additionally, I'm far more productive in the a.m. than in the afternoon...and I'm completely worthless after about 7ish in the evening.

I'll take sleep over everything. Well, except sex and food--those two will always be my first non-human loves!

Eva said...

When I was younger (in my teens) my migraine problems impacted my sleep a lot more than they do now. I would regularly get 4 to 5 hours of sleep and if I woke up I had to get up or I'd be sick. Caffeine and I have only ever been incompatible acquaintances, so that was no escape. When I was put on a medicine in college that let me sleep 12 hours without pain, I cried because I was so relieved to get away from all the tired and hurt (that I had just sort of accepted as normal up till then).

I am totally with you on the value of sleep. I'm so much more on top of my emotions and my life when I'm not irritable and exhausted.