Thursday, December 30, 2010

Get Up Early Or Sleep In Late?

I never know which way is better: getting up early or sleeping in late.

When I get up early, I tend to be more productive.  I have a cup of coffee, take my pills on time, and manage to get some cleaning and writing done.  However, by 2 p.m. I'm exhausted and in lots of pain.  Jon comes home at 5 p.m.  It's so hard to function after that time.  Plus, I NEVER manage to fall asleep before the early morning hours.  Annie goes into total zombie mode haha.

When I get up late, I'm not productive at all.  I am sloth-like and stay in bed until at least 1 p.m.  I usually don't bother to eat until supper time.  This seems to put a delay on the feeling deathly, and it can be pushed back until about 8 p.m., so I can have a little bit of non-cranky time with Jon.  However, I'm always less likely to work at night.  It seems like the wrong time to be working and I just can't find inspiration.

I wish I could say that I could get up early and nap in the middle of the day, but for some reason, sleep is elusive at that time of day.

Do others with chronic illnesses face a similar problem?  Have you or your doctors come up with any good ideas?  Are you on a stable routine or do you just sleep when your body will allow it?

I'd love to have some weigh-in on this topic :).

xoxo,
Annie

12 comments:

Baffled said...

After eight months of being sick I seem to have settled into a routine. Bed around 3am. Up around 11 or 12. Feed myself, prep dinner and do something important. Back on the couch at 3 or 4pm. Stuck there the rest of the day. If I don't do too much then I don't get cranky. If I try to do too much then I have a melt down around 5pm, which might include yelling and throwing things. Hubby has come to recognize the warning signs and makes me sit before I get too bad. He doesn't like me yelling.

Just one caveat, the routine is an average because I also have nights when I'm going to bed before midnight and others where I'm up until 5am or even 7am. I have found that free range sleeping suits me best and as long as I don't have appointments to deal with I tend to sleep when and where I get tired.

Felicia Fibro said...

I find that I feel better and get more productive after 10 hours of being in bed, even though I do not sleep during many hours of that time. I tend to stay up until 11-12, so that means sleeping in later for me. Even before having fibromyalgia I was never a natural early riser though.

My doctors encourage me to take a sleeping aid ~2 times a week, so I can get more and better sleep than I do naturally, without having me built up a tolerance to the medicine. On the days that I take them it takes me a little longer to mentally awaken in the mornings. On those mornings I usually get less done.

Good luck finding your best sleep-productivity balance!

dominique said...

My 'perfect' schedule (at least it was before Dekker's death) was in bed by 8 to rest, bath at 9 and asleep my 10-ish and then I was up by 8.

Since the chemical poisoning in June, though, I have to rest a lot more. I just get easily wiped out so I now take 'naps/rest time' twice a day. Once in the morning and once in the afternoon.

If not, I just collapse or do the yelling crying thing like Baffled. (God am I glad I am not the only one that does that!)


Happy New Year Annie!

Anonymous said...

Day or night, unless I take medication, I sleep for about 2 hrs., wake up, usually go back to sleep for increasingly shorter periods of time. Hubby up before 6am which means I am too. Sometimes go back to bed for a while, other times try to stay up.
Not a good napper: if I'm napping, I need at least 2 hours or I'm grumpy.
Usually go to bed around midnight; some times up later if need distraction.

Jamie said...

I don't have a good routine. I'm in bed far longer than I actually sleep (and, of course, things are FAR different right now, since I just had surgery). The typical "routine" I've tried to follow has been bed between 12-2am (unless I can get to sleep earlier), up whenever I wake up (normally between 11am-1pm). I had been able to get up a bit earlier in the morning to get things done, but never really before about 10am. I start my downhill pretty quickly mid-afternoon, and am couch-bound by about 5pm. My husband works nights and leaves at 5:30pm, so it works alright. He gets to spend my better hours with me, gets me fed, and makes sure I'm settled before he heads to work. I either fall asleep on the couch or drag myself to bed.

I think... whenever you can sleep, SLEEP!!!

Lynda Halliger Otvos (Lynda M O) said...

Sleep--what an invaluable part of a day and yet sometimes so elusive--other times 20 hours in a row. I nap whenever I feel drowsy and that’s usually a minimum of three hours. I go to bed after midnight and before four, mostly up by noon. I am very lucky to be married to a man who guards my sleep from intrusions. I had a flare up of CFS in the early 90’s which kept me down for nearly five years. He carried the ball full time while I suffered. Our daughter was elementary school age at the time.

Baffled said...

I am so glad to see that I'm not the only one with the wacky sleep problems. Happy dreams everyone!

Jamie said...

Definitely NOT the only one. And, by the way, my meltdowns tend to come a bit later in the day... around 9 or 10pm. I'm not sure why, but that's been the "norm." Oh goodness!

Annie said...

Haha, no you are definitely NOT the only one! I think we're all suffering a very similar issue!

Maria Marz said...

I usually go to bed early, and sleep in. This is mostly because of the medications that I take, which make me extremely drowsy. Before I got hit with fibromyalgia, I was able to get by on 6 hours of sleep and get a lot done.
My pace of life has greatly diminished from when I wasn't a chronic illness patient. It seems to me, much like Felicia Fibro, that I do best after 10 hours of sleep or so. And like Baffled, I need to pace myself and not overdo it or I can fly off the handle pretty easily.

Rosemary Lee said...

I find that if I force myself to get up at a routine time everyday I have more pain. I may spend time in bed to rest but my sleep patterns are still erratic. Even if I take a sleep aid I still wake up in the middle of the night and without it I'm up........
If I could figure out a way to sleep in the tub without drowning....

elisabeth said...

I am perforce a morning person due to my med schedule, but I do function better in the early hours once I get past my morning stiffness. I might not be a chipper little bundle of sunshine, but my productivity definitely fades in the afternoon as my fatigue and aches increase. Of course, insomnia shoots it all to hell. I'm just coming out of a pattern of falling asleep relatively easily, sleeping four good hours and then waking up and not being able to get back to/stay asleep.