It's been a looooong time

I haven't posted in a while and a lot has happened since. I got engaged, married, and have not even considered attempting polyphasic sleep again. I don't think is gonna happen anytime soon either because it would be really hard to stop doing whatever it is I'm doing to take a nap.

I have 2 jobs and a husband--that's not a good combination for potential sleep deprivation.

So, for now, I can continue to give advice to other polyphasers out there based on my experience but that is it!

Now, on to celebrate my birthday weekend!

poly mono

I'm going back to monophasic for a while. I was noticing a decrease in my memory and I was trying to deny it for a while. Last week it got really bad, with people telling me stuff like: "Jesus I just told you that 2 minutes ago". I usually have a pretty bad memory, but now I think it's getting out of control, and I need to be careful because I'm supposed to be getting good grades on my exams and I'm not cause I forget everything.

I will try polyphasic later though, and if it happens again then I'll definitely know what the cause is (first I should see some memory improvement now that I'm going back to monophasic, to be able to prove my hypothesis)

Messing up

I've been messing up big time lately. School is starting to get a bit overwhelming and even with all the free time I'm supposed to get I still don't have enough time.That plus the fact that I've been sleeping more, getting more headaches (stress), etc, etc. I don't know if I really want to fix anything though, I feel like I wanna go monophasic-ish for a couple days but at the same time I know I won't have time to do all the stuff I'm supposed to be doing. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh (frustration)

1.5-hr core everyman

I tried to switch to 1.5 hour core sleep the other night and it didn't work out that well. I think that since I would need to take 4 naps instead of 3, what I should do is to first, take the 4 naps to get ready and then sleep 1.5 hours less. I was reaaally tired and napping felt like 20 minute deaths. Also I had a horrible headache but I don't think it had anything to do with less sleep, but it was hard cause all I wanted to do was to crash for hours. It eventually went away and I didn't feel like crashing anymore and just switched back to my faithful 3 hour core. I don't know if I'll be able to pull this off one day but I think it'll be easier if I don't have school going on.

I forgot to mention that it took me a good week to recover from the post-U2 mess up. I kept oversleeping. Now I'm back on track with no intentions on missing naps and/or sleep times.

still messed up

This is I think the first time this happens to me. I have no recollection of getting up, turning off 2 alarms, not caring about the wonderful smell of fresh coffee, going back to bed. This is scary. I used to think I would always be aware of these things, or that I would make the conscious decision of getting back in bed. So I was woken up at 5... great, there goes 2 extra hours of sleep that might potentially keep messing me up. I took a nap at 2ish and I'll be having dinner at 7ish so I don't know how I'll make my evening nap happen. Maybe I'll just sleep in the car while my fiance (I need to get used to this one) drives.

uh-oh

On tuesday, I completely messed up because I didn't take my afternoon nap plus my evening nap. It was all for a good reason though, I was going to the U2 concert and the excitement got me. Also I didn't go to sleep at my now usual midnight. So I did this: I went to sleep at like 2ish in the morning but only for 20 minutes, as if taking a nap. Why? because I had an exam that day and had to study somehow. The result was that I overslept at all my naps yesterday. I think it was like doing 1.5 hours each (I've noticed that if I oversleep I always wake up at 1.5 hour increments, I guess b/c that's how long my sleep cycle is). Today I haven't napped yet (4:12 p.m) so I'm about to do that right now. I'll take this one, bump up the next one to 8 and then sleep from 12 to 3. Hopefully tomorrow I'll be back on track.

I'm also starting to get mentally ready for my switch to 1.5 hour core. I think I should set a date so that I force myself to do it as opposed to keep putting it off. We'll see.

ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZ

nap mess up

So last night, I skipped my 7ish nap completely and today felt a bit like crap when I woke up at 3. But it was all worth it. I missed it because I was out celebrating my birthday with friends and my now fiancee. He proposed last night! I'm so happy I don't even think about how tired I am. I'll probably get back on track after my 2ish nap.

:) :) :)

Follow-up on test results

I'm so happy. I actually got 100% on my cell bio test. I still don't want to attribute this to polyphasic sleep until I know how many people in my class got the same grade.Still, it feels pretty cool. Hooray for me. On the other hand though, I completely forgot to do my Epidemiology homework. Dang.

biggest brain score: 2952

who has the biggest brain

Since I want to keep track of my mental abilities and make sure I'm not making my brain shrink with this sleeping pattern, I started playing who has the biggest brain? on facebook to have a somewhat accurate way of measuring how stupid this might be making me.
Apparently I'm doing alright:
09/21/09: @ 11:44 a.m: 2727
09/23/09: @ 3:53 a.m: 2735/ @ 5:40 a.m: 2677/ @ 11:57 p.m: 2722
09/24/09: @ 5:43 a.m: 2920--> still not my high score but better than 2 days ago.

Conclusion: this is not making me stupid (I hope! :) )

polyphasic sleep put to test

So all this time, I've been adapting while going to school. Tomorrow I have my first big test and this will give me a good sense on how good or bad I'm doing. I already know that I've been doing alright in the short quizzes, but this will be the real deal...FOR REALS.
It's my first Cell Biology exam and I hope I can do well. I pushed back my core sleep by an hour yesterday and will do the same tonight. So I will be going to sleep at midnight and getting up at 3. That gives me plenty of time to finish reviewing for the test.

About the naps, I had 3 really good ones today, I remember dreaming for the first 2. The weird thing is that for both (and this has happened before but I did a poor job at documenting) I woke up before the 20 minute mark. So I wake up but don't open my eyes and realize because of the sleeping track that I use, that I'm awake before I'm supposed to. I hope this means my body got all the rest it needed and therefore woke me up. I don't know. I'm going to look into it.

Good luck to me!

headache

The headache I started getting from the mojito night decided to continue on until I slept for many  many hours. This is the most I've slept since I went polyphasic: almost 8 hours. My headache is not even completely gone that's the worst part. I don't feel like my head will split in 2 any minute, but still, it hurts. I hope these are not the signs of disease :s

beer + mojito = polyfail

Damn. I had one beer and a mojito mix drink thing last night and when I got up at 4 a.m. as usual I had a major headache and felt like crap. I was hoping those long threads about polyphasic sleep and alcohol were made up. Well, it turns out they were not. Dang!

Now I have slept for an extra 5 hours. Not proud at all.

sleep track report

I used a sleep track that has 26 minutes of white noise + annoying noises at the end to make sure you wake up. It was awesome. I used it first during my 9ish nap. It was alright, but I didn't sleep much mainly cause there's people coming in the classroom and talking around me and moving my table. I used it again for my 2ish nap and it was great. There's a moment of silence between white noise and rooster, and that's when I got up, because of the lack of sound. Same thing happened for my 7ish nap. Great. This is actually turning out to be very interesting. I'm done studying for my quiz today and have some extra time to maybe watch hell's kitchen. Yay!

sleep track

Thanks to this polyphasic forum I visit now, I got this sleeping track thanks to the suggestion of another polyphaser.There are many tracks with different durations and they all start with some white noise (I think there's brown and some others maybe I'm not sure) and end with a series of annoying noises to help wake you up at the end of a nap. There's a rooster, a pig, and some other farm noises I believe. I downloaded it to my iPod and I should give it a try right before my biochem class for my 9 a.m. nap which has to take place at the classroom, otherwise I can't find a decent seat. I have to give credit to the person who shared this online though, so here's the link: http://www.placebo.serv.co.za/?page_id=7

I'll be posting my results later today. I'm actually pretty excited about this!

Rested

After taking my afternoon nap post-heat tiredness episode, I was still a bit sleepy for about half an hour. Then I took my evening nap but I was stupid and one alarm I had set a few days ago went off right in the middle of my nap. So I pretty much took 2- 10 minute naps in a row. I then suffered from mild muscle pain which makes sense, cause it's believed to have a relationship to sleep deprivation. My core sleep from 1 to 4 worked out great and I'm done with my lab notebook for class later today, I studied and I finished typing my resume and I'm doing laundry. All these, while my boyfriend snores away right next to me. I'm so proud of myself for managing to resist the urge of crawling back in bed with him. Points for me!

lack of sleep + heat + driving = bad combination

Today I had to drive for like half an hour and I felt soooooooo sleepy. My trips are usually around that length but today, the fact that I couldn't take a proper 9ish nap, plus no 2ish nap and the heat that was driving me insane, I was almost to the point of falling asleep behind the wheel. This is, of course, not safe. But I blame it mostly on the heat. If I start seeing a pattern, I might reconsider this whole sleeping thing for the sake of safety.

weekend

I failed big time over the weekend. Once again, I'm going to blame my boyfriend hehehe. Just the fact that he's there makes it really hard for me to get out of the warm bed without looking back.

On saturday night I managed to get up at 4 a.m. and make myself some tea and do some homework. But I was too tired and going back to bed seemed so wonderful at the time. So I did. Meaning I slept an extra 3 hours. Dang.

Today I just turned off my alarm at 4 and went back to bed. Total extra 5 hours. Dang dang. Let's see how it goes today. I already forecast not napping for a while since I'm a the school library and left my iPod in the car. No iPod = no nap at public place.

Maybe I can go get it in a couple hours after I get some school work done.

naps

Keeping up with the naps is proving somewhat challenging. I skipped 2 yesterday and took what was supposed to be the 3rd at around 7ish. When I went to sleep at 1 a.m I was dying and waking up at 4 didn't really happen until I walked around and had coffee. I have to be more consistent about naps :S

Doing pretty good

I was doing almost perfect until yesterday when I went out with friends and skipped the 7ish nap. I thought it wasn't a big deal but when it was time to go to sleep at around 1ish I practically died. Next thing I know, it's the morning. Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrghhhhhhhhhh. As in the morning morning, when it's bright and clearly most other people are awake too, unlike 4 a.m. when it's dark, quiet, and I'm convinced I'm part of just a few. The weird thing is, I slept a lot more than my now usual and felt suuuuuuuuuuuuuuper sleepy. Even after my 2ish nap I still felt really tired. Conclusion-->this everyman shindig is awesome. I just have to make sure I wake up when I'm supposed to.

Yay!

I didn't post anything the last few days because I was waiting to first be able to get some sort of pattern successfully accomplished. And I can say that since Sunday night I've been following this schedule with no problems: 1a.m. to 4 a.m. , 9ish , 2ish , and 7ish. I say -ish because with this schedule it's true that you get some flexibility. I still haven't been able to remember my dreams but I did wake up a couple times right before my alarm went off, (at the 20 minute mark) which means that my body is getting used to the idea of getting all the rest it needs in 20 minute chunks, no more than that. I still use an alarm though, and I think I will continue to use it b/c I don't wanna risk oversleeping :)

One thing that I find incredible is that as soon as I wake up (to the smell of freshly made coffee, I've set up my coffee maker to start 5 minutes before I get up) I grab my book, start reading and taking notes, and by the time I get to class I have all the information clearly stored in my head and I know I'm all over whatever my professor's saying. Which means my memory skills have actually improved. When I first started reading about polyphasic sleep I noticed a lot of people complaining about their short-term memory taking a nasty dive. Apparently, this is not happening to me and I hope it never does.

So for now, I can say : Yaaaaaaaaaaayyyy! I am awake for 20 hours everyday!!!!