• Welcome to Autism Forums, a friendly forum to discuss Aspergers Syndrome, Autism, High Functioning Autism and related conditions.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Private Member only forums for more serious discussions that you may wish to not have guests or search engines access to.
    • Your very own blog. Write about anything you like on your own individual blog.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon! Please also check us out @ https://www.twitter.com/aspiescentral

The Sleep Thread. What Are Your Sleep Habits?

ftfipps

Well-Known Member
IF I get to bed at my usual time, 11pm, I will wake up around 7am. If this is the case I will enjoy my morning. If I happen to fall asleep during the day, meaning taking a nap, I won't be able to sleep until dawn the next morning and sleep until 2pm in the afternoon. If I sleep more than 10 hours I will get angina and headaches during the evening. Your risk of health problems increases with oversleeping just as they would with sleeping too little. I try to sleep no more than 8 hours and no less.
 
Last edited:
I work all hours of the day, from morning to evening, and by the end of the day I'm whacked and usually fall asleep quite easily. I say usually, because sometimes I'm tense or anxious and it takes me a while to get to sleep. I often wake up during the night because I have a vivid dream, because I need the toilet or because of no apparent reason. I don't sleep more than about 7 hours.
 
It seems like most people who work get between 1 and 8 hours on weekdays and between 8 and 12 on weekends from things I have read.
 
My habit is I have no schedule or habit. I sleep when I feel sleepy. Sometimes the postman wakes me with the doorbell, sometimes I sleep through that. I get up when I need to eat, or pee.
It's 08:05 now. I might go to bed for a bit.
 
I usually sleep pretty well thanks to my medication. I go to bed at 8:15pm-8:30 and usually sleep through until about 6:30am if it's school or 7:30am if it's holidays. The last week or so I haven't been able to get to sleep, but eventually got to sleep at around 10:00pm. So I sleep for about 10-12 hours usually - pretty good sleep.
 
My habit is I have no schedule or habit. I sleep when I feel sleepy. Sometimes the postman wakes me with the doorbell, sometimes I sleep through that. I get up when I need to eat, or pee.
It's 08:05 now. I might go to bed for a bit.

Interesting!

I usually sleep pretty well thanks to my medication. I go to bed at 8:15pm-8:30 and usually sleep through until about 6:30am if it's school or 7:30am if it's holidays. The last week or so I haven't been able to get to sleep, but eventually got to sleep at around 10:00pm. So I sleep for about 10-12 hours usually - pretty good sleep.

I used to straight pass out after taking my meds but I am no longer on them. if I get more than 10 I will be foggy.
 
I don't have a strict sleep pattern.
The only thing is I am a night owl and feel better and more alert after dusk.
I let my body tell me if I need extra sleep. Usually I go to bed in the small hours of the morning
then get up for a light breakfast about 6 hours later. Then if I have no appointments until late in the
afternoon, I will do a few morning chores like put a load of towells on to wash, my morning personal
routines then lay back down and fall asleep doing meditation or just ambient music for another hour or two.
So I get my 8 hours only in an odd way.
Sometimes I put in 10 if I am extra tired or not feeling well.

This is from habit since I always worked evenings or nights. It is my circadian rhythm.
 
Some nights I sleep 10 hours, some nights 2 when my brain just won't stop. It also depends on my work schedule. I'm not good at going to bed early.
 
I usually aim for 10:30 and wake up about 8:30. My daily commitments aren't until midday so the morning is usually inconsequential for me.

I do tend to wake up around 2 am, just sitting up in bed. Might just look through my phone for 2 minutes and go back to sleep. I do get very vivid and interesting dreams because of the medication I'm on. One was jet skiing on the back of a jet aeroplane. That was a good one. Lately I've just had dreams involve ...not very nice people from school. Haven't seen them in over a decade now but that doesn't stop them from invading my dreams it seems, so that's nice of them.

Aside from that I have to wear a night guard now as my teeth aren't in a great condition because of stress.
 
On occasion I do wake up and have a tic attack because of my Tourette's. That's not fun. If I think myself stressing in my dreams I may end up ticcing in my dreams which forces me into a tic attack at 3 am. I've also had times of punching myself in the face in deep sleep because of it. Fortunately that's seemed to have worn off now.
 
My sleep schedule depends on factors like if I’m tired, how tired am I, if I’m ill. Because I’m currently unwell, I’ve been sleeping a lot longer than I normally do. Normal patterns vary greatly to when I actually do finally go to sleep, despite going to bed at a reasonable hour of around 10:30, I can not seem to switch off so when I finally can sleep it’s around 1 or 2 in the morning...
 
My sleep schedule, if I were to let it happen in a way that feels "natural" to me, would have me going to bed exactly one hour later every single day. Which... well is what ends up happening, more or less. My schedule constantly "rotates" like that. It's rather irritating and gets in the way of everything. I try to resist it sometimes but this never ends well.

The oddest thing about it though is that I rarely ever feel "tired". On normal days, I wont get sleepy, even if the previous night's sleep wasnt very good. The exception is if I'm trying to "push" the schedule forward at the time... AKA, specifically going to bed 2 or 3 hours later each day to try to rotate faster back to a daytime setting. If I'm doing that, then I'll get sleepy in the hour or two before bed. Does make sense, doing that multiple days in a row can be a bit draining. But yeah, when NOT doing that, I just outright wont get sleepy. Which also makes it bloody hard to go to bed EARLY instead of later.
 
Sleep has become a little more elusive as I age. I try to keep a schedule, and get to bed before midnight. If I do that I wake up between 8:30 to 8:38 every morning, when I worked it was an hour earlier. Don't even need a clock to know what time it is. It's rare to actually sleep later than that. As much as I hate schedules and always have, my sleeping time is the one thing that is generally the same and has been my entire life.
 
Last edited:
When I worked 13 hour night shifts I made a point to remain on the same sleep schedule - went to bed once I got the kids off to school and woke up to go pick them up. I stayed on that schedule whether I worked or not. Most people I worked with switched their sleeping habits day to day and they were always sleepy at work. I wasn't and I felt my way was healthier and prevented what is now known as night shift disorder (disorders for everything these days).
Now I can't sleep unless I'm really sleepy, so it's anywhere from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. and wake up about 8-9 hours later. If I happen to take a nap (which is rare) I end up awake until 4 or later. If I could choose, I'd rather be able to sleep from around 10p to 8 a - that's just so rare. I wake up a few times during the night and it took me a few years to learn how to go to the bathroom without letting myself completely wake up - otherwise, I'd be wide awake and up the rest of the night.
I don't sleep much when I'm away from home - last one asleep and first one awake (by hours).
I slept with one of those watch things once and learned that I deep sleep the first few hours of sleep and the rest is lighter sleep instead of most people go in and out of deep sleep all night. Explained why if I let myself wake up during the night - I've already had what I needed from sleep.
My mind was kind of trained, too. I would not wake up with my phone ringing right at my ear, but I WOULD wake up if I heard one of the kids trying to sneak into the house when they were supposed to be at school.
 
It is my circadian rhythm.

I sincerely believe that circadian rhythms are a part of our biological structure. Just this week I have been watching some videos on plant research and found it interesting that plant life, almost as a whole, actually sleep. Since a plant's life revolves around light & dark cycles, most of their sleep cycles occur at night. People however, (and I don't know this as a fact - I'm only speculating) probably can be influenced by cultural habits (schedules). The last twenty five or so years before my retirement I worked a second shift schedule. (3pm-11pm) When I got home I had to take a couple hours to clean up but mostly relax and unwind. So obviously I didn't get in bed until around 2 or 3 in the morning and usually slept between 8 to 10 hours. Now since my retirement, I go to sleep around 10pm or 11pm and get up around 6am or 7am.

My wife is different altogether. Her father was in Air force intelligence here in the US. She developed and kept his habits of staying up all night and doesn't go to bed until about 6am in the morning. Whether this is encoded in her DNA or not is up to speculation.
 
I sincerely believe that circadian rhythms are a part of our biological structure. Just this week I have been watching some videos on plant research and found it interesting that plant life, almost as a whole, actually sleep. Since a plant's life revolves around light & dark cycles, most of their sleep cycles occur at night. People however, (and I don't know this as a fact - I'm only speculating) probably can be influenced by cultural habits (schedules). The last twenty five or so years before my retirement I worked a second shift schedule. (3pm-11pm) When I got home I had to take a couple hours to clean up but mostly relax and unwind. So obviously I didn't get in bed until around 2 or 3 in the morning and usually slept between 8 to 10 hours. Now since my retirement, I go to sleep around 10pm or 11pm and get up around 6am or 7am.

My wife is different altogether. Her father was in Air force intelligence here in the US. She developed and kept his habits of staying up all night and doesn't go to bed until about 6am in the morning. Whether this is encoded in her DNA or not is up to speculation.
There are some people that are naturally night owls and some that are morning people.
I believe it about the plants. Like a prayer plant raises it's leafs at night and morning glories open up at first daybreak and so on.
 
I sleep now between 10/11:30 pm till 6/8:30 Am.
On workdays I always have to get up around 6 am.
And to be honest, sometimes that make me extremly sleepy untill the point of collapsing.
So for me, 8 hourse is not enough sometimes.
I have experienced sleep paralysis and sleeping extremly light and I can say for myself that 8 hourse is not enough to make up for it, once you are drained you need to get powered-up again.

But now since it has gotten better I can still say that sleep really depends on the activitys of your day. Some extra sleep, around 2 hourse extra, is not bad and still keeps you in your routine on free days.
However, if I can't sleep properly, then I do sleep around 4 hourse extra. Sleep is not something you can just make up for without proper taking care for yourself.

I am not a special case, alot of people have sleep issues while also being on the spectrum.
 
It shifts around a lot. I also act out things from dreams. So I sometimes unintentionally hit my wife (she's the bad guy, zombie, demon, whatever) or beat the crap out of myself jumping out of the bed onto the floor. I currently have two bruised knees and 1 shoulder from last escapade.
 
@SusanLR Today my body told me to get a couple more hours sleep, so I did and I feel amazing. I also come alive in the nighttime hours.Today I had an afternoon visit from my nurse and even though I had just woken up, I felt good with the overall visit.
 

New Threads

Top Bottom