Waking up

[Koumei]

So, I might be getting a job soon. Though I've been aiming for ones with night shift work, Adelaide is a shit little town that closes at 6PM, so I'll probably end up with a 9-5 job.

Now, I have difficulty getting up in the mornings. I always have. In high school, my parents would wake me up and I'd need coffee to get moving, and still be half asleep in the morning classes and generally in a bad mood until I had chocolate washed down with Coke.

My last job was a little better - though I woke up at 5AM for a 6AM start, you can just have caffeine right by you when you're at a desk.

These days I go to sleep from 12AM to 4AM, & wake up from 12PM to 3PM.Yes, sometimes that means sleeping 15 hours. It just happens.

Now, my case manager is kind of annoyed, as she thinks I can just break this cycle and get into routine - despite every other time it lasting pretty much "until the moment I didn't need to" (that is to say, returning to my normal hours as soon as the weekend arrived).

So...

1. Is there a surefire way of changing the sleeping pattern?

2. If I just regulate it with sleeping pills at night, caffeine pills/Red Eye in the morning and coke throughout the day, is there really a chance of the chemicals having any lasting effects on me? All they'd be mixing with is Venlafaxine and, half the time, paracetamol and codeine.

3. Is it possible this is just how my sleep pattern is meant to be, and trying to change it is a waste of time? That the above method of turning my boy into a drug disposal facility is the only way to get by until I can pick up a nightshift job/get crazy rich and no longer need to work and my case manager can just suck it?

4. I the above is the case, is there any condition name, or something I could talk to a doctor about?

I would start by going to the doctor, but frankly I don't have the time to spend all day sleeping in a waiting room.

[Heath Robinson]

1. Is there a surefire way of changing the sleeping pattern?

2. If I just regulate it with sleeping pills at night, caffeine pills/Red Eye in the morning and coke throughout the day, is there really a chance of the chemicals having any lasting effects on me? All they'd be mixing with is Venlafaxine and, half the time, paracetamol and codeine.

3. Is it possible this is just how my sleep pattern is meant to be, and trying to change it is a waste of time? That the above method of turning my boy into a drug disposal facility is the only way to get by until I can pick up a nightshift job/get crazy rich and no longer need to work and my case manager can just suck it?

4. I the above is the case, is there any condition name, or something I could talk to a doctor about?

I would start by going to the doctor, but frankly I don't have the time to spend all day sleeping in a waiting room.

1. Not that I can find. Exercise apparently helps, though it's mostly planning and willpower. It might also help to remove artificial light sources from your environment (just don't trouble other people on your account) and keep your curtains open to acclimatise yourself to natural light variation since sleep patterns partially cue themselves off light exposure. Place your alarms a distance away from your bed so that you have to get moving to switch it off, and try to force yourself to stay still and listen to the alarm until you clear the period when you can easily fall asleep again.
2. Yes, but they may be preferrable to losing your job. Caffeine addiction, for a start. Sleeping pills are also addictive. The side effects are also bad on sleep pills (drowsiness is bad in almost every situation).
3. It's difficult to say whether your sleep cycle is meant to work this way, since the whole thing is pretty malleable and complex. I doubt it is, though.
4. It's called a Sleep Disorder, though there are progressively more specific names for the problem depending on other aspects of your situation. Yours sounds like Delayed Phase.

[Kaelik]

One way to change your sleep pattern, it's worked for me to produce drastic changes in the past:

You go 10-16 hours without food, and then eat "breakfast". Your body decides that is the new morning.

It trys to go to sleep 10 hours before that, and it wakes you up in time to get the new breakfast.

So if you want to wake up at 6 o clock, just eat your last meal at 2 o clock (I usually play it safe) and then not eat anything until you wake up at 6. (have eight alarm clocks, you just need to get up and eat, your body will have less trouble getting up then in the future).

Then make sure you never go more than 8 hours without eating, unless your next meal is breakfast, and always always eat a relatively large breakfast (a sandwich with your cereal or something.)

You should be able to get up at that time easily.

I used this system to switch between summer night shifts and school 8 o clock classes over the course of two days. It's worked well enough that I'm willing to starve myself for 16 hours because I have so few difficulties afterword.

YMMV.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Then make sure you never go more than 8 hours without eating, unless your next meal is breakfast, and always always eat a relatively large breakfast (a sandwich with your cereal or something.)
...
YMMV.

Yeah. It can be hard to eat a big breakfast early in the morning if eating less than two hours after you get up gives you really bad indigestion. Anyways, willpower does seem to be the largest component of staying on a sleep schedule. That and natural light (if your schedule is reasonable) and exercise (so you can get to sleep on time without drugs).

[Prak]

well, with my current class being at 7:30 requiring me to get up at 4:30 am, I've found that I can get up at ~4:30am fairly reliably just because I know I need to get up (liking the class helps), but any other day, I'm in about the same boat, in bed anywhere between 12 am to 4 am, up sometime between noon and 2pm, and it's just the way it goes.

However, I've found that one way to reset your sleep schedule is to just stay up all night and all day until the time you need to go to sleep. Sometimes it works, sometimes your body just winds up trying to make up for lost sleep.

[Meikle641]

However, I've found that one way to reset your sleep schedule is to just stay up all night and all day until the time you need to go to sleep. Sometimes it works, sometimes your body just winds up trying to make up for lost sleep.

I basically do that when I need to change sleep cycles. Shit sucks, though.

[Josh_Kablack]

1. Is there a surefire way of changing the sleeping pattern?

Surefire no.

More likely yes.

Practice what is known as "good sleep hygenie" - make sure your bed comfortable and use it for sleep only (not studying, not reading, not watching TV, etc). Force yourself to maintain the same waking/sleeping hours every day (yes this means getting up early on weekends - it can take months to establish a new rhythm). Control your light exposure - bright lights (preferably natural sunlight) as soon as you get up in the morning and dim lights an hour or so before sleep. Make sure no sunlight gets to you while you are sleeping. Refrain from eating and caffeine anywhere near to bedtime. Force yourself to exercise in the early part of the day and force yourself to relax later in the day.

2. If I just regulate it with sleeping pills at night, caffeine pills/Red Eye in the morning and coke throughout the day, is there really a chance of the chemicals having any lasting effects on me?

Speaking as someone who's day job is currently in sleep research: STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM SLEEPING PILLS. They are not a long-term solution for anybody, and they carry significant risks.

3. Is it possible this is just how my sleep pattern is meant to be,

Yes.

and trying to change it is a waste of time?

No.

Seeing as having a job and staying in Adelaide are presumably both desirable to you, the cost of those may be forcing your body to go against its natural tendency.

[Koumei]

Actually I'll be only too happy to leave Adelaide and go back to Melbourne one day. It's just that I'm renting from my parents here, which is very cheap, so basically I'd need a job before I moved. So I could do a six-month "force it via drugs" routine, move, then do nightshift.

As for good sleep hygiene, having tried that before, let me be the first to call it a crock of shit. It seems it's only good for helping those who generally sleep well normally but "have been having some trouble of late".

Anyway, thanks Heath, I can talk to a doctor about that (if I can stab my leg so that I am bleeding a little so that I can skip the waiting list) and maybe get the case manager... off my case.

Oh, and as for addiction, I should have stated "serious side effects". I've been addicted to caffeine before and it's not that big a deal if you just keep supplying the body with what it wants, likewise every month or so I end up addicted to codeine, suffer withdrawal for a day or two, and detox.

Addiction I can deal with. "Just waking up early" I cannot.

As for breakfast: when keeping to my normal schedule, I can't stomach food for perhaps half an hour, sometimes more. When waking up early, it takes about half the day before I can eat anything more solid than sugar. Not even custard or yoghurt.

[RandomCasualty2]

Generally, you can get your body to start waking up at a different time by continually forcing yourself to wake up at that time. You'll have to suffer through a few days of hell because you're going to be exhausted, but that will help you get to sleep earlier at night and then wake up earlier during the day.

I don't think regulating it with drugs would really help much, you're probably better off doing it the natural way. I mean you could maybe use sleeping pills to try to go to sleep earlier, which may help some, though I don't know if that would confuse your body.

The other way (if you have some time) is to go to sleep gradually later and later and roll your schedule over. So for instance if you sleep normally between 12 AM and 4 AM, go to sleep at 5 AM, then 8 AM, then 11 AM, and so on. Eventually you can roll it over such that you're sleeping at where ever you want to be.

[ubernoob]

If you're really that comfortable putting drugs in your body, marijuana could be a seriously great way to ensure that you get a full night's rest. It's illegal in the US, but has the upside on sleeping pills that there is no physical withdrawal.

Just make sure that you go to bed right after you smoke. If you wait too long it'll wear off and you won't go to sleep any earlier.

[Meikle641]

Alternatively use it in food form, so you could eat dinner then crash when you get drowsy. Or get/make a vaporizer. If I used weed, I'd use the latter since there's none of the burning and tar, etc.