Click here to view today’s sleep log

Tonight I am mega-tired!

Last night there was a bit of drama, as I thought my pet rat was dying (I think she has days left as she has two massive tumours growing on her chest). She couldn't breath properly and was getting very anxious, so I sat up with her until midnight. I didn't want to just dump her in her cage to die, so in the end my girlfriend agreed to help. I slept on the sofa with my pet rat on my chest, and my girlfriend watched DVDs and kept an eye on us to make sure I didn't roll over on her and squash her.

I woke up around 2:00am and to my surprise the rat was looking a lot better so I put her in her cage and went to sleep. I set the alarm for just after 3:00am, so I should have got about the right quantity of sleep for my core, although I think the quality of the sleep was awful.

This morning after my core I did a bit of work on my site and some chores. My morning nap was amazing as usual and I slept very easily for it.

After my morning nap we went roller blading for a few hours, which tired me out nicely for my 12:20 nap. After that I played a lot of video games (Guild Wars 2 just came out) until my eyes started to feel sore and I had a headache. I went for my 5:00pm nap and afterwards took a cold shower and then went out for japanese food in Cambridge.

That brings us up to now. I am extremely sleepy now and would love nothing more than to go for a nice long sleep. I discussed at great lengths with my girlfriend why I wanted to quit this experiment, but she convinced me to try at least 1 more day. This might sound pretty pathetic since this is only day 6, but to spend this long feeling tired is not pleasant. Also I am finding my schedule is increasingly getting in the way of my social life.

Now I am typing this post standing up to try and stop myself from drifting off. If this doesn't get easier soon I am definitely going to have to pack it in. I can deal with being tired for a while, but a big part of me thinks this will not even work. I have quite a bit of extra time at the moment, but I am so tired I can't do anything with it, and I am not able to do a lot of the activities that I normally enjoy (although the rollerblading felt great!).

I will report back tomorrow if I make it!

Click here to view today's sleep log

This morning was pretty horrible really. I have been lengthening my core nap by a few minutes each day to try and find a length of time where I don't feel groggy afterwards, and today was the first time that I woke up feeling pretty good after it. The problem is that things went downhill from there!

When I started this experiment, I had a lot of horrible symptoms from the sleep deprivation: Not only did I feel tired but I had a lot of other nasty feelings too. I would describe it as feeling a bit hung over. I felt a pressure inside my skull, I sometimes felt slightly sick, I was dehydrated, my eyes were bloodshot and sore, I found it hard to focus on things and I often felt very hot and uncomfortable. The past 2 days these feelings have all gone, but have been replaced with an extreme sleepiness. To be honest the second day was the worst as I was walking around outside and nearly falling asleep whilst walking. This time I just found it very hard to keep my eyes open.

I did the washing up and weighed myself as usual, but then I tried to do some programming and had to give up very quickly as I was in serious danger of falling asleep. In the end I went for a walk at 4:00am which was a lot earlier than usual. On my way back home I was walking down the street and I saw 2 people walking towards me, and I freaked out a bit and got an adrenaline rush (maybe I am paranoid). The cool thing was that as the adrenaline kicked in I literally felt my eyes go from squinting to wide open and all of the grogginess disappeared. Unfortunately this only lasted a few minutes and when I got home I was back to my sleepy self.

I ran out of chores to do, and I was way too drowsy to play computer games or program, so my only option ended up being to browse the web for a bit. In the end I had to strip down to my underwear and put the fan on me at full blast, and move my chair out of the way and stand at my computer to even stand a chance of waking up.

When 6:30 came around I was very happy as this meant I could brush my teeth and nap. I decided not to use the face mask and to just cuddle up to my girlfriend, so I set the timer for 28 minutes in case I couldn't fall asleep as quickly as usual. In the end I fell asleep very quickly and had a pretty awesome nap.

Today was the first day without work, so we went into Cambridge city centre to do some shopping. I was a bit sleepy but it was nice to not have to sit in front of a computer all day.

I got back at 12:15, just in time for my nap. I slept really well even though I was feeling more alert by this point, and after my nap I felt pretty good. For my 5:00 nap I only drifted off for a short while but after I only felt slightly tired which is basically the best yet! I think I may be starting to adapt now.

I'm hoping that I'm over the worst of this. Let's see what I feel like after my core tonight.

Click here to view today's sleep log

The early morning today was pretty easy, especially compared to yesterday morning. I decided to go to bed about 10 minutes earlier last night for my core, so I have had 3:15 hours sleep, and I woke up feeling a bit more refreshed. I don't know if this is due to lengthening the core or just getting used to the schedule.

I got up and put my headphones on and sat on my computer for a second to write a comment on my core sleep (on my sleep site). All of a sudden there was a tap on my shoulder and my girlfriend appeared in the room. I didn't hear her come in as I had loud music on and it scared the life out of me! She told me that I had snoozed my alarm instead of turning it off, so it woke her up when it went off again. I felt really guilty about that as she was really tired and could do with some extra sleep at the moment.

I did some programming, did the washing up, tidied the hallway and the second bedroom (where my computer is) went for a walk and then went to Tesco Express at 6:00am when it opened to buy milk and lettuce. When I got home I made the sandwiches for the next day and went for my nap.

It took me quite a while to sleep for my morning nap which is unusual - normally I am out like a light. Afterwards I felt pretty good.

When I got to work I came over extremely sleepy. Normally, since I have been doing this experiment I have had serious sleep deprivation symptoms. It's not like normal tiredness - you feel hot and drowsy and a bit ill. This was different because I felt fine, but just insanely sleepy. At about 9:00am someone in the office opened a window and the breeze really woke me up! I went from feeling like I was going to pass out to felling just tired (like how I would normally feel on a Monday morning).

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful: I slept for all of my naps and haven't been especially tired. I had a gin and tonic with my dinner and I don't think it will affect my sleep as that was 5 hours before my core. I have just over 2 hours left of day 4, and the tiredness is just starting to creep up on me.

Although I have felt comfortable and relatively alert, I am still not awake enough to enjoy video games or most of the things that I enjoy doing to relax. Hopefully that will change soon!

Click here to view today's sleep log

I wrote the last post just after I woke up from my core sleep this morning at 2:30. I did not feel good!

This morning was the hardest part so far by a long way. When I woke up I immediately felt terrible. I took a few attempts at writing the blog and the result was not particularly impressive if I'm honest with you. I really needed to go downstairs and be active but I was so tired all I wanted to do was go back to sleep.

After an hour or so I pretty much snapped out of it: I still felt tired but I was able to concentrate on what I was doing. I spent a while programming my sleep site and added a 'quality' value to my sleeps which colours them green if I slept well, yellow if I slept a little bit and red if I didn't sleep. This took me quite a while, and afterwards the tiredness began to set in again.

The previous days I went for a 20 minute walk at about 5:30 and it really perked me up, so yesterday I decided to go and post the electoral register in the postbox at 5:00am and then go for a walk. At first this made me feel a bit better like usual, but I realised that after half an hour of walking around it felt really monotonous and I felt extremely sleepy. I felt like I could have fell asleep standing up!

When I got back it was torture trying to stay awake, and after making my lunch to take to work I crept into bed half an hour early, and got up at 7:00 with my girlfriend.

I was quite tired at work in the morning, but the morning nap helped a lot. When it came to lunch time I walked home and fell asleep straight away for my 12:20 nap. After work I felt too awake to sleep, which is a shame because I'm a bit tired again now and I think I'll suffer for it tomorrow.

So far, I have never felt great on waking up from any of my sleeps. Sometimes when I take a little nap I feel a bit rested, but not fully rested, and when I wake up after my core nap I seriously feel like I have just come back from the dead! I'm wondering if the timings are not right or something, but I don't want to mess with my schedule too much.

Hopefully tomorrow will be better than today!

Click here to view today's sleep log

I have just woken up at the beginning of day 3, after my core nap. I feel extremely tired and I'd love to go back to sleep.

Yesterday (day 2) was much easier than the first day. For me the hardest part so far has been the period before my core (10:00pm - 11:30pm) and the morning (2:30am - 5:30am), and this was a lot easier yesterday than the first day.

During the daytime yesterday I actually felt pretty good - I was very alert and awake. Unfortunately I think I was a bit too awake as I never managed to sleep for my lunchtime or 5:00pm naps. I think this may be why I feel so tired now.

I think I only managed to sleep for all of my naps on the first day because I was a bit sleep deprived - the way I feel now I think today will be similar.