Thursday, March 24, 2011

Day 3

Doing great. I had a lot of energy yesterday - went and played Ultimate for 3 hours and then hung out with friends to play Spades. I have played a lot of spades with these guys over the years, and since you need to be able to track the cards that have been played, it is a mentally challenging game. It makes a easy marker to gauge my memory performance and since the guys will give me serious grief if I am not operating up to expectations, I can use it as an informal, but impartial gauge of my mental acuity. I did stay out late last night, and my evening nap was delayed by about 2 hours, which caused me to be quite tired. I awoke without an alarm, however, and had my morning nap on schedule, where I also woke without an alarm. I did linger in bed for about 1/2 hour, pleasantly drifting/half asleep, but that is typical for me, so I am not sure anything should be read into that.

I feel some of the effects that I associate with sleep deprivation - there is a slight feeling of pressure in my fore-brain, and my thoughts are slightly... slower than normal. I do not feel other effects that have always associated with those two indicators though. In the past, when sleep deprived to the extent those conditions, I always have felt foggy and often I have slight tracking problems - my eyes will glide over text without quite reading it. I do not feel those. On the contrary, I feel alert and focused.

Some observations: I have not been eating as well as I usually do, because every meal seems like breakfast, and my breakfasts do not typically contain of vegetables, which is what I eat for lunch and dinner. I tend not to be hungry for quite a while after I wake up, and I don't want to eat a big meal just before I go to sleep. I assume that this will sort itself out; it is just an unforeseen side effect of poly-phasic sleeping.

I have also found that I am getting a LOT more done. Not only have I gained 4 hours, but I also tend to think of each block as a "day". It is only 6 1/2 hrs, so I need to be focused to get my goals in for that waking period. I spend significantly more time in productive work. Out of the 6 1/2 hours, I tend to have a solid 4-5 hr block for projects, which has been working out well for me.

Below is a diagram of the Weaver Tri-phasic sleep cycle. The darker green represents the sleep schedule. Although I have an 1 1/2 for the afternoon nap, I have been waking naturally after 40-45 minutes. I don't know if this will continue or not.



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