Too much sleep?

[Moyer]

About a month ago my hours at work changed from normal daytime hours to 3pm-11pm. Add in the commute, making meals to take to work, a shower when I get home, etc, it ends up being 2pm-midnight. I get to sleep around 1 or 2am. Since I have no big reason to get up, I don't use an alarm clock.

I've been sleeping later and later though. Today I woke up at 12:30 in the afternoon. How the hell am I sleeping for more than ten hours? This is getting rediculous. I didn't think you could actually get too much sleep. My real problem is, I only have about two hours of free time a day. I used to have six.

Maybe this is all stupid and I need to start setting my alarm clock for eight hours of sleep. What did people do before electricity was invented? Sleep for 12 hours?

Is there any supplement that can help limit the amount of sleep I get?

 

[jweave23]

umm... not sure about any supplement that could help that, but you seem to be in what I call the "2nd shift trap". I used to work 2nd shift years ago and absolutely hated it because the same thing happened to me. I stayed up a little too late, then slept in and had no time during the day to do anything. I would say you need to get disciplined with the alarm clock. 8 hrs of sleep would be decent, maybe get up at 9 or 10 IMO.

 

[Neuromancer]

Its always a vicious cycle with me too. After sleeping too long one day, I feel tired all day, then sleep too long that night because I feel soo exhausted and again feel tired all day. Just keeps compounding until you are sleeping 10, 11 hrs. Too much sleep is definetaly bad! IMO, anyways.

 

[MF210]

Its always a vicious cycle with me too. After sleeping too long one day, I feel tired all day, then sleep too long that night because I feel soo exhausted and again feel tired all day. Just keeps compounding until you are sleeping 10, 11 hrs. Too much sleep is definetaly bad! IMO, anyways.

When you say too much sleep is definitely bad, do you mean this on terms of building muscle? Or just in general b/c you can't get anything done. I'm kind of curious if there are catabolic effects of over-sleeping. (Other than the fact you aren't eating)

 

[Neuromancer]

When you say too much sleep is definitely bad, do you mean this on terms of building muscle? Or just in general b/c you can't get anything done. I'm kind of curious if there are catabolic effects of over-sleeping. (Other than the fact you aren't eating)

I was only reffering to the way I feel when I oversleep. But its odd that you mention the effects of oversleeping on muscle building, I had a schedule change awhile back. Similar to a 2nd shift schedule I guess you could say, but I slept like 9 - 10 hours every night. My gains all but stopped. I even ran a cycle in that time and got results, but not results like I had hoped for. After my schedule changed, things got back to normal. I had been wondering if it was the sleep that affected me, or the lack of food for 10 hours? Other than that, my diet was still good...I think I may do some searching and see if I can come up with anything.

 

[Dan]

Ever heard of the circadian rhythm? In simple terms, your body has a sort of internal clock that dictates what time of day it likes to sleep. If your sleeping time is way off of your circadian rhythm, it kind of messes with your body.

 

[Moyer]

Is the rhythm different for everyone? Does it change over time?

 

[stuart harlin]

It is really a blessing...at least from my perspective.

Trust me on this... since I am person who does not sleep very well or for a satisfyingly uninterupted amount of time, I am jealous of your predicament. If I might offer some short term advice, why don't you just train like hell for a couple of months and see if your progress is not enhanced by the extra sleep that you are currently experiencing. I have a difficult time recovering from my weight training sessions partially because of a chronic lack of sleep. If I was able to sleep over ten hours a night I would not only increase my weekly training sessions by one day a week, but slightly increase my relative intensity within each session. Also I believe that if you supplemented your training program with some responsible and intelligent prohormones or other "supplements", including some natural growth hormone releasers... this could be the most productive time in your training career.

Also looking back at my life so far, I would kill to be able to sleep so deeply... enjoy it for awhile and then move on. I believe that this is only a short term phase in your circadian adjustment.:thumbsup:

 

[Neuromancer]

Trust me on this... since I am person who does not sleep very well or for a satisfyingly uninterupted amount of time, I am jealous of your predicament. If I might offer some short term advice, why don't you just train like hell for a couple of months and see if your progress is not enhanced by the extra sleep that you are currently experiencing. I have a difficult time recovering from my weight training sessions partially because of a chronic lack of sleep. If I was able to sleep over ten hours a night I would not only increase my weekly training sessions by one day a week, but slightly increase my relative intensity within each session. Also I believe that if you supplemented your training program with some responsible and intelligent prohormones or other "supplements", including some natural growth hormone releasers... this could be the most productive time in your training career.

Also looking back at my life so far, I would kill to be able to sleep so deeply... enjoy it for awhile and then move on. I believe that this is only a short term phase in your circadian adjustment.:thumbsup:

Well thats exactly how I thought. I was sure that more must be better, and I should recovery excellently. Unfortunately it really didn't seem to work this way, and when my shedule returned to about 7 - 8 hours of sleep a night, things improved...

 

[littlemark]

Got to be a combination of metabolism and hormonal condition. I switch shifts every two weeks (nights/days). The first week I switch onto night shift I sleep an extra 1-2 hrs above normal and find the same thing. I really don't get much out of this week progress wise.
I honestly believe its just the metabolism getting completely screwed up by the different timing on the release of bodily hormones etc.
The other thing is going 10hrs without food is a killer. A screwed up hormonal state plus extra time without food could well explain the problem.

 

[Rogue Drone]

Optimum sleep duration for Bodily repair, and optimum sleep duration for a sharp mind are contrary, longer (8+ hours) sleep is usually accompanied by more periods of deep delta, the endocrine repair state and more theta, the REM dream level. Too much Theta, though, hinders the waking mind afterwards from going into the focused state of Beta, and superalert gamma. Excess theta is why monks and other meditational practioners are so non responsively flat, they are zenned out on slower brainwaves and can't easily acheive the upper beta and gamma; ODing on the dream state.

The key is to find the optimum balance, and/or sleep according to the upcoming demands of the day. If I have a critical meeting the next day, I deliberatley only allow myself about five hours of sleep, my body will ache and be less energetic, but my mind will be much sharper and focused.

What amazes me is the guys like the Navy Seals in hell week, 7 days of a total of only about four hours sleep while in a constant state of near hypothermia, cold water pain and max phyiscal extertion, those are some tough, dedicated Mofos.

 

[MF210]

Well thats exactly how I thought. I was sure that more must be better, and I should recovery excellently. Unfortunately it really didn't seem to work this way, and when my shedule returned to about 7 - 8 hours of sleep a night, things improved...

I don't know your entire situation, but this could be due to the fact that you can get more meals in. I know on days when I go to bed at 10:30 and wake up at 6:30 in the morning I can spread my meals out more effectively and add 1 or 2.

What works the absolute best is if your schedule allows is to get 7-8 hrs sleep, wake up early b/c it will help you get an adequate timing & quantity of meals, and take a 30-60 minute nap (preferably directly after a workout). Many peoples' schedules do not allow this, but NOTHING works better than this layout.:thumbsup:

 

[200wannabe]

Optimum sleep duration for Bodily repair, and optimum sleep duration for a sharp mind are contrary, longer (8+ hours) sleep is usually accompanied by more periods of deep delta, the endocrine repair state and more theta, the REM dream level. Too much Theta, though, hinders the waking mind afterwards from going into the focused state of Beta, and superalert gamma. Excess theta is why monks and other meditational practioners are so non responsively flat, they are zenned out on slower brainwaves and can't easily acheive the upper beta and gamma; ODing on the dream state.

The key is to find the optimum balance, and/or sleep according to the upcoming demands of the day. If I have a critical meeting the next day, I deliberatley only allow myself about five hours of sleep, my body will ache and be less energetic, but my mind will be much sharper and focused.

What amazes me is the guys like the Navy Seals in hell week, 7 days of a total of only about four hours sleep while in a constant state of near hypothermia, cold water pain and max phyiscal extertion, those are some tough, dedicated Mofos.

Rougedrone, good posting, you seem to have a good understanding of this subject, do you have, or could you point me in the direction of some articles etc where I may read more?

 

[littlemark]

200 beat me to it. RogueDrone, this sounds pretty interesting. I too would be interested in some further reading, links etc.
Thanks