Polyphasic Sleep Log: Day 1

Alright, since I now have some extra time and I want to record my experience with polyphasic sleep I am starting this blog. I know it is common for polyphasers to blog, so I'll throw my 2 cents in too.

I am usually a very good sleeper and have needed at least 8 hours of sleep to feel fully functional during the days. I can normally lay down just about anywhere at any time and probably fall asleep within a few minutes. My wife usually gets much less sleep than I do. So, quite often I would fall asleep early in the night and she would be up much later. I hope to be able to get a lot more time with her than I did on my Monophasic sleeping routine. I am also a teacher/trainer and often need preparation time. That digs into my time with my wife and famiily as well. The topic came up of Einstein only sleeping 4 hours a day. After looking into it a bit, I didn't verify that Einstein did it, but I found Leonardo da Vinci and Thomas Jefferson along with a few others. A little more looking on the internet I found that the Everyman schedule was probably the best for me, having a regular job and all. That means a core sleep of about 3 hours, and then 3 twenty-minute naps spaced across the rest of the day.

So. I had stayed up late the (Wednesday) night before, not knowing that I was going to begin my polyphasic sleeping the next day. I probably got 5 hours of sleep. I decided to try it, and was able to get my 20 min nap during my lunch break at work. I went in a dark, unused classroom and was able to get to sleep with ease. I slept a solid 20 minutes and felt good coming out of it. I also took a nap at 4pm and again my ability to sleep didn't let me down. 20 more minutes and I was feeling great. My 9pm nap was a bit more of a challenge.

One of the reasons I chose this schedule was because I put my kids to bed at 9pm and figured I could lay down in the room with them and get my snooze in while making sure they don't goof off when they are supposed to be sleeping. Well, they goofed off and I had to reset my alarm a couple times because I interrupted my 20 minutes several times to get the kids settled. I don't think I actually fell asleep for that nap. But, just laying there for about 30-35 minutes did re-energize me a little.

I was able to stay up until 1:30 am without any problems. I normally struggle to stay up that late. I did a little workout on the Wii Fit, and then went to bed for my core sleep cycle.