So today was actually pretty hard but for no fault other than my own. I missed my midnight nap yesterday evening because of my radio show. I miss the nap every week, but usually I either nap 11:20-11:50 to make up for it, or I do my core sleep immediately afterwards. Last night, I did neither. After skipping the midnight nap, I didn't do my core sleep until 4 am. The next day's results were devastating.
Other blogs talk about the importance of sticking on schedule and not missing a nap, but I always assumed that my core sleep gave me a little leniency... guess not. I woke up absolutely exhausted with a layer of fog engulfing my head. I spent my morning from 8 am until 11 researching newspaper articles eagerly awaiting my noon nap. But even after I took my 12 pm nap, I still felt brain dead, which was a rather scary prospect as I have a paper due tomorrow. Referring back to something I occasionally did when I only slept two hours a day, I inserted an extra nap between my 12 pm and 4 pm at 2:30. When I was first starting with polyphasic, if I really really needed it, I would take a 6 am nap between my 4 am and 8 am. While my recovery isn't close to perfect, I feel much much better.
I realize that there are a lot of instances of bad days on this blog, but you have to realize, that I have not being doing this experiment as effectively as I should. Oversleeping, while bad, you can recover from. But if you miss one nap, the entire next day is destroyed. Other blogs I've read said the same thing, but I'm realizing that my somewhat cavalier attitude towards nap times has made the rough days much more prevalent than necessary. Thinking about my paper, the benefits of polyphasic sleep are obvious. If I were sleeping normally, I would have to pull an all-nighter tonight to get this paper done, but because of polyphasic sleep, I'm essentially always pulling all-nighters without the need for a recovery period.
Other blogs talk about the importance of sticking on schedule and not missing a nap, but I always assumed that my core sleep gave me a little leniency... guess not. I woke up absolutely exhausted with a layer of fog engulfing my head. I spent my morning from 8 am until 11 researching newspaper articles eagerly awaiting my noon nap. But even after I took my 12 pm nap, I still felt brain dead, which was a rather scary prospect as I have a paper due tomorrow. Referring back to something I occasionally did when I only slept two hours a day, I inserted an extra nap between my 12 pm and 4 pm at 2:30. When I was first starting with polyphasic, if I really really needed it, I would take a 6 am nap between my 4 am and 8 am. While my recovery isn't close to perfect, I feel much much better.
I realize that there are a lot of instances of bad days on this blog, but you have to realize, that I have not being doing this experiment as effectively as I should. Oversleeping, while bad, you can recover from. But if you miss one nap, the entire next day is destroyed. Other blogs I've read said the same thing, but I'm realizing that my somewhat cavalier attitude towards nap times has made the rough days much more prevalent than necessary. Thinking about my paper, the benefits of polyphasic sleep are obvious. If I were sleeping normally, I would have to pull an all-nighter tonight to get this paper done, but because of polyphasic sleep, I'm essentially always pulling all-nighters without the need for a recovery period.
