some years ago when i had no schedule or kids i did a sleep experiment and found that my body would naturally tend toward a 26-28 hours “day” where i might sleep for 8 to 10 hrs, then remain awake and alert for 18 to 20. To somewhat try to keep in the normal 24 would cause an oscillation such as a long day, short night followed by short day, long night, then repeat; or it would require an all-nighter to meet some daytime obligation, followed by an extra long sleep.
Now its still difficult to have the brain wind down to fit 24 so its like 18 awake-6 sleep with wake up after 4hr to empty bladder. Not restful or good sleep.
If you figure an expected lifetime is only 26,000 days then it is easy enough to figure out how many you have used up, or how many left to go.
No! I guess you can call it insomnia like others. There can be different reasons for all of us.
I did Two Three months studies over the last few years. During those Three months I averaged 4.86 hours and 4.79 hours.
Obviously as good of an estimate as possible because I don’t know the exact time I fall asleep. Waking up is easy to determine.
I am semi-retired now so it’s more manageable. I can take little cat naps. When I was working it was absolutely a challenge. I remember numerous times I was falling asleep behind the wheel.
With that said I’ve had dozens and dozens of occasions where I sleep like 12 to 14 hours total in 5 days.
I became Delirious, irritated, irritable,impatient and more.
It is very important to “empty” the brain before going to bed. They call it sleep-hygiene.
Doing online work or even media consumption fills the brain, wich actually costs sleep quality.
Same with unsolved problems, to-do lists unsolved problems and ideas.
The best for me is to have a pencil and a notebook at bedside, on wich I can scribble down whatever bothers me, getting it out ouf the head without fear to forget something and face trouble later.
The next morning is still enough time to do whatever, no need to tumble the thoughts over and over.
Put them on paper and leave them there, turn the page so they are locked in.
For this to work, one has to realize that one can not do anything “right now” or during sleep.
The next thing is to understand that sleep can not be forced. Sleep will come sooner or later and what time is left is still better than nothing and actually enough for the day. If one starts to worry if still awake at one and having the alarm at five, then thisis also a stressing thought rumbling through the brain, so to accept whatever is donated, instead of worrying about getting unsufficient sleep, is a big step towards getting the brain clear.
What helps is exercise in the comfortable range of exhaustion.This is the point where one has universal powers, to determine when and what is enough. There are no ideals, no must-do, no schedules.
The actinic blue light of LED and displays signals blue sky to the body, via receptors and brain, preparing it for good-day activity.
This differs quite a lot in spectrum spread and duration (!) from the blue light at blue hour in nature.
Usually, there is a time of warmer light in the evening, signalling it is time to pack up and end the day’s business, then comes the blue hour.
In the arctic it’s very common with immigrants to suffer from sleep disorders, while locals adjusted much better to the daylight phases. This phenomenon is well known among scientists who spend weeks or months at ice stations.
Nowadays almost all of us live in constant arctic summer, with blue light everywhere and no times of sunrise and sunset and no real night and no daytime.
The light in the brightest artificially lit room (apart from special cases, like studios and similar) is by magnitudes less bright than the outside world and the spectrum is much fuzzier with a narrow and exceedingly high peak in the blue, especially with LED lighting.
So yes, artifical light a detrimental on living beings, especially “conversion” light, like LED or neons.
That’s the reasons I don’t use Leds bulbs indoor in evening or similar artificial lights, even watch the white blinks from spot on TV.
The only sources of artificial lights that doesn’t hurt much melatonin suppression are LPS/HPS lamp for streets and dimm. incandescent indoor use. All of them are now replaced by Leds, the power of marketing named “energy save”. I call that human regress…
This glasses are one option for eliminating blue light exposure in the evening.
3-4 hours before your expected bedtime is usually sufficient.
Also many if not most devices today come with a blue light reducing option in the settings. Often called comfort mode of some other buzzword.
Interestingly there has been research that camping can help reset circadian rhythms. Forsaking artificial light beyond fire of course.
Melatonin also works well for some people, though you only need 1mg not the 5-50mg tablets that are out there.
Finally its not just blue light but light intensity that affects circadian rhythms, short of forsaking artificial light you would ideally want to eliminate blue light and have only low intensity red and green.
I think that even classic brown sunglasses block good blue light.
As you said the intensity and type of light source are the most important thing. Watching directly a naked bare LED is worse than having a diffused soft white light.
They block blue light but you want over 95% blockage for ideal effect if you need blue light blocking.
Also i forgot to mention F Lux software for the computer.
Yes, orange lens block better blue light, I doubt about who claim same effect with transparent lens…I already use this SW for pc, same filter on phone with browser in black background mode.
The best would be avoid use them after sunset
