Get Thee To Bed.

Uncharacteristically, this week's afternoons have crawled by, resulting in a couple of head-nodding moments at work. You could guess that it might be caused by post-lunch food coma. 95% of the time though, my lunch is a medium-sized salad consisting of spinach, carrots, almonds, egg and tomato drizzled with Catalina dressing. Not what you'd consider a heavy meal. So no, the culprit is lack of sleep. Surprise surprise.

[via]

The problem is not that I have trouble going to sleep. I don't; I typically head off to Dreamland less than five minutes after my head hits the pillow. However, I have trouble going to bed. For some reason I procrastinate crawling under the sheets for as long as possible. Those who know me well can probably guess (correctly) that I'm messing around online, reading, listening to music or most likely a combination of the three. (I don't watch TV and am temporarily living in a cell phone dead zone, so I suppose I have to fill my free time somehow.)

Sooo, yes, I'd rather be sleeping most of the time. Problem is, listening to the next song or reading the next article takes immediate priority ... and so does the next, and the next. Before I know it, it's past midnight and I end up drowsy the following afternoon.

This is not a viable long-term solution (although what am I really saying; I've been freakin doing this for years). I keep meaning to go to bed earlier, but it never seems to happen consistently. Hmmm. Maybe I should bring some kind of boring book to bed. Either that or up my dose of melatonin. At the very least, I know it's not my diet that's making my afternoons last an eternity ...

Caffeine Therapy.

I can't seem to regulate my sleeping patterns. Wait. That's not quite right. Actually, I can't seem to bring myself to go to bed at a decent hour, even when my 8:00 class requires me to get up at 6:30 every other morning. I end up procrastinating and going to bed at ungodly hours -- which makes me a very sleepy boy indeed when early afternoon hits. Most of the time I resist the temptation to take naps during the day but sometimes, falling asleep anyway isn't unheard of for me. And then I'll wake up disoriented, groggy and occasionally not knowing whether it's AM or PM.

This probably needs to stop. I'd say I need an average of six hours of sleep nightly in order to function properly the next day, making midnight my target bedtime. Problem is, I don't remember the last time I wanted to go to sleep at that time. I consider myself a nocturnal creature like millions of other people, but this doesn't work well with my morning schedule. So I turn to coffee.

Currently I only drink an average of one cup a day, during breakfast. This boost gets me through my classes in the morning hours and a little bit after lunch. Inevitably, I crash around 2 or 3 pm and never fully recover (which is bad news for my afternoon classes). I drink the occasional second cup in the evening when I study after dinner, but for the most part I've been okay at going without. But I've been sorely tempted to up my regular caffeine intake so I can be more functional as the day goes by -- and believe me, this semester has been and will continue to be full of long busy days.

Scientific studies say too much caffeine is bad for me and I wholeheartedly agree, which is why I'm trying to cut down. But there's no doubt I study better in the evenings, so why not strive to be as sharp and productive as I can be with the help of a nice cup of coffee? It's hard to argue against that, and so I indulge in that second night-time drink.

Then again, it's even harder to argue against being more disciplined and consistently going to sleep at a reasonable time, isn't it?

Temporal Displacement.

So basically, my sleep pattern is completely screwed up at the moment. The combination of flying from the Pacific to Central time zone, Daylight Savings Time, and generally traveling for 14 hours has resulted in my brain/body not knowing WTF is going on. I tossed, turned and didn't get to sleep until 2 this morning, and woke up without the slightest bit of grogginess at 7. You'd think that I'd be fighting to stay under the sheets (word to Ellie Goulding) to catch a few more Zs -- but sadly that isn't the case.

I've just read a chapter from one of my textbooks for cryin' out loud. Unbelievable. I'll need to hit the melatonin extra hard tonight to get my sleep schedule back on track.

Anyway. I'll have last week's Sunday Seven series up later today after I get sorted out. Photos from my trip to the Northwest should be up this week as well. [Update: Sunday Seven Series 029 has been retroactively posted.]

Cue The Dream Sequence.

It's no secret that I'm a night owl -- have been for most of my adult life. A typical night finds me wide awake until anytime from midnight to two in the morning. This might be because some nights I work out relatively late and I'm still keyed up from the exercise, but that's probably a poor excuse. The fact remains that I really could use a couple hours more sleep each night.

A few years back I researched sleep aids in an effort to try to get on a more regular, healthy sleep cycle and learned about melatonin. According to WebMD, it's a hormone that our bodies produce which

helps control your sleep and wake cycles ... [Y]our body clock controls how much melatonin your body makes. Normally, melatonin levels begin to rise in the mid- to late evening, remain high for most of the night, and then drop in the early morning hours.

[via]

It's used to control jetlag, reduce chronic headaches, treat Seasonal Affective Order (SAD), and may even slow the spread of cancer and boost the immune system (although the research supporting the last two claims is yet incomplete). All fine and good. But what I was really interested in was its ability to control sleeping patterns -- one of the obvious side effects of taking melatonin is drowsiness. This excerpt from the Wikipedia article was especially interesting:

Some supplemental melatonin users report an increase in vivid dreaming. Extremely high doses of melatonin (50 mg) dramatically increased REM sleep time and dream activity in both people with and without narcolepsy. Many psychoactive drugs, such as cannabis and lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), increase melatonin synthesis. It has been suggested that nonpolar (lipid-soluble) indolic hallucinogenic drugs emulate melatonin activity in the awakened state and that both act on the same areas of the brain.

Okay. So basically, if I take melatonin, I should:

1. fall asleep sooner and experience deeper sleep;
2. have awesomely vivid dream sequences; and
3. feel like I just sparked some kush?

Win!

Actually, I have used melatonin on and off for the past few years and it does work -- when I remember to take it. I did experience drowsiness soon after I gulped down a pill, and my dreams seemed pretty lush and colorful, as if I'd turned up the volume, brightness and saturation controls in my brain. Overall an enjoyable, positive experience with dual benefits (more sleep and nightly subconscious entertainment). Unfortunately, with me being my inconsistent self, I'd put the bottle somewhere and forget about the stuff entirely for months at a time.

Fail.

So in a renewed effort to become a healthier individual (and coinciding with Lent), I re-upped on my supply and will begin a new melatonin regimen starting tonight. Who knows, if my dreams end up being interesting enough, I may write about them too.

Haiku Series 001: Meta.

Almost one o' clock
The house is quiet and still
I should be asleep

But no, I'm messing
Around on the computer
Thinking up haikus.

Fifteen more minutes!
I keep promising myself
Do I listen? LOL!

It's no wonder why
A mug of coffee and I
Have a love affair.

Shhhh.

*yawn*

For my fellow insomniacs, here's something that might help you recover some much needed Zs: SimplyNoise.com gives you a steady stream of white, pink or brown noise in an attempt to lull you to slumber. I like the oscillating brown noise option myself; it almost sounds like ocean surf.

Try it tonight and see if it works.  Sleeeeeeep.