Waking Up

[DonRotolo]

Sleep is indeed a pattern. Once your body is trained to wake up at a certain time - takes about 2 weeks - it will do that on its own unless outside influences occur. the key is consistency - always go to bed at exactly the same time, no matter what. I go to sleep just as Futurama comes on Adult Swim on Cartoon Network (22:30 EDT). (Bonus: I think I'm sleep-learning the scripts).

Waking up was never easy for me, but now that I'm ancient 6:45 am works just fine. Consistency.

To help you wake up, get some sugar in your system as soon as you get up. Not refined sugar or HFCS,instead try some orange juice. If you can manage, wake up 30-60 minutes early, drink a glass of juice, then snooze (yes, go back to sleep!) until it's time. You will be amazed at how easy it is to get up, because your body is already working.

Use that routine without any variation at all for 2 weeks, then tell me what happens. You'll be amazed.

Oh, I should mention: It is remotely possible that you have a sleep disorder, it is not uncommon, and in reality you might not be getting any good sleep at all. The ideal is to have a sleep study (your doc can help there). The cheap (but not a good substitute) alternative is to set a video camera on yourself all night and watch it the next day (on fast forward) - how well do you sleep? Toss and turn? Stop breathing? Or sleep like a rock?

Final alternative: Wire up a servo to dump 1 liter of water on you, that'll wake you up.

You definitely have to address this, it can have serious consequences. Ins chool the worst you get is an F, in the real world you get fired. And, at college, there's no one who cares to bother waking you.....

Don