Don't be a morning person if you're not one | Hacker News Reader

Don't be a morning person if you're not one

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33 pointskreeWall23 comments

No such thing as natural morning or night person. Peoples rhythms are thrown out of wack due to artificial light. Get rid of the artificial lights and we all go back to our natural circadian rhythm. We start to get up and go down with the sun.

All you need are glasses that block blue light. Try it.

... and possibly enough vitamin D early in the morning (e.g. before 10am), either as a supplement, or, preferrably, by exposure to the sun. And also quite a bit of exercise.

Or not. Anecdata are plenty, scientific evidence is scant.

calling bs on the "blue light glasses work" as well. No direct scientific evidence.

There is no direct evidence but proxy evidence.

Atleast for me, using a red-tint filter on a phone or computer screen helps a lot with eye fatigue and afaik also with sleeping as I tend to be more tired when waking up after not using such a filter.

Additionally, I'm fairly certain that there have been numerous studies that found that the color of light heavily affects the circadian rythm, especially the blue component, not only in humans.

By proxy any blue-light filter should have similar effects. And by proxy of that a blue-light filtering pair of glasses should too.

To be clear, I was not calling bullshit - I experimented with UVEX blue-blocking glasses, and so a marked difference in "natural" sleep times. Similarly with early morning Vitamin D, and exercise, and I am not the only one.

However, I am not aware of any reasonably objective evaluation of these claims, so I don't consider them "truth" or "science" - they are anecdata, which might be interesting, but not science.

That would be a real bummer living in the far north/south. Kind of boring to go to bed at 3 in the afternoon... :/

That's not what sleep specialists say. Citation?

Hey, I'm one of the "night owl" people type.

I've always been since when I memory of.

If you're reading this and you are interested in more data for studies or experiments to challenge my chronotype, let me know.

Tried many different method and nothing really worked. If not forced out of bed I'd wake up past 12AM and go to bed around 4AM.

Working as a remote for a different time zone helps a lot with work, luckily :)

Well hit me up if you want to know more.

I can probably do an AMA if people are interested enough.

You've probably tried many things, but just curious: have you tried melatonin (and if so, what was the result of that)? I've had some or other form of sleep and/or sleep time window issues since early teenage years or possibly before as well; regular exercise and (some form of) diet helps, but what really changed sleep for me (and therefore had a measurable impact upon my quality of life) was melatonin (I have a strong aversion to the idea of regular use of sleeping pills). It's used by jetlagged people to reset circadian rhythm, etc. (See e.g. https://www.gwern.net/Melatonin)

Apologies if this is nothing new at all to you (probably not), but interested in what you think re. this (perhaps melatonin does not help at all in your case, which is also interesting in itself).

I tried melatonin and it was awful :D I did it in the wrong way though. Specifically I took two pills instead of one (I think it was 500g each and I took two) and I slept for about 24 hours straight! I simply couldn't stay awake so I just took one sick day at work and sleeped it off :O

I also don't like the idea of building my life on top of regular pills usage, unless it's the only way to go through.

I don't exercise regularly, but I have such a busy life that I find it really difficult to find time (and consistency) to stick to it. When I DID exercise regularly (daily, 30-45 minutes, for about 4 months) it didn't change my sleep habits.

And to be honest I CAN wake up at 7 - 8 AM if somebody kicks me out of bed or if there's an "emergency" (like one of my children shouting for help or crying) or some family appointments... but I'm referring specifically to natural sleep rhythm or what my body would "like" to do.

I also somehow find it WAY easier to wake up when I'm NOT at home.

On an interesting note, I live in Italy (UTC+1) and when I went to San Francisco (UTC-7) for work, not long ago, I kept waking up at 7AM consistently, naturally and went to bed around midnight more or less. I felt NO JETLAG AT ALL. When I came back, I felt nothing for two days and then I had to sleep for about 12 hours to catch up the normal sleeping rhythm, then I went straight back to my normal habits.

I admit I probably have the weirdest sleeping habits I can know of :)

Hmm very interesting! Thanks for sharing. :)

> I think it was 500g each and I took two

I do hope you meant mg, not g - I've seen (usually American) online malatonin pills with 50g+ dosages (effective dosage seems to usually be within the range of 0.3-1.0g), so could be g :O but hope not. 0.5-1g does the trick for me, fwiw.

> I also don't like the idea of building my life on top of regular pills usage

I hear ya; the reason I'm ok with melatonin is that there appear to be no tolerance buildup, addiction, or any actual effects specific to long term usage (see Gwern's meta-analysis of literature, etc.) But - yeah.

Very interesting sleep time window patterns. Have you thought about consulting professionals re this? See e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delayed_sleep_phase_disorder

> I do hope you meant mg, not g

ahaha XD Yeah sorry. one pill == 500mg :D

> Have you thought about consulting professionals re this?

I did but since I found a way to accomodate my schedule (more or less) by working in the afternoon and evening and sleeping through the morning (til about 10.30 or 11 AM) I'm fine for now.

I'd be more interesting in the CHANGE itself.. like in experimenting on changing my sleeping habits, more than in the results.

I'm a tech/sci/IT nerd afterall :P

In my case, melatonin has been wonderful for rested sleep, but it always results in increased hunger and weight gain, which is why I discontinue it after about a month, when my pants start getting tight. Then I repeat the cycle when I'm feeling not well rested again.

I've heard someone say that he thinks a lot of night people aren't actually night people--they're just people who don't decide when they want to sleep or wake up and drift until they collapse.

I have to admit that I'm quite ignorant about the science of "morning persons" VS "night persons", sleeping schedules, natural rhythms so for anyone more in the know than I am, aren't body and brain extremely flexible and retrainable to accommodate for different schedules? As in, if you force yourself to go to bed at 10PM every night and wake up everyday at 7AM, don't you eventually become a "morning person"? And say that "eventually" happens over a period of a few years to make the transition smooth.

Genuine question, I'm really curious.

> As in, if you force yourself to go to bed at 10PM every night and wake up everyday at 7AM, don't you eventually become a "morning person"?

Been trying that for ~15 years, hasn't worked yet.

You should have some children, you will turn in 2 years or so

Thanks, that drew a chuckle.

nose exhale

That's not always the case. My daughter's going on 6, and she actively enables my being a night person.

But it's worked out perfectly in my case. My daughter is definitely a morning person and enjoys having some alone time. About two years ago, she realized that the better she is the less reason I have to get up and the longer she gets some alone time. I prep breakfast the night before so she can get it without help in the morning, then she lets the dog out, turns on music or an audiobook with the Echo and gets some drawing/crafting in until I wake up. There's also a 50/50 chance that she'll have tidied up my living room and the playroom before I get up, too. Basically anything that would get me out of bed early she started taking care of, as a way to prevent me from having a reason to get up. The only part of the routine I actively created was the breakfast one, because of a few spilt milk jugs in her attempts to make cereal alone.

She's made me quite envious of morning people, actually. Even when I get up with her though, she just makes me a cozy pallet on the couch and insists I lay back down and leave her the hell alone and stay out of her way until at least 10am.

I think we are adaptable like this, I am anyway.

If I force myself to go to bed at 10PM I just end up frustrated for hours on end and actually sleep less than if I go around 12-1am. That's the absolute earliest I can - in uni I regularly didn't sleep before 4am.

You can't just force out a habit that built up over (in my case) a very long part of your life.

Going to bed and going to sleep aren't the same thing, so at least in my experience, no.

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