Switching to Biphasic Sleeping? Start here.

[silicon toad2000]

I found it difficult to guage the length of your sleep cycle for the nap due to the varied times of getting to sleep at the start of the nap.
I don't think you can really judge the length of your cycle until you have biphasic into a routine and it takes very little time to get to sleep for the nap.
Once you know the start time of your sleep you can start varying the wake time and see what gives the best results.

[Gdet9878]

Last night was my first try. I started with the 4.5 hours of core sleep (I'm insanely tired as I write this, i need my nap). The weird thing was, i fell asleep at almost 4 a.m. on the dot, and woke up at 8:30 a.m. on the dot after having a dream about raman noodles and oatmeal. That's 4.5 hours exactly, which I guess would mean my cycles are 90 minutes long? (assuming it was 3 cycles. I hope I'm not some weirdo with 45 minute cycles)

I'm going to do some more experimenting. I'll see how my first nap goes. Hopefully i won't oversleep.

Another question. How long does it take for your cycles to shorten? Will I notice in months or weeks? Days?

Update:
My nap was HORRIBLE. I slept for less than 30 minutes over a period of two hours. I feel completely awful. At least knowing the benefits will be greater in the end is keeping me going.

[silicon toad2000]

I'm in the process of switching back to bi phasic.
I have noticed that after my nap I am extremely thirsty. I don't feel that I am dehydrated before I go for the nap. I keep my fliuds up throughout the day.
Anyone else ntoice this when they wake up from their naps?

[Gdet9878]

yes i have. and i wake up with a very bad taste in my mouth. I'm currently developing bags under my eyes. Lovely.

Question for the pros out there..
When you wake up from a nap rather tired, and remain tired the remainder of the day, do you try to increase sleep to 6 hours of core? Or should i feel fine after my 4.5 hours of core?

[silicon toad2000]

are you getting good quality unbroken sleep for your nap.

I had trouble when I was woken through my nap. The key for the nap is that you need to get down to the delta sleep. if you are woken halfway through the nap the odds are that you haven't sleep deeply enough. The delta sleep is the sleep your body needs to recuperate.

[kpreston]

Hello,

I was reading one of the many blogs that discuss biphasic sleeping. It motivated me to give it another try, now that my schedule has calmed. Unfortunatly, I've failed on day one.

I took my first nap at 9:00 PM. This is 30 minutes after I get home from work every day. I set my alarm for exactly 90 minutes, because I suspect that my sleep cycle is shorter. I had no problem falling asleep, and woke up 15 minutes before my alarm. I'm not sure if this is because my sleep cycle is short, or because I was so excited to get started with a biphasic routine.

I went to my friends' house to help them pack. After getting home I enjoyed a quiet morning doing homework until around 4:00 AM. I'm more of a late night person, so being up this late--or early--is a normal thing to me. I wasn't tired, but forced myself to lay down at 4:30 AM (my target core sleep time). I fell asleep quickly.

Once again, I woke up before my alarm went off. Unforetunately, this time, I wasn't able to get out of bed. I can't recall what time it was, but I know I was overcome with fatigue and went back to sleep. I woke up every 15-30 minutes to a snooze alarm, and finally got out of bed at 11:30. This gave me approximately 8 1/2 hours of total sleep.

Has anyone else had problems like this? How can I overcome it?

Thanks,
Kpreston

[silicon toad2000]

that fatigue sounds like you were woken out of delta sleep, or woken in the middle of a sleep cycle.
From the sounds of it your core sleep was 7 hrs 15 minutes.
I'd suggest that perhaps for a bi phasic sleep pattern that your core sleep is too long. try setting your nap for 1.5 hours and your core sleep for 6 hrs for a total of 7.5 hours.

[kpreston]

Originally Posted by silicon toad2000

that fatigue sounds like you were woken out of delta sleep, or woken in the middle of a sleep cycle.
From the sounds of it your core sleep was 7 hrs 15 minutes.
I'd suggest that perhaps for a bi phasic sleep pattern that your core sleep is too long. try setting your nap for 1.5 hours and your core sleep for 6 hrs for a total of 7.5 hours.

This eliminates the most attractive benefit of biphasic sleeping: time. I already sleep 7.5 hours monophasically. It would be life-changing to be able to stay up late and get up early, like many of you seem to do.

Edit:

... that your core sleep is too long

I think I see where the confusion came from. My core sleep was only scheduled for 4.5 hours. I was supposed to get up at 9:00 AM. That's right. I reset my alarm every 30 minutes for over two hours.

[silicon toad2000]

Sorry I have misunderstood your post. I thought you indicated that you got a total of approx 8 1/2 hours sleep.

how long was your core sleep supposed to be?

[kpreston]

Originally Posted by silicon toad2000

Sorry I have misunderstood your post. I thought you indicated that you got a total of approx 8 1/2 hours sleep.

how long was your core sleep supposed to be?

4.5 hours.

Nap: 9:00 - 10:30 PM
Core: 4:30 - 9:00 AM

[silicon toad2000]

I'd suggest that your quality of sleep may have had something to do with it, but you said that you fell asleep right away.

I would say that it could just be in the bedding down process and that you just need to make yourself get up.
A pre sleep routine might help your brain wind down before sleep, homework might not be the best thing to be doing right before you go to sleep. I turn most of my lights out and read a book before i go to sleep.
Light is one of the brains triggers to say it needs to be awake. I find by turning out lights and dimming them it seems help my brain start to wind down. I guess it's telling my brain its getting close to time to go to bed.

[kpreston]

I'll just have to work on my willpower I guess. I'll post back when I try again. Thank you for being helpful.

[silicon toad2000]

good luck with it. I find it great to be able to survive on 6 hrs sleep and still feel weel rested.

[Gdet9878]

my biphasic sleeping attempt failed. I was so tired after 3 days that i crashed so early and slept in so late.

I'm pretty sure i know why i failed:

1. My nap was disrupted many times, although I'm not sure by what.. but i felt very unrested after my naps.

2. I take a long time to fall asleep. I took an even increased time to fall asleep when my project had begun. For the nap, I would have to open my eyes every 15 minutes or so to change my alarm clock back another 15 minutes so it would allow me the proper time to sleep (although like i said in 1. that i was disrupted many times).

I would like to master this so I can witness the difference in day to day awareness... but at the moment it seems like quite the challenge. Does anyone out there have any tips on what I can do to change any of the factors above? I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.

[silicon toad2000]

Steve has an article on how to get up as soon as your alarm clock goes off. One thing that seems relevant is that the mind needs to wind down a little before trying to go to sleep.
For a start I'd suggest have a look at your pre sleep routine and look at what stimulus are present before the nap/core sleep such as noise, light, physical activity, mental activity... see if you can reduce those by reorganising your tasks.
As far as a disrupted nap/core sleep, have a look at your sleeping area and see if you can make it darker or quieter or more comfortable in any way.

I had the same problem with my nap just last night. I kept waking every 15 minutes. My nap is 9pm - 10:30 and I think I slept from 9:15-9:45 and then woke up, by 10:10 I hadn't got any more sleep so I got up. I kept to my 4.5 hour core sleep so tonight I should be tired enough that I will get to sleep for my nap on time.

Remember this is not a failure but an opportunity to learn.

[Vanderlei]

Really liked it, I'll do it a try as soon as I get into a healthy diet.

[Victor Vikingr]

I have a question. Would Steve's method from "How to Become an Early Riser" article also apply to biphasic sleeping (i.e. getting up at two set times a day, and go to sleep when you feel like it)?

[silicon toad2000]

I think it would but you would have to listen very carefully to it, so carefully and blocking out distractions so completely that you may as well go to bed anyway.

[KeithS]

I have tried this schedule a few times in the past but to no success. I believe right now would be a very good time to start because I am having really bad sleeping problems. I exercise, eat right (not perfect but better than I used to), and take vitamins. I know it's not stress because the problems I have now I've dealt with for at a number of years. The problem is that I can only sleep for a max of four hours every few days, and that is if I take a lot of melatonin pills. When I wake up from this bi daily 'nap' I'm not tired but I soon crash after that and I can not go back to sleep no matter how many pills I take. I've had sleeping problems my whole life but this is the worst.

Anyway I think this would work because I'm basically already on it, just an extreme version of it. Most of my living begins later in the day including work. I'm thinking of:
Core-starts at 0200-0600~
Nap-starts at 1900-2030~

I'll start as soon as I can and update.

[highvoltage]

I've started a new Biphasic sleep trial. I'm posting my progress over in the "polyphasic sleep log" thread here.

My plan is to have a 90 minute nap around 7:00 PM, and a 4.5 hour core sleep from 02:00-06:00. I just started today with my nap, and my first core sleep will be tonight (or early tomorrow morning, to be precise). Anyone else thinking about trying biphasic sleep? Care to join me?

[aomega54]

This sounds very intriguing.

One question though - how do you negotiate the sex and your partners? Surely, unless your significant other (or the not so significant random others) aren't into this habit, it would be quite difficult to maintain?

A

[dioxin88]

Hey guys, first post here. I've been considering doing a biphasic schedule for a few weeks now. I've somewhat inadvertantely started doing due to a hectic schedule but I would like to get one a much more stabile sleep pattern. My only worry is that I have a pretty severe case of Irritable Bowel Syndrome and I haven't been able to find any info on whether or not a biphasic schedule would help, hurt, or not change anything. I was curious if anyone had any info or knew where I could find info on IBS in correlation to a biphasic sleep schedule. If I do decide to go through with a 30 day trial run I'll let you know what effect it did have, maybe I can be the first with documentation.

[Practical Manifestations]

It seems that the main objective with the multiple sleep periods is to have more time that you are awake. As a result, though, I would think that you would also have a tendency to eat more. Any comments?

[juice43]

Alright first post here on the forums, so hello everyone.

I remember that I tried out biphasic sleep sometime in March, after reading up on it for a few days. My schedule was 20:00-21:30 and then 2:30-7:00. I was only able to do it for like five days, since I missed my nap and lost orientation. Currently my sleep schedule is something like sleep at 1 on weekdays waking up at 7 for high school (it was the same before biphasic too). Then also sleeping at 1 on weekends, but waking up either at 12-13:30. It's a bit hectic and not effective since on Mondays I tend to feel horrible during school. And even sometimes for exams I stay up until like 2 or something. I'm really interested in the schedule and reading the forum has been helpful, but can't start now since May and June are the hectic part of the year.

Another thing, is there anyone that does 3/1.5 split? When I start to adapt should I just dwelve into 3/1.5 (which is what I want) or gradually get there by doing 4.5/1.5 for a while?

I also noticed that biphasic made me a bit hungry during those few days. I always eat breakfast, like at 7 and lunch like at 12, but while doing this experiment I remember that I started getting hungry by around 10, and at about 1:30 in the night, I was also hungry. Just a minor note in response to Practical Manifestations

[RagsToRiches]

I recently failed to transition to biphasic sleeping over 14 days

Reasons for not suceeding:

Not tired enough around nap-time, dispite cutting main sleep to 4.5 hours towards end.
Solution: I highly recommend being EXTREME about cutting your main sleep to start with until you ingraine nap time in. I will probably do 3 hours main sleep for the first 3-4 days next time.

Also I will cut caffine completely for the first few days - and probably invest in some ear-plugs for good measure.

Noisy housemates at nap-time even though I told them
Solution: Moving in with ambitious self-dev enthusiasts in July

You can read my log here - Rags To Riches

[juice43]

Ah, you couldn't get to sleep for your naps, which prevented the whole thing from working. My real issue was that I couldn't keep the schedule maintained for the nap since I usually don't take any naps and stay awake. Next time I think that I too will do 3/1.5 for like a week. Then I feel that I am too tired once I am adapted though I will have to switch to 4.5/1.5. I should try soon before exams start to set in otherwise I'll be messed up during that period and have to wait during the summer.

It seems that you tried this pretty recently when do you plan to try again?

[Jduester]

Hi guys and gals,
I found this forum thread by googling biphasic sleeping. My work schedule makes me get up at about 2:00am each night, but I can sleep afternoon/evenings... I'm reading through this thread, gathering information and ideas on this sleep pattern. I plan to try it soon, once I'm done with this thread.
My sleep schedule will be:
1.5hr nap at 2:00-3:30pm
4.5hr sleep at 10:00pm-2:30am

Ideally, I'd like to get to a 3/3hr cycle, but I'm going to try this first.

Thanks for all this information, and I hope this thread stays/gets active again!

Josh

[Jduester]

Today is my first day of Biphasic sleeping (4.5/1.5). I have read a lot this morning though about brain/memory activity during REM and Non-REM cycles. My job demands high concentration and intensive daily learning (studying technical analysis and financial market charts/data). I now wonder how my memory and learning ability will be affected.

I don't think this thread is active much anymore, so I started my own thread,where I will reflect on my 30 day biphasic sleeping test... see the link below.

Josh

[tco]

I'm a 22 year old male that will be entering medical school next fall. I'm highly active, and exercise at least 5 days per week, typically 1-3 hours per session, whatever time allows. I'm thinking of starting a biphasic sleep routine for a number of reasons, mainly, a lack of productivity at key points of the day (midday and late night).

I've often faced the problem of a lack of productivity around 3 PM, and I'm wondering if biphasic sleep helps with this. I've been told that it's a blood glucose level problem, as most people's levels drop down below 70 mg/dL around this time, but I can drink a caffeinated milkshake around 2:30 and still feel tired at 3 PM.

Anyway, like I said, I'm wondering if any biphasic sleepers have found the cure to the midday crash.

Also, which cycle is it best to start the routine with? The nap or core sleep?

Thanks!

[Wes]

Medical school and the profession itself does raise a lot of issues when it comes to sleep (or the actual opportunities to do it, more precisely). I'd recommend you probe your colleagues from higher years, to learn a few strategies with proven success... they always have them, out of necessity.

Take the legit ones and scrap those that sound shady to you (a few meds students have them and don't realize the potential dangers). I'm sure you'll know how to tell them apart.