Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Day 8

For those following along, I’m in the midst of a 30 day experiment with polyphasic sleeping.

I hate polyphasic sleeping.

It’s 9:00pm, I’m exhausted and I’m stuck waiting for midnight before I can go to bed.  Then I have to get up at 4:30am and putter around the house for a few hours until everyone else wakes up.

Two nights ago (Christmas) we got snowed in at my inlaws (who I love).  I didn’t have all my normal entertainment accouterments so I picked up a James Patterson novel about 9pm and finished all 390 pages by 8:00am the next morning.

I found that I love the hours between 5:00am and 7:00am.  It usually takes me a half hour to shake the cobwebs and then I get two hours to myself.  Then for the rest of the day I mostly hate it.  Even the last few days when I feel pretty good, there’s always this underlying fatigue.  My eyes always feel heavy.

So that’s my complaints for the day.

Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Day 4

For those following along, I’m in the midst of a 30 day experiment with polyphasic sleeping.

It’s dark except for a single lamp.  I’ve got a cup of coffee in one hand and a book open in my lap.  It’s 5:30am and I’ve had almost an hour of quiet reading since I awoke an hour ago.  It will be another hour and a half until my wife and two boys wake up.

This is why I wanted to try polyphasic sleeping.

As a husband, father and a small business owner I have a lot of constraints on my time.  The extra two and a half hours before anyone else gets up is a wonderful thing.

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Today I felt almost normal.  There’s still an underlying fatigue but I felt like my mind was working normally again and I wasn’t so out of it.  I spent the day at the house and doing some shopping with my 4 year old.

Later in the afternoon I unexpectedly felt exhausted and my eyes grew very heavy.  I checked and it was 4:30pm – time for the second nap of the day.  It was still an hour before I was able to lay down, but I took this as a good sign that my body is already starting to adjust to the schedule.

Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Day 3

For those following along, I’m in the midst of a 30 day experiment with polyphasic sleeping.

Today I could tell a marked difference in my mental functions.  I had an extremely hard time focusing on anything and I often found myself going in circles on simple tasks.  Creating this post took me three times as many clicks to get it started.  I’ve already stopped a few times staring at the screen trying to figure out what I was doing.  It also took a lot of mental energy to keep going on a single thing  until it was done.

Getting up this morning was especially hard.  I felt like I was tearing myself out of bed and it took me a half hour to start doing anything productive.  If the goal is simply to exhaust myself to the point that my naps start making up the difference, I’m wondering how deep this rabbit hole goes.

Naps did come easier and I was still able to shake the fog within a few minutes but I didn’t feel rested afterwards.

Thankfully this is the last day I’m in the office for awhile so I have a few days to get acclimated.

Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Day 2

For those following along, I’m in the midst of a 30 day experiment with polyphasic sleeping.

A bit of sleep deprivation crept up throughout the day. While I felt pretty good, I had trouble organizing my thoughts a few times and once didn’t filter a criticism to a client as much as I should, and normally would.

Fell asleep a bit quicker on my naps. Woke up fine and shook the cobwebs within ten minutes. No dreams yet which means I’m not getting to REM.

The last few hours before I went to bed last night were interesting. First, I started falling asleep on the coach around 9:30pm and Candace quickly roused me. Then I began to feel a combination of dread and craving for bedtime. I desperately wanted to go to sleep but was not looking forward to getting out of bed after just four and a half hours.

Overall I feel like I’m still running at about 95%.

Polyphasic Sleep Experiment: Day 1

For those following along, I’m in the midst of a 30 day experiment with polyphasic sleeping.

Today was a piece of cake.

Thanks to a 2 year old that kept waking up and being nervous that I would oversleep, I woke up five minutes before my alarm and rolled out of bed at 4:25am. I felt good and was alert and focused during the day.

Napping was a bit weird. I gave myself a 30 minute window to get my 20 minute nap in but I’m pretty sure I didn’t sleep more than 10 minutes both times. It took awhile to drift off. Apparently this is normal and, as I adjust, it will be easier to fall quickly asleep and go straight into REM.

Overall, the day was a breeze. However as a small business owner and father of two youngsters, getting just 4.5 hours of sleep in a day is not all that uncommon. We’ll see how I’m feeling by week’s end.

Polyphasic Sleep Experiment

We’re all stuck with the same 24 hours in a day.

Or are we?

I first heard about polyphasic sleeping when I was browsing Steve Pavlina’s blog. He kept a journal of his attempt to sleep less than 3 hours a day. This was intriguing to me and I instantly wanted to give it a try.

There are, of course, downsides. The acclamation period is two weeks of a foggy hell. You have to keep a highly regimented schedule of 20 – 30 minute naps every four hours. This means scheduling your entire life around sleep and even leaving parties to nap in the car.

If you’re late for a nap, it’s hard to catch up. If you miss a nap, you’re exhausted for days.

Considering my current life situation, this wasn’t feasible so a shelved under “some day”.

I recently purchased a copy of 4 Hour Body and read the chapter on polyphasic sleeping. This introduced me for the first time to the different levels of polyphasic sleeping. Basically, for every 20 minute nap you take during the day, you forego 1.5 to 2 hours of sleep at night. Also, on the easier levels of polyphasic sleeping, you can be a little more relaxed with your sleep schedule. If you’re an hour late for a nap, it’s no big deal.

Now this I can do!

Starting tonight, for the next (at least) 30 days I am going to run my life on the Everyman 2-Nap polyphasic schedule. This means 4.5 hours of “core sleep” at night (midnight to 4:30am) and then two 20 minute naps at noon and 4:30pm.

Does everybody get the same 24 hours or can you hack your sleep to, in my case, steal back an extra three? I’ll find out soon enough.

Photo by malias

Weekly update #4 and #5 – Finding my groove and traveling

All of a sudden things have gotten easier.

The first three weeks of the Perfect Health Project were extremely hard. Most of the pain was emotional. It is kind of embarrassing to admit that I had such a rough time giving up certain foods. I mean… it’s food. Fuel for the body. Not exactly something worth getting all upset about. Yet changing my habits made me grouchy, depressed and angry.

But that was the first three weeks. As of two weeks ago, everything suddenly became a lot easier. I stopped craving sugar, found a rhythm in my eating habits and even started to enjoy a lot of the foods I used to turn my nose up at. Who knew steamed peas and corn mixed together could be so satisfying?

This relief could not have come at a better time as last weekend I caught a plane for Austin, Texas to attend a conference for my business. Five days of figuring out how to eat healthy while on the road and I was more than a little nervous. I thought about packing a bunch of food to have with me or hitting up a grocery store once I arrived but in the end decided against this. One of the goals of this project is to see how much of a “normal” life I can lead while living in perfect health. That means picking up food at the conference and eating out every day.

I figured out, surprisingly, that it is pretty easy. Almost every restaurant has at least one healthy option. Airport food stalls regularly carry things like fruit and Naked juices (which are amazing by the way). The conference I attended had large fruit cups available for breakfast and the Mexican restaurant across the street from the conference center had amazing spinach burritos on their lunch menu. While there were still times that I could not find something readily available to eat, finding something that fit my diet was much easier than I expected.

There is, though, a dark side to trying to eat out while cutting out 95% of what most American’s eat from your diet. You become that customer.

“I’d like the cobb salad. But I don’t want the chicken on it, I’d like grilled salmon. And I don’t want the bacon bits either, so can you just put some extra avocado on there for me? Oh yeah, and I need the vinaigrette dressing instead of the ranch and I’m going to need that on the side.”

The waitresses were loving me…

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As I’ve now finished out five weeks of the Perfect Health Project, I am also starting to see some changes in people around me.

One night in Austin after dinner, my friend sat back, looked at his empty plate that had recently held fried chicken and french fries and then looked at my plate where I was finishing up the above cobb salad, and sighed heavily. His stomach had begun to ache and he was feeling sluggish. He confessed that he wished he had gone with the salad as well as it would have made him feel much “cleaner”. And that is exactly what he did the next night at dinner.

I have also seen several people in my life start eating better. My wife has decided to cut out sugar (her kryptonite) and refined wheat from her diet. Joseph, a guy I work with, has also decided to eat more balanced with more whole foods as opposed to the processed kind he eats on a regular basis. And my kids are asking for fruits and vegetables as snacks after lunch and dinner instead of animal crackers or pretzels. It is exciting to see this little project I have taken on impacting the people around me. Hopefully I keep inspiring people to give this stuff a try!

Weekly Update #3

My doctor’s visit on Wednesday lasted over an hour even though he checked me for less than ten minutes.  He was fascinated by this little project of mine.  We talked the whole time about everything surrounding my manifesto.  He gave some really good advice and also offered to help anyway he could.  Some changes he suggested include adding yoga to my routine, so I get some strength training, along with integrating fasting occasionally as well.  My doctor fasts once a week and has also done extended fasts as well, all for health reasons.  He suggested I experiment with extended fasting that lasts at least a week so I’m going to research that a little more and possibly work that into this project at some point in the future.

We also went over my blood work and there were a couple concerns.  First off, my LDL (bad) cholesterol is at 130. This is considered “borderline high” by the American Heart Association.  My doctor is not too concerned since I am only 28 years old but said we would be having a different conversation if I was in my mid-thirties or older.  He is also pretty confident that my new diet will cause it to drop significantly over the next couple of months.

The second issue with my blood work is my vitamin D levels.  Vitamin D deficiency is one of those things that doctors have just recently realized is a major problem.  According to my doctor, one in six people are vitamin D deficient.  Since it is such a new issue, doctors do not know all of the ramifications of vitamin D deficiency, but symptoms include colds and flu, periodontal disease and cavities, depression and seasonal affective disorder, osteoporosis, heart failure and cardiomyopathy, high blood pressure, lung cancer, ovarian cancer, colon Cancer, asthma, breast cancer and multiple sclerosis. The healthy range of vitamin D is between 50 and 80 ng/ml. Doctors get pretty concerned if you’re in the 20s and I’m sitting at a solid 18.3 ng/ml.

The recommended daily intake for vitamin D is 1000 IU/day.  For people like me that are deficient need to be taking a lot more.  My doctor recommends I get 2000 IU/day.  You can get some vitamin D from food.  Certain fish contains a decent amount of vitamin D, but otherwise it’s really hard to get it by eating.  For instance, I would need to eat 100 eggs or 13,300 grams of beef liver every day to get my 2000 UI.  Fortified milk contains vitamin D but I would need to drink 20 cups of milk a day to get enough which goes against the manifesto and my lactose intolerance.  So the other options left are eating a bunch of herring everyday ($$$), getting more sun or taking a supplement.  Since supplements are also against the manifesto, I’m going to opt for getting more sun every day.  With spring quickly approaching I’ll be spending much more time outside so I am going to wait and see what my levels are in two months before I start taking a supplement.

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Eating the right amount of calories every day continues to be the most frustrating part of this diet.  The combination of consuming food with much fewer calories plus only eating until I’m 80% full make it mentally taxing to keep track of everything.  If I skip a meal, which I’ve been prone to doing in the past, it makes it very hard to catch up on calories.  Or, if I eat a lot of food but it is all low in calories, I get 80% full quickly but end up with days like Monday where it’s 8pm and I’m lightheaded and grouchy because I’ve only consumed 900 calories so far.  Then I end up sopping up extra virgin olive oil with whole wheat bread just to get enough in my system.

Emotionally, the hardest part of this new lifestyle is when I go to the grocery.  Today I was wandering around looking forlornly at all of the food I can’t eat.  I even stopped in the bakery section to see what kind of donuts they had available.  I think I would have gone for the jelly filled today.

I’m pretty much regulated to the produce, canned beans and bread aisles when I’m shopping for myself but I have to veer off course when picking stuff up for the rest of the family and that’s when I start to get frustrated again.  I miss my old habits of eating whatever I want.  I also miss not having to constantly think far in advance about what I’m going to eat.  Three weeks in and living a healthy lifestyle is proving pretty difficult.

That is also one thing that makes this hard.  Three weeks in.  That means I have forty-nine weeks left.  There is currently no light at the end of the tunnel.  I’ve done thirty day experiments before and they usually go well but by this point I’m nine days away from the end.  Instead of 344 days from the end. Easter is just around the corner, a big time of feasting and celebrating in our family and I get to tackle it with no meat, candy or cake. Soon after that we’ll move into our family’s birthday season, again with none of the usual fare on my plate.

Why is this so hard?  That is a question that I will spend some more time on in future posts, but it is a question that is resounding in my head on a daily basis. Why is it so extremely hard, both emotionally and physically, to live a healthy lifestyle in this country?  Until this changes, we’ll continue to have the highest obesity rate and highest percentages all of the diseases that come with that.

My pants tell the story of how I got fat

If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know I recently hit the 200 lb mark after losing 25 lbs.  One of the great aspects of losing weight is trying on the clothes that haven’t fit for a long time to see if the weight loss has had an effect. Yesterday I rifled through my jeans and pulled out a pair with a size 34 waist.  I tentatively put them on and, with just a tad extra effort, was able to zip them up and button with no problems.  Success!  I went down stairs to tell Candace about it and as I was talking I stuck my hand in the pocket and found an old receipt.  I opened it to check out the date so I would know the last time I was able to fit into the pants.  The date was 10/12/2008.  A year and a half since I had to trade them in for a bigger pair.

I then looked over the receipt again and noticed it was from Kroger, a local grocery store.  Hmmm, what was the last thing I purchased at the store the last time I was able to fit into these pants?  Here’s the list (receipt shown below):

• 1 pack of peanut butter Oreos
• 1 pack of regular Oreos
• 1 box of Little Debbie Swiss Rolls
• 1 box of Little Debbie Zebra Cakes
• 1 Tombstone Pizza
• 1 pack of Tombstone garlic bread

I think that gives a small glimpse into how I became 50 lbs overweight.

Manifesto Monday: Observing the Sabbath

“[The Sabbath] is a time to come apart from the things of the world.  It is something to look forward to.  You get to go on hikes, stop pushing.  I don’t know how to describe it to you.  I think the Sabbath gives you peace, and that contributes to your health” – Marge Jetton, 104 years old

“To cease” is the original meaning of the word Sabbath and comes from a description of the seventh day of God’s creation in Genesis, the first book of the Bible.  This eventually became a law for the Jewish people, the breaking of which could result in death.

While death has been removed the equation, this is still a regular part of the practice of Judaism.  From sun down on Friday evening until “the appearance of three stars in the sky on Saturday night”, no work is to be done.  There are 39 rules that are applied to the “Shabbat”, most of which I keep all seven days of the week.  Rules such as plowing, beating wool and tearing for the purpose of sewing are rarely a problem for me.

The problem for me exists in breaking the spirit of this law.

“To cease”

Judaism doesn’t have a lock on the Sabbath.  A few modern day Christians, particularly the Seventh-day Adventists, still observe the Sabbath.  The Uposatha is a Buddhist Sabbath day meant for “the cleansing of the defiled mind”.  The Jumu’ah, or “Friday Prayer”, is held every Friday by Muslims and, while not a 24 hour practice, is often used as a time of rest.

Regardless of religious background, the focus of the Sabbath is to rest.  In reading about the various cultures of longevity around the world, a common thread of regular rest and focus on family runs through them all.  Therefore, I’m using the concept of the Sabbath as a way to remove myself from the normal pace of life once a week to rest and spend time with my family.  The rule of thumb is:

“I can do anything as long as it accomplishes nothing”

From sun down Saturday night until sun down Sunday night I will observe the Sabbath and do no work.  Here’s a few examples of things not allowed:

• No house work including doing dishes, cleaning bathrooms, etc.
• No “real” work such as checking business email, scheduling client calls, etc
• No running errands such as picking up groceries, returning a movie, etc.

The goal of the day is to spend time relaxing in preparation for the work week and spend time connecting with my family without distraction.

How does this relate to living in Perfect Health?

In the book Love and Survival: The Scientific Basis for the Healing Power of Intimacy, Dr. Dean Ornish, in speaking on the impact of love and relationships, says, “I am not aware of any other factor, – not diet, not smoking, not exercise, not stress, not genetics, not drugs, not surgery – that has a greater impact on our quality of life, incidence of  illness, and premature death from all causes”.

While there’s been plenty of studies done on this subject, I’d like to point out one in particular.  J. H. Medalie and U. Goldbourt kept track of 10,000 men over a five year period.  They were tracking the risk factors in development of angina pectoris – chest pain indicating heart disease.  The findings were startling.  Even in the face of “high risk factors” a wife’s love and support play a huge role in keeping a man’s health “balanced” and substantially reduced the likelihood of developing angina.

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Fostering the love and support of your family is potentially the most important thing you can do for your health and is seen in all of the Blue Zones across the world.  Observing the Sabbath is the rule that forces time into my schedule to do just that.