Waking yourself up...

I have tried and failed polyphasic sleep a few times and my main problem is I can't figure out how to wake myself up.

I have no problem falling asleep (as all of my friends know :P) and I can fall asleep in literaly any situation. I have fallen asleep in some pretty funny positions. But I digress.

My problem is once im alseep there is no waking me up. Sometimes my freinds can't even wake me up. I mean pretty much the only thing that works is ice or punching me a few times :P

I'm pretty sure that like everything else once I get into a routine I should be fine but for now what can I do to wake me up. I mean I will do ANYTHING. And yah even those sleep tracks don't wake me up. The problem with me and those kind of wake up things is it kinda just melds into my dream >.<

So any drastic measures I can take. I am trying to do this over the summer and I'll try anything. Heck ill use a shock collar if I have to :D

If you can recommend anything that would be awesome. I don't care what it is...as long as it will wake me up.

I don't have this problem myself (my issue is *staying* awake when it's 3am and pich black outside), but I've heard that other folks nap with headphones on with 30 minutes of soft music or whatever. The key is at the end of the time a gentle voice says "wake up now" then the voice gets louder and louder. If you don't turn off the music in time it starts screaming at you. Kind of thing that, once it happens a couple times (or just once) you get conditioned to respond to the "wake up now" signal. I bet those tracks already exist if you search for them.

I know ive used them :P

They don't seem to work. I've used the polyphasic sleep tracks which have some pretty insane wake up sounds. The problem is I go into deep sleep way too fast. I hit the bed and fall asleep (or wherever is that I'm sleeping) there really isn't a transition from kinda sleeping to deep sleep there is just deep sleep.

So I guess that would make me a good polyphasic sleeper because I can fall asleep instantly...than again its a gift and curse. I can fall asleep anywhere, at anytime, with a ton of sound but I can't wake up for the life of me.

Heck ealrier today I wanted ot take a quick anp it ended up being 4 horus and my phone was ringing the whole time. It just doens't phase me.

Probobly another thing is when I do wake up form a 4 hour nap im not groggy at all.....

One question ...if you take a 3 or 4 hour nap ...is it even a nap anymore

Get an alarm with a really high pitch! Mine scares me awake in the blink of an eye and usually manages to piss me off as well. But i get my ass up! Like an alarm with a smoke alarm sound. that should wake your right up! or maybe you'll just dream the house is burning down? but it should work!

hmm that does sound like a good idea. LOL where could I get an alarm with a high pirtch like that. That could probobly work.

But than again I could dream my house is burning down :P than again I could make anything into a dream.

Yes an alarm that pisses me off would be nice.

Also one quick quesiton where could I get some really nice headphones that want fall off or anything (over the ears maybe wireless). Anything besides bose cause bose is so overpriced.

Thanks!

Hum... one other thought: drink a bunch of caffeine just before you go to sleep. Since it takes time to get into your system, you should be able to fall asleep but it will wake you up as it gets into your bloodstream.

If that fails you could always try hired goons. :D

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Originally Posted by aceofspades

hmm that does sound like a good idea. LOL where could I get an alarm with a high pirtch like that. That could probobly work.

But than again I could dream my house is burning down :P than again I could make anything into a dream.

Yes an alarm that pisses me off would be nice.

Also one quick quesiton where could I get some really nice headphones that want fall off or anything (over the ears maybe wireless). Anything besides bose cause bose is so overpriced.

Thanks!

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Well if you have a cell phone go through its alarm options and see if it can't piss you off.:D I know mine does!

In my experience all the "tricks" give way to our mental conditioning.

You can set 10 alarms, in 10 different corners of the room. But if you wake up from SWS and are conditioned to just go back to sleep - your body will find a way. In that cognitive fog you will go to each alarm, turn them off, then find a way back to bed.

I think it's best to try and work on internal conditioning than external "tricks". Of course, that's not easy, but then again no one said adapting to polyphasic sleep was :P

I have a really high pitch alarm clock that wakes me up within 1-2 seconds every time, and I'm a heavy sleeper. When I'm away from my alarm clock, I use my cell phone alarm, and one of the "alarms" it came with was Bach's Fugue in D Minor, which wakes me right the hell up.

You could try having an external trick, like the fire alarm sound, and be ready so that if you see your house on fire (dream) you know to wake up. Something along those lines may work some of the time.

Cheers

get a high pitched whailing alarm clock as described earlier and put it in some sort of locked container right next to your head and put the only key somewhere on the other side of your house it works nicely for me when i need to wbtb and know ill be to lazy to stay up a couple of times i even had to put the key in a combo box so id have to think to get it out get to the other side of my house get the key (and retrieve the combo box the key was in) go back and open the first box and turn off the alarm before it wakes everyone up and i get yelled at lol

and if thats too complicated they sell special alarm clocks for people like yourself with overly neccecceraly loud alarm clocks with a built in combination lock

I thought this was strange. Last week for 4 of those days, I woke up at exactly 3:47.
I added then together and got 5 which means, simply put "change".
It will be interesting to see the outcome of this one, if any.

I personally am married to a wonderful man that has no fear of beating the crap out of me or making loud noises in our apartment. I have a drum kit (that I unfortunately cannot play in our apartment due to noise restrictions) sitting in our bedroom (because it wouldn't fit anywhere else and it looks nice).

1. He pokes me and tells me nicely to get up. It doesn't work.
2. He takes the drum sticks and does a few rolls on the drum kit (or if it's too late he just whacks the crash symbol a few times). Usually this works, but if it doesn't...
3. He punches me in the shoulders/thighs until I get up. (It's okay, I have a penis, it's not spousal abuse. =P )

Oddly enough I can never remember the first 2 minutes of being awake, so every nap is me falling asleep and then suddenly being out in the living room.

I'm a REALLY heavy sleeper, so sometimes an alarm clock wont work for me. I've been known to somnambulise my way over to the clock, shut it off, and then go back to bed.

I would recommend these:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/lights/9171/
You have to get up and THINK to make it turn off.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/lights/8f1a/
I don't know how it's even possible to sleep through this. If this DOESN'T wake you up, you need to see a Doctor (seriously...).

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/lights/8f22/
Same thing, but cuter.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/homeoffice/lights/91f2/
You have to chase it across the room. (Watch the included video)

So get a spouse with a drum kit or one of these alarm clocks. Have fun!

I have the weird problem that alarms that work at school don't work at home. I mean, I have this one alarm that if I hear it I am UP. I sit straight up and have no thoughts of going back to sleep. Then at home it goes off and I turn it off and barely realize it because I didn't wake up. Has anyone had this and are there any ways to work with it?

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Originally Posted by asher

I don't have this problem myself (my issue is *staying* awake when it's 3am and pich black outside), but I've heard that other folks nap with headphones on with 30 minutes of soft music or whatever. The key is at the end of the time a gentle voice says "wake up now" then the voice gets louder and louder. If you don't turn off the music in time it starts screaming at you. Kind of thing that, once it happens a couple times (or just once) you get conditioned to respond to the "wake up now" signal. I bet those tracks already exist if you search for them.

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I can't sleep with noise at all. I imagine if I was exhausted I could, because the surest way to tell if I'm sick is that I can fall asleep while watching TV, but I'm not sure how to train myself to do that.

well if you know you wont pee the bed...drink lots of coffee or tea before bed you should wake up soon due to full bladder.or you can put a really cold wet wash clothe on your face and as you move the cold water will run down your face and wake you up or if it falls off you might roll over on it.lol, nothing else gets you up like something soft and wet in your bed.:P..um....or you can get a cat with separation anxiety that has to sleep with you.:)

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Originally Posted by JollyRoger

Well if you have a cell phone go through its alarm options and see if it can't piss you off.:D I know mine does!

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Well JollyRoger with the cell phone, some people in my house enjoy sleeping at 2 in the morning and if i wake them up with my high pitch phone alarm, I'm gonna get in trouble. Any ideas (vibrations don't work)