Naturally Nocturnal Humans

reply to post by Nightflower

I have no idea why you are equating your nocturnal behavior with evil. You need to drop that construct altogether.

And, personally...I am extremely nocturnal. However, I still make great grades in college, and discipline myself to still get up on time, go to my classes, get my homework done, and sleep during the daytime and nighttime (I split up the hours so when I am tired, I simply sleep). There are ways to have it the way you like it without compromising your nocturnal behaviors. Just discipline yourself and use self mastery, and then you can live any way that you choose.

Also...why do you care what others think of your nighttime addictions? That's your reality and your construct. Don't open your construct to the minds of others. That's a good way to weaken yourself.

I had no idea there were so many of us. I have been this way since I can remember. My dad is the same way and my oldest son. I think it runs in families.

When the kids were little it worked great. My hubby worked days I worked nights so we didn't need daycare. It's hard living in a diurnal society. People don't understand they were always waking me up during the day. Instead of being apologetic they would seem almost put out by the fact that I was sleeping during normal waking hours. When I would tell them I worked all night they would usually say something like "I can never sleep during the day." So I guess I wasn't suppose to either.

I have worked day jobs but felt like crap most of the day. I would finally start feeling fully awake in the evening and would then have to force myself to sleep. The big problem for me is appointments. After coming home at 8 AM I have to get up at 9 or 10 AM for dentist/dr, funerals, weddings etc. I often feel like a zombie during these functions so I usually opt out of anything that isn't absolutely necessary. It's hard to be social.

One might think with the name Morningglory I would be a morning person well in a way I am. I am amongst the first to welcome the morning.

reply to post by Nightflower


I dont understand this? Your body can get accustomed to the hours you need to be awake. The body only needs 6 hours of sleep a night "sleep period". I used to live the nocturnal life too, I used to push certain substances. Truth be told those substances I was pushing kept me awake for days on end. But I did notice a hudge change in my sleep cycle. Basically like you said sleep till around 5 or 6 pm. Going to bed in the early morning around 4am or 5am. But now that I have a job and a girl who isnt a user I have changed my cycle backwards. I get up at 4am every morning to go to work and im in bed by 8 or 9pm. Sure I feel like a bag of garbage in the morning but it passes once i shower and eat breakfast. I Used to HATE mornings, now i actually enjoy being up early.

All im saying in this post is that I can relate to where your coming from, but i dont understand how you cant change your sleep cycle to work to YOUR advantage. Somehow I managed to do it, I guess everyones different and some just cant easily change like me. It sure was hard in the beggining though.

My advice to you is to really do some more research in to this and see what you can find. My personal expereince was a good one, I learned to adjust my self out of the "nighttime/Party" mode everyone thought i was in. Its nice i dont catch so much flak from my pa anymore.

reply to post by Nightflower


yes thats more what i did mean to say ,i failed to distinguish between sleep and how i feel in the day, night time feels calm compaired to daytime ,daytime reminds me of a sense of being surrounded with a feeling of being saturated with slight buzzing,this deminishes as night time evolves,re appears after sun up slowly worse between 12 -4pm.
feel even better with a moon edit for s+f
new theory just popped out maybe the climate is changeing and the Schuman resonance frequency ,I do know a few around my street who potter about to the wee hours at least 4
I wonder are most of the people on the thread under 30...??

[edit on 20-3-2010 by onecon]

Thank you! This thread is great, starred and flagged!

In Norway, people say there are "A and B people". A people are up early where as B people are up at night.

I'm a B person. I just can't function correctly during the day. I'm tired all day, lack of energy etc. I work better at night, just something about it I guess, maybe my biological clock is turned differently then others.

I like the night, it's calm and I can work in peace. Don't get me wrong, I like the day time, but I can never ever get in that "rhythm." It just doesn't work for me, which has caused me a lot of trouble with past employers. At times, I've wondered if something is just wrong with me.

But anyways, I wasn't able to eloquently put my feelings into words, but you get the point. Thanks again for this thread.

maybe you are a creature of the night. you dont work well with too much solar energy? who knows.

Its funny, I have a running joke with my father in law as he knows I have weird sleep patterns. If the in laws come to visit he always says something like "Oh so youve just got up - morning..and we have a laugh, I remind him that while he was catching zee's in the land of nod I am lying in my bed looking into the night sky wondering why Im still awake!

Thanks for sharing your story, it really is good to know that there are others.

I have had sleep issues all of my life and had never heard of the Circadian Rhythm, let alone knew what it was.

Some days when I wake I feel as though Ive been hit by a bus and this feeling stays with me, I also have stomach/digestive issues,am always cold.

Im in no way lazy, Im the sort of person who likes to do everything I do to perfection ( well, as close as I can manage :-).

Ive only been up a couple of hours ( Well it is the weekend! ) and Im still a bit hazy so I will come back later to continue reading this thread and hopefully contribute some more.

Thanks

Edit to add - During the summer I sleep best, Im a sun worshipper and cant bear to miss out, the sun always wakes me. ( we have rubbish summers in the uk )

[edit on 20-3-2010 by Beauty_HairyBeast]

Nightflower.
And it kind of makes you wonder why other's can sleep at night, and live in the same area, doesn't it?
They are thick skined we are talking feeling crap in the day reason i feel for me is
I reckon i am sensitive to things,The people who are a sleep are not sensitive, this depends on whether you believe in the ability of premonition and spirit.This is why people are sensitive to lots of things foods noise tremors even foreboding places "have you felt this as a child anywhere" but some do not know they are sensing and are being spoken to all the time but lack discernment and time to discern and if they do they dismiss as a notion it simply does not register as real.Spirit tries hard
not derailing or taking from the part being up all night as i am as well ,but explaining my theory as why the day is bad many people have had to move because of towers
This is a real phenomenon you can by anti elf stuff from wallpaper to fabrics to paint to usb sticks to pendents

[edit on 20-3-2010 by onecon]

I also am nocturnal. For as long as I remember I have not been able to sleep at night. I used to find it extremely frustrating trying to sleep duing the evenings only too find I could not. When I went to school I would be up all night as well, so only managed an hour or two a couple of times a week and although I always felt tired still managed to get good grades. These days I tend to go to bed after sunrise. Sometimes I used to just walk all night just so I wasn't disturbing others in my home. Yes it can be very peaceful, although different times I have lived in cities and saw some awful things. (Australia) I am and always have been a chronic insomniac but it is not so bad now I live alone as my children are adults and out in this scary world. The only thing I find frustrating about it now is that I live in a small town and being a musician/songwriter find it difficult to work on songs or even just too listen to music as I do not wish to disturb the neighbors. I decided recently I am going to sell up and build a boat and go and live on the Murray River as at least I should be able to find somewhere that I no longer have to worry about writing music or listening at night. I tried medications at one stage but found they did not help, and some of them were quite strong yet it seems I build an immunity very quickly.

nice thread! I am a night owl myself. I thought something was wrong with me. But then I began to embrace it. It is very hard to do so in today's society, as it is pointed out, many people do not understand that we exist. It's good to see many more like me out there. I feel so lonely at night sometimes, but knowing I am not the only one... makes it more tolerable in my mind, and not as out casting.

yes and no...

I think humans, unique to our species, can change their internal clocks and even shut genetics on and off. Science is also beginning to discover this and many other things possible through the power of our thought and free will.

Why i don't completely agree with you, is that we all NEED the sun. It's our biggest source of vitamin D... and since this late night habit (I used to have insomnia) can be cured through hard work and a few tired days to get your body back on track, I would say it's important to utilize this knowledge.

If you think there is no possibility for this change, well, you are undermining the capabilities of the entire human race.

reply to post by Nightflower


WOW this is amazing what you are saying i went to sleep at five this morning and was at work for 9 oclock i shot tired.
im so glad i am not alone
Be Well

reply to post by Nightflower

Maybe this works different for Nocturnals. I'm sure our body knows how to manage itself and since we are naturally nocturnal, the rest of our body might be just adjusted to that too. There's probably still much research to be done, but for example, my body temp is lower in the day, so is my appetite.

this is a very interesting thread - hopefully we can find some more science to go with all the personal experience

I used to refer to myself as 'The Queen of the Undead' :-)

I know you and many others here will understand

the lower body temp/appetite thing is what caught my attention - have no idea if there is a real connection - but that goes for me too

and I've spent years trying to make my cycle fit into various situations - it can be a real nightmare

if I could I would stay up 24 hours a day - I love the day and don't want to miss out on anything. But I function much better at night - it's as if I turn on at around 3:00 PM and then all the wheels start spinning for real

One thing I discovered about working late shift or just avoiding daylight is I need to take Vitamin D3, 1000mg per day or I just don't feel right. Most vitamin D is normally acquired from sunlight.
I also bought a "happy light" that provides another form of "sunlight" which I use about an hour per day at the computer.
Good to know there are other nocturnals out there.

Originally posted by Odessy
yes and no...

I think humans, unique to our species, can change their internal clocks and even shut genetics on and off. Science is also beginning to discover this and many other things possible through the power of our thought and free will.

Why i don't completely agree with you, is that we all NEED the sun. It's our biggest source of vitamin D... and since this late night habit (I used to have insomnia) can be cured through hard work and a few tired days to get your body back on track, I would say it's important to utilize this knowledge.

If you think there is no possibility for this change, well, you are undermining the capabilities of the entire human race.

If somone can change their internall clock, good for them. I know i can't, i tried many years, and it's the same for many other's. I'm not trying to stop anyone from trying .

I don't buy to much into the power of thought thing, but that's another topic.

Vitamin d is a good point. I guess if we were living in nature with a nocturnal rythm, we would still catch enough sun in the afternoon hours or morning before we go to sleep.

But even most day active people get to little vitamin d nowadays.

In the tech age we can help ourself with solarium or with special bulps that are rich in uvb rays. I got myself one that is for reptiles and use it for about an hour every night, if i don't forget it :p.

I'm also a 'creature of the night', as it were. I love the peace and quiet, the stillness of the wee hours. Bedtime is usually around 4-5 AM. I have a couple friends who stay up late too, and others who think the world will end if they're not abed by 10PM, working on their much-needed 8 hours slumber. According to this thread, there's a lot of us night owls.

I agree with what has been said by previous posters towards being nocturnal in lifestyle/living patterns. I overcame depression myself via returning to my natural nocturnal lifestyle and i've never looked back. I have personally had an aversion to warm colours and to a lesser extent sunlight all my life.

I have been nocturnal since i was a child. I have always felt lethargic or even a little 'lazy' during the sunning hours. As a child i always sat out watching the stars at night, wondering what was happening.
People in my life(Family, work, school) have always noted how 'lazy', 'lethargic' or even 'slow to respond' i am during the day. At night(evening to morning) I'm energetic, happy and generally better in most things i do but unfortunately society dislikes me living this way.



Sincerely,

Khounur

When I first saw this thread I was tempted to chime in with a 'me too' comment but I have to say I'm a bit surprised at the lack of skeptisism here..

I've had nocturnal sleeping patterns for huge chunks of my life and I still stay up late and sleep in when I can. It's got to the point many times where the only way to return to a regular sleeping pattern was to 'pull an all-nighter' as it were.

With hindsight however I've come to associate this with being anti-social, un-productive and depressed. Not a lifestyle I want to accept as 'the way I am' purely because getting up early didn't feel good.

Whatever floats your boat though! If you can live happily like that then good luck

An interesting thread. I am a night owl (though not as extreme as some here) but I am trying to become more of a morning lark. It's a morning lark world. In a way I resent having to try to change this part of my personality.

One reason I am trying to change is so I can start a home exercise program before work. I know myself--I'll never do it if I don't get it out of the way first thing--because I basically hate almost all forms of exercise, even though I feel better physically afterward. (Is it possible my brain doesn't make exercise endorphins?)

My sleep difficulties have interfered with my life for years. One reason I have stayed in my current job, the one I have a hate-love relationship with, is that I'm able to take a nap when I need one. Some days I wouldn't be able to get my work done or even function without the nap. Another plus is that I have some flexibility in my starting time, so normally I don't start until 10am.

I'm currently reading books about sleeping and sleep disorders. They all seem to agree on one thing--America is sleep deprived and pays dearly for it.

Originally posted by Dynamitrios
I never would like to miss a rising sun above the aegean sea . . . .

I too love to see a beautiful sunrise before I go to sleep.