So, how do you sleep?
 

What are your sleep habits? Got any funny quirks? I've got plenty!

I MUST read at least a few pages, but usually for 30-90 minutes, before I can fall asleep.
I use a baby noise-machine, set to chirping crickets and croaking frogs.
I can NOT put my feet out from under the covers just in case something were to grab them from under the bed.
I can NOT sleep with my hands uncovered because I had a cat for nearly a dozen years who would suck my fingers if they were in his reach.
My ears must be covered, either by my hair or blankets.
I MUST sleep with a king size pillow, one corner under my head, the length of the pillow against my body and the other corner between my knees (bad hip).
If I dream of water, I had better wake up and go tinkle...or I'll pee the bed. Haven't wet the bed since grade school and I learned this trick, but having a water dream (water, snow, glass of water, ocean, ice, fishbowl, fog, swimming, boating, lakes, rain, streams, if there is water in ANY form...) means I need to get up and go to the bathroom. I wake up whenever I dream of water.
If I set the alarm, I always wake up 10-7 minutes before it goes off, no matter what time(s) it is set for. I cannot STAND to be startled awake. I can even do this if Hubby sets the alarm. I must hear a 'tick' or something as it prepares to go off.
I sleep pretty still. R-side or L-side with no rolling around. Sometimes the kitty will sleep against my chest and push me onto my back, but I never move myself unless I wake up and change positions.
I cannot fall asleep if people are talking/singing and I can hear the words (tv or radio) because I will stay awake to 'listen'.
I have to check the time before I fall asleep so I can keep track of how long I sleep between waking.

I must have one leg straight and one leg bent.
I must have one arm under my pillow and one out.
I must have my TV on because I am afraid of the dark......still.
I always look around my head and nearby walls a few times before I can sleep to make sure there are no spiders lurking in the dark.
I must have my soft green blanket from Wal*Mart to sleep...and yes it does go EVERYWHERE with me.

I generally sleep with my legs slightly bent, sometimes with them elevated on a pillow. I also regularly stick my left out of the covers and put it on top of the bed.

Before I go to bed, I usually put my CPAP mask on and turn my alarm on. I can sleep with or without a TV on, but I usually just turn it off since the noise from the CPAP blocks out the TV.

Not well.

I usually just fall asleep because I'm friggin exhausted. But if MB's away, or if I'm away, I'll read until the wee hours...and drift off (with the damn light on). Thankfully, I'm not in that situation very often.

I toss and turn at night, so I don't have any particular position.
I sleep lightly and wake at the slightest sound.
I can't sleep if I can hear any noise, so if there is noise, I put ear plugs in. These tend to get a bit hurty after a couple of hours and wake me up though. Usually by then whatever noise was bothering me has stopped though, so I can go back to sleep.
I always read before going to sleep. If I don't read, I don't sleep.
As I'm getting older, I'm finding I need less and less sleep, although right atm I haven't had enough due to sick kids.
I need a new mattress. Maybe I'll stop tossing at night when that happens.

I must be tired.
Otherwise I won't sleep.

I just sleep. Tired, not tired, noise, no noise. Not even light levels really affect me. I'll just sleep through it all. However, if something changes rapidly, like someone flicking on lights, or people talking, I'll wake up really fast.

Restlessly. Toss and turn, but I don't sleep on my back. Curled up on my side or on my stomach with one leg bent. I kind of look like I'm doing that Karate Kid thing. Lots of dreams so I wake up a lot. Light doesn't bother me. Noise might wake me.

My ex b/f always said I could sleep on a rock. He's probably right. When I lived in my old apartment I got used to sleeping on the floor in front of the TV after I broke my arm. It was the only place I could sleep for a long time because I had to prop my arm up, then I just got used to it.

I'm just now learning the art of falling asleep without the TV on. [Read: :doit: or http://dormirsinllorar.com/foro/images/smiles/23.gif. Mostly :doit:]

As long as I'm not spooning with my hunny, I prefer my right knee bent, left leg straight, on my back to fall asleep. Eventually, I end up on my side in a fetal position.

Sometimes I sleep with my head under my pillow. Not because it's too light, but just because it feels good. Usually I have an upper back or neck ache that instigates this.

I have to sleep with something covering me - a sheet at minimum. Even during the weeks without power following the hurricanes in 05-06, and it was 94 at night and muggy with no a/c and the windows boarded up, had to have that sheet. And if the feet were ever to left uncovered, I'm quite sure after 31 years in this world, that something would surely nibble on them.

I sleep like a freakin rock. Nukes wouldn't wake me up (although my daughter rolling over in bed across the house will). My mom and brother are the same way. My brother has three alarm clocks and sleeps through all three of them going off at the same time. I'm not quite that bad.

I carry on conversations in my sleep. Sometimes it's talking in my sleep... sometimes I actually carry on entire, rational conversations with eyes open, appearing to be awake and alert to others. I remember none of it.

My hands have minds of their own when I sleep. I always have to one hand touching my bedmate. Usually I stick a hand in the waistband of his drawers (if he's wearing them), or slide a hand under his torso. I kinda wedge my hand anywhere I can. The Man tells me that when he comes back to bed after a midnight pee, my hand is roaming all over, searching the bed for him.

Every night is different. Some nights I sleep soundly all night long. Some nights I'm sleeping lightly and toss and turn. Last night I was hot and didn't sleep very well.

I like to sleep on my stomach, but it eventually hurts my neck so I put one pillow under my left shoulder to raise it up and take some of the strain off my neck.

As I get older, I'm thinking we need to get rid of this double bed and get a King sized one. We'd probably both sleep better. If she tosses and turns, it wakes me up, and vice versa. Can be hard to get back to sleep.

i got used to sleeping with a body pillow now i can't sleep without one.

I need a noisemaker, and either a window open and fan on, or an a/c (not C/A, its not noisy or windy enough). I like to on my stomach, or on my left side with several pillows. I take personal offense to being awakened by snoring and have a tendency toward physical violence in these situations.

You probably just have a good biological sense of time. My father is like that. He hasn't bothered to set an alarm clock for as long as I can remember. He just stops for a moment before falling asleep, and considers what time it is and what time he has to get up, and he wakes up on time, even if he's not fully rested. It's insane.

Me, I toss and turn. I wake up at least 5-6 times a night. Always have. There was a period several years ago where I was on a particular medication that had side effects of deep sleep and very vivid dreams. It was so incredibly disorienting to wake up and find that it was morning already.

I use many pillows--like 7, placed all around my body, and sometimes on top of my head.

I use a fan and/or a white noise generator.

I sleep like the proverbial stick of wood.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz . . .

Hi Cloud! You've been missed.

Uuuh- my husband caught me sleep walking again. It's back...... I was feeling like I wasn't well rested even though I'm my usual dead tired......Aparently he caught me standing at the front door looking out. (it's mostly glass) How creepy. He thought I got up to go to the bathroom and he had to go....so he waited and waited until he found me staring out of the front door window...he was good and led me back to bed. That creeps me out. Because I have no recollection of it.

I usually fall asleep to Colbert at 9:30 and get to the bed one way or the other.....

I sleep weird.

.

Start out on my back, feet sticking out from under the covers (my feet are usually too hot, at least in summer). At some point I turn over and sleep on my stomach. Critters sometimes nibble on my fingers; I move my hands under the covers if they wake me up.
We finally got a ceiling fan two years ago -- I find it very hard to sleep without moving air (unless it's the dead of winter). We also got a latex foam mattress after our old inner-spring jobbie died -- it's infinitely better, and will last 20+ years.
Oh, and I wear scrubs as PJs.

oh, yeah, forgot to add:

nakie. always.

I think it's interesting that those noise maker things are common place over there.

I don't know anyone here that uses one.

Ibram, you're too young to be a peeping tom. How'd'you get that pic of me asleep?

Sleep is a pretty simple and straightforward thing for me. I have a fairly solid and consistent internal clock; I get tired about the same time each night and hit the sack. I toss and turn quite a bit in my sleep (I always have done so), and I alternate between sleeping on my back or side. I sleep through most noises, but have troubles getting back to sleep if something does wake me. Getting up with the alarm has never been a problem, and for the past few years I've been one of those 'wake five minutes before the alarm' types.

Music, all night, is a must. Music goes off, I wake up. Pissed.

Also use the G-Force Visualizer plugin for iTunes, which is fun to trip out and/or meditate to before I pass out.

Sometimes I can't sleep without checking the cellar. no joke. I lay there and toss and turn until I make sure there arent any new cellar posts.

I start on my back, roll to the right, shift to lay on my stomach, at which time my lower back will start hurting, flip to my left side and then to my back again. The room needs to be cold, cause I like a lot of covers (i so love the winter time), and I need some type of noise (not crickets, i would go insane and not a ceiling fan cause i can hear the repetitive whirling noise, like if it's off balance). And my toes stick out from underneath the covers too - it's like i'm trapped or something.

Like a baby. The guilt doesn't get to me at all ...

oh. you meant something else.

I am an unruly sleeper, front, back, sides, sprawly.

My kind of thread...

1. Rarely have a problem sleeping. Go to bed, close my eyes and the next thing I know that freaking alarm clock is going off.
2. I like to channel surf through all the stations first. I am glad I don't get very many channels on the TV in the bedroom.
3. Side sleeper. One arm under pillow and one wherever.
4. One foot out from under the covers.
5. With a fan on. I must have the noise.

I'm one of those people that can fall asleep almost at will. Not bragging, just a fact.

The Way:

1. Always sleep on my left side.
2. A body pillow, keeping my legs and arms from actually touching one another
3. A pillow under my hands
4. A seperate pillow in between my feet
5. A pillow on the small of my back
6. A pillow under my head
7. Complete silence and darkness.

Hoof Hearted--have you tried the "sun" type of alarm clock, which wakes you up with a gradually increasing light? Totally non-startling.

Aliantha--white noise generators are great! A fan will do in a pinch (and I like the movement of the air).

There has to be some kind of noise!
 

Dr. Jeffrey Thompson's Ambient Music for Sleep was supposedly "developed over 15 years of clinical research" ...I like the way it sounds.

When I do feel the need to have something play me to sleep, I have several drumming CDs and a couple environments CDs — wolves in a forest, two different thunderstorms, and waves at the beach.

Waves at the beach is the least successful.

Drumming is nice. The repetitive patterns are soothing, like a mantra. If my daughter is being fussy and not wanting to go to bed, I can hold her while I play the drums (lightly, with little bundles of dowel rods) and she goes right to nighty-night.

I've recently started experimenting with having a Terry Bozzio CD playing very low in her room at night. We also have a CD for babies with various types of white noise, such as vacuum cleaners and hair dryers.

I use drums, in a different way, to calm my mind down while I'm trying to get to sleep. I imagine playing the drums, visualizing it as well, sometimes I add a bass guitar, so I can play figures against an ostinato. I actually learn how to play new things this way (when I actually sit down at a drumset, my limbs already know how to play the pattern).

kind of off topic, but I'd be interested in recommendations of some good drum cds to listen to

I sleep on my left side with a knee digging into my back. all night. i never move once.


actually, I can sleep wherever, whenever, within 3 minutes. wanna race? I'll pass out on yer ass.

but i snore like a big fat loud ass snoring jerk. come stay over sometime. you can sleep at the other end of the house. I'll still keep your ass awake.

The neighbor across the street gave me the finger this morning. fuck him.

I'm kinda p'ticular about my sleeping arrangements.

I finally found the perfect body pillow for my head, another one with a center support disc that goes between my knees, and a random pillow to go behind me.

I mostly sleep on my right side and ALWAYS on the left side of the bed.

I have my right arm under the pillow sticking straight out over the edge of the bed. My right leg is straight and the left is bent. I switch sides regularly, thus the need for the pillow behind me, as I cannot sleep without a pillow between my knees. My back begins to spasm and wakes me up, if I don't keep my spine straight.

I cannot sleep in total darkness or silence. My thoughts begin to race and tumble and the spots behind my eyelids drive me nuts. I sleep with the TV on all night, but the program can't be too interesting or too boring. If it's too boring (like an infomercial), it will piss my subconcious off and I'll wake up. If it's too interesting, it will keep my consious mind alert and I won't drift off. I've found that TNT programs like Law and Order and X-Files are perfect. Before I go to sleep, I actually go through the TV on-screen guide and pre-program my shows for the entire night until the morning news, to ensure maximum sleepability.

I need it to be cold. I have to have a quilt over me, covering my feet and up to my chin. It has to be tucked behind my back so no air can drift down my spine. I sleep in satin jammies or a t-shirt now that I have children. It used to be nekkid.

If I wake up during the night, I cannot go back to sleep unless I have a drag off a cig. I have to go out on the porch in the dead of night, light up for one drag, then head back to bed.

I have three alarms which I rotate. They all have different sounds because I become immune to the current one and eventually it stops waking me up.

I used to function great on 4-5 hours sleep a night, now I need a minimum of 7. Getting old, I guess.

I love having my 2yr old curled up next to me, but not my partner. He is a hotwater heater and sweats a lot, makes me itchy and uncomfortable.

If I lie down for a nap, I don't need a wakeup call. I automatically wake up after 1 hour, on the nose (as long as the kids are quiet enough for me to fall asleep).

I drowse more than I actually sleep - I'm in an eternal search for the coolest side of the pillow.

Shittly, unless my coma is drug induced.

I take a mixture of drugs and rotate them out so that I dont get immune to them.

I sleep on my stomach in a cold bedroom with the fan on, I have to have noise. The kids wake me up when they cough, but the drugs let me fall back asleep.

Often I wake up in the early hours and just think and think and think....it drives me nuts.

I only need 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep to function, but usually average 6 :)

lol@ lj


I sleep very well thank you.

I do tend to wake at 6am even if I don't get to sleep until 12 or so and that is sometimes annoying.

My average is 6 hours too ducks. I like 8.

i am a dysfunctional sleeper........

i used to have great trouble getting to sleep, and i still do but it's getting better. I could be dead tired from sport or work or whatever but i have an inability to turn my brain off so will lay there awake until my noggin winds down. When i was 19-23 this was a nightmare. I would go to bed at 9.30 and get up at 6.30 and only have 4-5 hours sleep. Concequently i would fall asleep at my desk, i would sneak off to the toilets for a nap, or i would tell my boss that i was going for a nap and sleep out the back warehouse on the floor on my lunchbreak. Thank fuck this is getting better and that only happens once a week or so now.

I love powernaps too. I can be stuffed and barely functioning i'm so tired, but if i have a 5 min powernap im good to go again. Love 'em.

Aside from that im a prety good sleeper. Sleep on my sdie and turn over a few times a night. If i have nothing on the next day (or if the wife is working on the weekend) then i am known to sleep until 2.30 or 3pm with no trouble.

However my wife is a freak who has a resting body temperature that is very close to the surface of the sun, she also likes to talk.......and i mean TALK, in her sleep. Giggles, yells, she even calls the frigging dogs up onto the bed in her sleep! This is done on a nightly basis so some nights in my household can be interesting. She moves around a lot as well, throws arms and legs all over the place. I often find myself sleeping as close to the edge of our bed as can be as she has taken over. Now she's pregnant and got one of those big body pillow things she has pretty much claimed the whole bed as her domain......

......damn those doggy beds sure look comfy.......

Spare Room Silk, spare room!!

we're moving house shortly so there spare bedrooms full of crap - but don't worry i've already thought of it.

she wonders why i stay up late on the weekend watching TV - i get a better sleep on the couch then i do in bed!