I started polyphasic sleep in 2010, and started with Uberman and E3. Uberman wasn’t sustainable for me, but it changed my life for the better, as my mild concentration and depression issues both lifted, and it helped me organise my life better. When I switched to E3 I felt better than when I was either uberman or mono. Since then, following a structured lifestyle, and aiming for health has lead me to making better life choices such as improving my diet and even motivating me to do some cardio! It really was a cascade of events that wouldn’t have started if I had not become a polyphasic sleeper.
I now also have a better understanding about my body, and I have gained some very special skills, mental and spiritual. I simply have a better connection with my mind and my body.
My sleep has improved, obviously, I can nap whenever it is appropriate now and I wake up feeling refreshed so my energy levels are better throughout the day.
Since this post, I have been polyphasic in some form or another for almost 2 years now, and if I stay in control I will never go back to monophasic sleep.
So here’s my story… I’m on E3 since 2012.12.06. At first it seemed really easy. I guess being all excited about the whole thing made it seem easy too. After a few days I started to feel the lack of sleep. Staying awake after my cores was the hardest. At that time my schedule was: 01:00-04:00, 10:00-10:25, 15:30-15:55, 21:00-21:25. By the end of the first week I had to listen to crazy loud music and sometimes jump around every few minutes to be able to stay awake in the early hours. At that point it seemed like this is not possible, but as I consider myself having a willpower above average I just decided to force myself through it. And after a few weeks it actually started to get better. Here’s a note from day 12 though:
“Also today was the first time I experienced heavy narcholeptic symptoms while not at home. We were at a café with my wife, having a hot choco. Suddenly, my eyes started to close and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop them from doing so and I almost fell asleep sitting there. It was quite scary and I hope this won’t occur to often.”
Well, it did happen after that. Mostly in the cinema and it still happens when we watch a movie not long before my core in the dark laying in bed.
After 3 months I considered myself fully adapted for 1.5 months already. Keeping my schedule wasn’t hard anymore, and I started experimening with moving my naps around and adjusting my core to better fit my current lifestyle. There was one problem that started to surface though. I was gaining weight. And by that I mean 6kg in 2 months. Being awake for 20 hours a day instead of ~15 means I get hungry more times a day. And I got hungry especially after my naps so I really needed to go on a strict diet to stop gaining any more weight. Another interesting thing I noticed is that my resting heart rate went from an average of 75 to 66 (few weeks average), and my blood pressure from 135/78 to 115/60. I read others mention this too so I think it’s related to being on polyphasic somehow. On the social side of things after 3 months finally not all get-togethers were all about me and polyphasic. By this time I explained it to everyone in my family, my wife’s family and to most of our friends. I was glad, because although at first it was fun being in the center of attention, telling the same thing over and over again started to get boring
After 6 months polyphasic was already my default lifestyle so it felt as I never did anything else. I changed my schedule to: 11:30-03:00, 06:00-06:25, 13:00-13:25, 20:00-20:25. Mostly because this way I’m able to go to bed with my wife. I still had extra sleeps for quite some time (falling asleep on the sofa) every now and then, but only after my core. Mostly when at 3 am I am sitting there, having nothing to do and not feeling energized enough to start working. I was fine with this, but I didn’t feel more rested afterwards though. On the contrary, usually I felt more tired during the day after these extra sleeps. So if you think you’ll add some extra sleep every weekend, don’t do it. It’ll make adaptation harder, and it won’t give you any benfits later on either. By this time the morning sleepyness is completely gone. In fact, I’m able to do 1-2h of active programming or anything without dozing off (by drinking a cup of coffee after waking up, which I DO NOT RECOMMEND! At least if you’re not already on your schedule for 6+ months). I also can move my naps around anyway I want if my day requires me to as long as I have 3 of them during the day. I keep at least 3 hours between them and never tried being awake for more the 9 hours straight though. I’m not sure if I could actually. Moving my naps around when necessary has no noticeable effect at all. Of course I stay on schedule when there’s nothing important going on.
Nowadays my naps are like this:
morning naps are 50%+ REM
daytime naps are ~80% light sleep, with a little REM, but more often SWS
evening naps are 50%+ SWS
My cores on average on almost every day have ~1h REM and ~1h SWS. Sometimes (like yesterday I get 1h REM but 1.5h SWS). And for example today I had 1:07 REM, 1:07 SWS, 1:07 Light sleep. Call that even distribution ha! 🙂
Overall, I’m very happy with polyphasic lifestyle, and I’m not planning to go back to monophasic as long as I don’t have to. Many people told me that this can’t be healthy and what if it’ll have negative effects on the long run. Well, here’s my answer to that: By being on polyphasic, I get one extra waking hour for every four hours of the day compared to when I was being monophasic. So after 4 months I get 1 month extra. I can think of 3 outcomes for my future.
1: For everybody there’s a chance of dieing in some kind of accident. If that ever happened to me anytime soon, I can tell that I lived more than if I was sleeping monophasic.
2: If I’m lucky enough not to have any fatal accidents, but I get Alzheimer’s, or live 10-15 years less because polyphasic, I’m still fine with that. And the reason for that is I’m sure if you ask any 60 years old if he/she would like to live 10 more years as 25 years old, and then die rahter than living 20 years as 60-80 years old, most of them would say yes without thinking. And that’s what I’m doing right now. If polyphasic proves to be harmful on the long run I still traded my being old, weak, sick, medicine-taking, being on pain the whole day, hard moving, doctor visiting days to young, healthy and fun-having days. Even if not trading them on a 1:1 ratio, I still think it’s a great deal.
3: If polyphasic proves to have no negative effects or only minor ones, or even to be actually more healthy than monophasic, I won big time!
So here you go, I hope you liked it, share your story too!
Polyphasic Society 
I started polyphasic sleep in 2010, and started with Uberman and E3. Uberman wasn’t sustainable for me, but it changed my life for the better, as my mild concentration and depression issues both lifted, and it helped me organise my life better. When I switched to E3 I felt better than when I was either uberman or mono. Since then, following a structured lifestyle, and aiming for health has lead me to making better life choices such as improving my diet and even motivating me to do some cardio! It really was a cascade of events that wouldn’t have started if I had not become a polyphasic sleeper.
I now also have a better understanding about my body, and I have gained some very special skills, mental and spiritual. I simply have a better connection with my mind and my body.
My sleep has improved, obviously, I can nap whenever it is appropriate now and I wake up feeling refreshed so my energy levels are better throughout the day.
Since this post, I have been polyphasic in some form or another for almost 2 years now, and if I stay in control I will never go back to monophasic sleep.
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Hey guys,
So here’s my story… I’m on E3 since 2012.12.06. At first it seemed really easy. I guess being all excited about the whole thing made it seem easy too. After a few days I started to feel the lack of sleep. Staying awake after my cores was the hardest. At that time my schedule was: 01:00-04:00, 10:00-10:25, 15:30-15:55, 21:00-21:25. By the end of the first week I had to listen to crazy loud music and sometimes jump around every few minutes to be able to stay awake in the early hours. At that point it seemed like this is not possible, but as I consider myself having a willpower above average I just decided to force myself through it. And after a few weeks it actually started to get better. Here’s a note from day 12 though:
“Also today was the first time I experienced heavy narcholeptic symptoms while not at home. We were at a café with my wife, having a hot choco. Suddenly, my eyes started to close and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t stop them from doing so and I almost fell asleep sitting there. It was quite scary and I hope this won’t occur to often.”
Well, it did happen after that. Mostly in the cinema and it still happens when we watch a movie not long before my core in the dark laying in bed.
After 3 months I considered myself fully adapted for 1.5 months already. Keeping my schedule wasn’t hard anymore, and I started experimening with moving my naps around and adjusting my core to better fit my current lifestyle. There was one problem that started to surface though. I was gaining weight. And by that I mean 6kg in 2 months. Being awake for 20 hours a day instead of ~15 means I get hungry more times a day. And I got hungry especially after my naps so I really needed to go on a strict diet to stop gaining any more weight. Another interesting thing I noticed is that my resting heart rate went from an average of 75 to 66 (few weeks average), and my blood pressure from 135/78 to 115/60. I read others mention this too so I think it’s related to being on polyphasic somehow. On the social side of things after 3 months finally not all get-togethers were all about me and polyphasic. By this time I explained it to everyone in my family, my wife’s family and to most of our friends. I was glad, because although at first it was fun being in the center of attention, telling the same thing over and over again started to get boring
After 6 months polyphasic was already my default lifestyle so it felt as I never did anything else. I changed my schedule to: 11:30-03:00, 06:00-06:25, 13:00-13:25, 20:00-20:25. Mostly because this way I’m able to go to bed with my wife. I still had extra sleeps for quite some time (falling asleep on the sofa) every now and then, but only after my core. Mostly when at 3 am I am sitting there, having nothing to do and not feeling energized enough to start working. I was fine with this, but I didn’t feel more rested afterwards though. On the contrary, usually I felt more tired during the day after these extra sleeps. So if you think you’ll add some extra sleep every weekend, don’t do it. It’ll make adaptation harder, and it won’t give you any benfits later on either. By this time the morning sleepyness is completely gone. In fact, I’m able to do 1-2h of active programming or anything without dozing off (by drinking a cup of coffee after waking up, which I DO NOT RECOMMEND! At least if you’re not already on your schedule for 6+ months). I also can move my naps around anyway I want if my day requires me to as long as I have 3 of them during the day. I keep at least 3 hours between them and never tried being awake for more the 9 hours straight though. I’m not sure if I could actually. Moving my naps around when necessary has no noticeable effect at all. Of course I stay on schedule when there’s nothing important going on.
Nowadays my naps are like this:
morning naps are 50%+ REM
daytime naps are ~80% light sleep, with a little REM, but more often SWS
evening naps are 50%+ SWS
My cores on average on almost every day have ~1h REM and ~1h SWS. Sometimes (like yesterday I get 1h REM but 1.5h SWS). And for example today I had 1:07 REM, 1:07 SWS, 1:07 Light sleep. Call that even distribution ha! 🙂
Overall, I’m very happy with polyphasic lifestyle, and I’m not planning to go back to monophasic as long as I don’t have to. Many people told me that this can’t be healthy and what if it’ll have negative effects on the long run. Well, here’s my answer to that: By being on polyphasic, I get one extra waking hour for every four hours of the day compared to when I was being monophasic. So after 4 months I get 1 month extra. I can think of 3 outcomes for my future.
1: For everybody there’s a chance of dieing in some kind of accident. If that ever happened to me anytime soon, I can tell that I lived more than if I was sleeping monophasic.
2: If I’m lucky enough not to have any fatal accidents, but I get Alzheimer’s, or live 10-15 years less because polyphasic, I’m still fine with that. And the reason for that is I’m sure if you ask any 60 years old if he/she would like to live 10 more years as 25 years old, and then die rahter than living 20 years as 60-80 years old, most of them would say yes without thinking. And that’s what I’m doing right now. If polyphasic proves to be harmful on the long run I still traded my being old, weak, sick, medicine-taking, being on pain the whole day, hard moving, doctor visiting days to young, healthy and fun-having days. Even if not trading them on a 1:1 ratio, I still think it’s a great deal.
3: If polyphasic proves to have no negative effects or only minor ones, or even to be actually more healthy than monophasic, I won big time!
So here you go, I hope you liked it, share your story too!
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