Sleep Deprivation and Irregular Sleeping Patterns

Hey everyone, as the title suggests, I have a few questions about sleeping. I work as a tasker at my local mall in the early morning and I was worried about this affecting growth in my body. I have to be at work for 5 in the morning so I usually wake up at around 3:45, make myself some breakfast and pack a lunch and then head off to work. They are only 5 hour shifts but as soon as I get off from work at 10, I have to rush to university to get to my class which starts at 10:30.. After that I finally get home. I was worried in the sense that I'm cutting into when my body usually secretes HGH right in half and in turn and completely missing out on the peak time where most people who would be sleeping would normally grow and recover... I've been doing these shifts for a few months now and usually I'm so tired that when I get home, I eat and take a 1 hour nap to hopefully shake the tiredness off and then study and workout for the rest of the day.

What do you guys think? Will my circadian rhythm adjust to my new schedule and secrete HGH earlier instead? Or am I losing out on a lot of growth? Surprisingly, I actually perform much better on days when I only get 5-7 hours of sleep and I don't know why both at the gym and school. The rare days I do get more than 7 hours I find that I am sluggish and my head is in the clouds. Any of you guys work like this? Just a bit curios... Also, I've talked to my manger and she says that she will try me out for a floor position where I work which has 'normal' hours and longer shifts so I can't wait to get back to a regular sleep pattern.

-Primal

Your body will adjust to your schedule but if you are not getting a minimum 7 hours per night your gains will be very limited at best. The most important things to build muscle are heavy weight, a lot of food, and plenty of rest ie sleep.

P

In the past if I wasn't getting 7 hours a 30-45 min nap after the workout was needed.

Alright that's good, thanks Prae. Like with what cog says, what if I break my sleep up during the day so like I get 6 hours of sleep, work, go to school, eat, train and then nap for 2 hours during the day? Would that count towards getting 8 hours? I'm like a night hawk, yesterday I was dead tired from 3-5 because of my schedule. I forced myslef to stay awake till 8 when I usually get to bed for work and then I couldn't get to bed... I also study better at night too :( teenage sleep problems *sigh*

-Primal

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Primal

Alright that's good, thanks Prae. Like with what cog says, what if I break my sleep up during the day so like I get 6 hours of sleep, work, go to school, eat, train and then nap for 2 hours during the day? Would that count towards getting 8 hours? I'm like a night hawk, yesterday I was dead tired from 3-5 because of my schedule. I forced myslef to stay awake till 8 when I usually get to bed for work and then I couldn't get to bed... I also study better at night too :( teenage sleep problems *sigh*

-Primal

---

Spain and Italy had siesta.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by cog

Spain and Italy had siesta.

---

^^ Haha what??

-Primal

Getting 3-4 hours pf sleep at a time prevents getting any REM sleep which is what actually provides all the recovery benefits of sleep so the answer is no...if you want to be the most productive in life that includes any atlhletic endeavor than you need a period of uninterrupted sleep. Siestas are great in ADDITION to your regular 7-8 hours...teenagers need even more because they are in the hormonal growth phase...this should tell you something!!

P

Alright then I'll really work on getting a solid 7 hours at least a night... I'll also try to get that better floor position at my work which will allow for a reasonable work pattern. Learned what a siesta was today... never knew what that was before!

-Primal