Sleep vs. Time in the Saddle
 

Kind of an extremely amazing thing for me right now - I just woke up from two nights in a row of getting a solid, virtually uninterrupted night's sleep. And it was the 4th or 5th night of significantly better than average sleep. In my case, this cocktail of medications I've started seems to be kicking in; normalizing my ability to sleep seems to be a sign that the balance of various neurotransmitters is improving. Ironic I was so ashamed a few months back to even take these prescriptions to my pharmacy. Seems to be helping in various ways. I always thought of depression as basically staying in bed or sitting around, doing nothing. I guess I was significantly deeper into it than I thought - very active but unable to do many things that required higher brain function. I explained it like this to someone - throw a chainsaw at me and tell me to go out and take down and clean up a tree, no problem; throw a pile of financial records in front of me and ask me to do a fiduciary accounting and a 1041 and I just couldn't -inability to focus on something which takes mental acuity made me get very frustrated and rapidly fail, which lead to anxiety, guilt, shame.

Ordinarily, I look at sleep as the enemy, because I always have so much on my plate, but this actually feels really good. A big change. I've had insomnia for years, so I've gotten used to not fighting it and doing something, either physical like riding or going to the gym to swim, or catching up on work. Then I have to fight to stay alert at work in the afternoon some days.

The down side, I haven't been on a bike for 8 days. Right now, I think sleep is more beneficial overall. I don't feel bad about that. There is a lot of validity in the old saying that life is a marathon, not a sprint.

I really want to get back on a planned training regimen, back to riding road/tri rather than just a hybrid on MUPs. I may need to adjust some other things to do that.

However, change can bring opportunity, even where not expected. Roads here are notoriously terrible, so finding smooth asphalt is a challenge. But, I work in a very large office complex that is probably a third of a mile long X a quarter wide - and in the last phases of a total, month's long replacement of all asphalt in all of the parking lots - took it down to bare soil and rebuilt it all. A very signifcant expanse of pristine asphalt and virtually no one around after 6 pm or weekend - throw bike and gear in car, ride an hour or so after work a few nights a week.

Just wondered, anyone else have sleep issues? How do you deal with it, and how do you work cycling in and balance it with your need to sleep?

I walk, bicycle and swim. It greatly helps my sleep. In fact, without that exercise daily, I do not sleep well. In my case, it is not sleep vs. saddle time (exercise). They complement each other.

Moved from 50s to General

This is totally me too - my body is so accustomed to the daily workouts I give it that I dont sleep well if for some reason I cant do it. Funny how your body becomes so used to being worked out.

Don't look at it as sleep versus time in the saddle. Both are necessary. Framing it in that manner is like framing "food versus breathing."

The older I get the more I am realize the importance of getting enough sleep. I have to make a conscious effort sometimes to ensure I am able to get to bed at around the same time so I can get my 7.25 hours. When you are sleeping well you it goes unnoticed because everything just works and works well. You are able to fight off infection because your immune system is strong. Your training is great because you are able to recover. But it's when you don't get good sleep that you notice, and it's mostly bad.

No reason you can't get good sleep and ride. If you one is interfering with the other, you've got too much stuff on your plate.

I've been using a phone app with thunderstorm sounds to help me sleep. Drowns out all the little noises that keep me awake. It has a timer if you don't want it to run all night, it's pretty cool. There's a bunch of different free ones.

https://play.google.com/store/search...p&c=apps&hl=en

White noise is a great idea. My own kids still sleep with either a humidifier or air cleaner in their rooms for the white noise. But they've been used to it since they were babies.

I have an air purifier next to my bed that I had been using while I slept. But those things really run up the electric bill.

my schedule is so busy it really does boil down to cycle or sleep. i choose cycle.

sleep? ive heard about it..

Riding is like coffee for me. Best way to keep me awake all night is a nighttime bike ride. Which I've had to do recently because of the 100+F weather.

If I can't get out at dawn there's no point in riding until near sunset. Tried it last Monday, really overdid it on a four hour midday ride. Had to take a few days off, other than easy 20-30 minute cruises around the block to stretch my legs.

So if I plan to sleep I need to skip the bike rides, at least the late day or early evening rides.

Nowadays, no matter what time I go to bed, if I can sleep past 6:30am I consider it a personal achievement. In bed by 10pm, up before six. In bed by 2am, up before six. It's a less than optimal situation, but hey... nobody ever told me getting old would be fun.

Sleep is definitely NOT the enemy. Sleep is good! I get as much of it as I can squeeze in.

I find that exercising, especially cycling, helps me sleep quickly and deeply at night. If I go a couple days without exertion, I end up with a light and restless night's sleep.

I also find that if I'm going to have any hope of doing a long, long distance well, I need to get some decent sleep in the night before the ride or preferably for several nights before the ride.

Cycling is what I did to help me sleep.

I used to work in law enforcement as a THI investigator in a major US city. My very first call was to an accident involving a 6 or 7 year old boy who had been run over and killed by a car while riding his bicycle. When there were no accidents to clean up, I backed up the patrol officers, and as our district was part of the inner-city, that was busy too. Having bills to pay, and wanting more than I could afford on my basic salary, I worked as much overtime as I could, usually doing 12 hours a day, 6 days a week.

I don't recommend law enforcement as a career to anyone except those who are simple, and not very imaginative. My job made me angry, depressed, excited, and disgusted. I couldn't fall asleep at night, and I couldn't wake up in the morning without a great deal of willpower. In my nearly ten years on the job, I was never late by even a minute, and, remarkably, never missed a day, mainly because the more I worked, the more I earned. But it seriously wears on you.

I had done a lot of cycling in my school years, and returned to it by chance a few years after I started working in law enforcement. I forced myself to get out of bed two hours earlier, and to ride two or three hours on my day off, and it changed my life. Cycling improved my physical and mental well-being in ways that no medication could.

I began riding more, and working less. I moved to the normal four day, ten hour schedule, and rode as much as I could in the mornings, and on my days off. I then started commuting the 30km to and from work. On weekends I joined group rides, and met a lot of interesting people.

Being an aggressive person (the Infantry and law enforcement can do that to you), I hated to be passed in competitive rides, and I pushed myself hard to keep up, and keep ahead when possible. I was lucky enough to meet some mid-level racers, and we began to ride together regularly, it was a blast. I began competing in small races, and did well enough that they were able to get me a spot on their team.

While competing around the region (I began taking time off from work to do this), I met more people, and began competing in more events. This led to a summer racing in southern Europe (my first time outside America), and I decided that the world was too big a place to be investigating car wrecks and chasing dope dealers.

I was too old at the time to take up cycling as a professional career, but cycling made me realize that I could probably do other things which I had not thought possible. I quit my job, moved out of America, and began a new career. I enjoyed the new work, but found that I couldn't afford much on what it paid, so I quit that, and opened a small business.

Now I make a fair amount of money, I can work from home, and I have plenty of time to ride. I just started a family recently, and life is good.

My advice to you would be to stop thinking, and start riding. I used to see death and pain on a nearly daily basis, if you think your job is stressful or depressing, try cleaning up an accident with two or three dead people, and making the calls to their family members, and standing by when they identify the victims at the morgue. I learned to turn my mind away from such things as I would change a tv channel from a show I didn't want to watch.

I have no trouble sleeping nowadays, and no bad dreams.

Sleep has been a real challenge for me for a few years now. Would you care to elaborate at all on what you are taking and what path you've been down to arrive at the cocktail you mention?

In my case I struggle to get to sleep and there seems to be no quality to the sleep. I'm not taking anything - no drugs, no alcohol, no supplements - but I wake groggy and tired and there is no feeling of restorative power to the sleep I get.

You are a prime candidate for having a sleep apnea test done, if you haven't already. Your symptoms are pretty close. Discuss with your Doc.

I am 52 and use a white noise machine. I have become addicted to it that if I am staying in a hotel and there isn't an a.c. unit with a fan I can out on I get annoyed.


As for getting up, my ex dubbed me "Dave in the box" because I spring to life when it's time to get up, at least on the weekends. ;)

Been to THREE "sleep" doctors including the head of the local hospital's sleep center. All completely useless. All want to babble on at you about sleep "hygiene" and caffeine and so on while not really listening to what you're telling them. Sleep study in the lab is pointless for someone who can not sleep on a "normal" schedule and nobody has offered any alternative for in home.

There is a home unit to test for SA. I have your same problem - can't sleep during sleep test. I told them no more and lost a lot of weight which solved my problem.

Sure, but probably not quite what you may have had in mind. This thead was moved from another forum (50+) where regulars would know what I meant without the back story being written, since they already know it.

I was disgnosed with dysthymia, a form of depression, along with ptsd about 3 months ago - the "path" was basically becoming less and less functional with certain things, work etc. So I'm on an SSRI, a mood stabilizer which is "off label" but the MD has found it helps some of her patients with trauma disorders, and for about 2 weeks now something called Wellbutrin, which increases levels of dopamine and norepinephrine. Whether the change is neurochemical, psychological or some of both, I can't say, but it is better - nice to be able to get into deep REM sleep and also fall back to sleep if I do wake up. Specifically it's fluoxetine 40 mg, lamotrigine 300 mg and now bupropion 15 mg (? that last may not be right #, I can't recall right now).

I'm not medically trained at all, so all I could suggested would be to pursue possible causes with the appropriate doctor(s) - which you have done, sorry you have found no answers to date.

All very true. I stated that really poorly. Sleep per se is great when it's needed. My enemy is the unproductive time spent trying to get to sleep, stay asleep, or go back to sleep when I just can't make my mind and body cooperate. That is the wasted time and frustration.

Exercise does help, especially in the fresh air. I would actually be a lot better off if I could make myself ride before trying to get some sleep, but usually so wiped out I can't. So I ride after a partial night's sleep, 2-3-4 AM, then COULD probably sleep better - but then I have to go to work or start my weekend list of "to do's".

First, rule out an organic cause such as thyroid issue, depression, stress, blood pressure. Then onto habits near bedtime such as exercise, medications, foods, caffeine, etc.

Get whatever amount of sleep that works for one's self. I will be hitting the sack in about 2.5 hours, 10PM, and should wake up around 12:30/1:00AM then be out the door between 2/2:30AM to start a 100+ miler. Slow and easy 15/16mph average with a couple of stops and possible joining up with the Tuesday morning group ride. Then home for yard work, house cleaning and BF. ;0) Got to then grab another few hours of sleep and out the door at 12:01AM Wednesday morning for my 100 mile Pete Cornell Memorial Ride. Maybe 4 or 5 hours of sleep before Thursday's 100 miler. Ever since I bicycle crashed in 2011 my sleep cycle has been shortened and I just don't often sleep for a 5 to 6 hour length of time.

I'll stop complaining now.