Polyphasic Sleep Long-Term Consequences | | |
One long-term consequence of the polyphasic sleep experiments I did in 2005-2006 is that I still retain the ability to fall asleep very quickly. Enough time has passed that I suspect this is a permanent change. | | |
These days when I decide to go to sleep, I can typically fall asleep within 30 seconds or less. Sometimes I can be asleep within just 2-3 seconds. As Rachelle can attest, this is no exaggeration. | | |
This isn’t narcolepsy. I don’t drift off during the day, and I don’t fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow. Unless I’m unusually super-tired, the decision to sleep is under conscious control. When I decide to sleep, my body falls asleep almost immediately. | | |
This is true for falling asleep at night as well as for taking naps if I so desire. | | |
On many occasions I’ve been startled awake while Rachelle and I were lying in bed together. After we talked for a while, I decided to fall sleep, so I did just that. A few seconds later I’m startled awake by Rachelle, who suddenly started talking again. To her it was just a pause in the conversation lasting only seconds, but for me that was enough time to fall asleep, start dreaming, and be startled awake, clearly remembering the details of my dream. | | |
This sometimes happens 2-3 times in a row. After being startled awake once, I “thank” Rachelle for scaring me, and then I go right back to sleep within seconds. Rachelle mistakenly assumes I’m still awake and makes another verbal comment, which wakes me up yet again. Sometimes she laughs about it, not in a sadistic way but rather in semi-disbelief that I could be falling asleep so quickly. She also finds it amusing. | | |
When this happens a few times in a row, sometimes I’ll re-enter the same dream and continue where I left off, but usually I’ll enter a different dream that doesn’t seem related to the first dream. | | |
There’s a bit of time dilation when I’m dreaming, so I may feel that several minutes have passed in the dream world, while Rachelle tells me that only seconds passed within her waking time frame. | | |
