Some people have trouble waking up, beating their snooze alarm like an alcoholic dad treated a petulant child in the 1950’s. I, on the other hand, have a nasty habit of waking up and not being able to fall back asleep. My alarm goes off once, I’m awake. It doesn’t matter if it’s 4 AM, once consciousness has set in, there’s no going back. Which is why, there is nothing more frustrating to me than waking up a half-hour before my alarm on a weekday.
What am I supposed to do with that half-hour? Try to fall back asleep? it won’t work. Maybe I can take that half-hour to learn a new language? Perfect my dance moves? It’s not like it happens with regularity so that I can schedule something. It’s just a half-hour spent lamenting that I’m not sleeping.
Waking up a half-hour before your alarm is like pouring a bowl of cereal and only after taking the first bite finding out the milk is bad. Ten minutes before the alarm isn’t as bad, you don’t lose that much sleep, it’s just sort of a jump start on the day. But 20-30 minutes is like being robbed of a power-nap.
Have you ever had a crush? Someone that you pined for over years but couldn’t get up the nerve to ask on a date or even attempt to have a conversation and then you find yourself suddenly stuck in a confined space and you realize this idealized person has just aggressive B.O.? Or maybe you even fall in love with someone, then suddenly, a month after you start dating, that person suddenly and casually, as an aside like everyone agrees, that “9/11 is an inside job and blah blah blah something about the Jews.” That’s exactly what it’s like to wake up a half-hour before your alarm.
You save up for months and months, planned, called AAA and gotten maps and travel tips, learned a new language, used your miles to upgrade to first class, then get to your upgraded suite at the 5-star hotel, only to realize that there’s only a twin bed and you get bed bugs and it rains during your entire vacation and you get food poisoning and while you’re trying to sleep it off the room next to you is having a Furry orgy and they all try to stay in character by screaming animal things in high-pitched voices. That’s what it’s like to wake up a half-hour before your alarm. At least to me, not sure how it is for the rest of you. But I have to imagine it’s similar.
The ultimate message here is: screw you, my stupid, mean, vindictive, passive aggressive brain.
Strangely Naked 
My cat used to do that to me. Well, first two hours before I had to get up, but then again 30 minutes before. It’s hard to fall back asleep from kitty aggressively scratching at the sheets on my body to get under them. You just keep digging, kitty. It’s ok. It’s just skin. It’ll stop bleeding, eventually.
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That’s why you should never check the time when you wake up without the alarm.
What possible good can come of it?
I have an alarm clock (although I use the alarm on my phone, not my clock), and I point the clock away from the bed during the night.
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The time doesn’t really matter, once I wake up, I’m awake, unless it’s 1 AM, which, I’ve woken up at 1 AM before and started getting ready without looking at the clock, arrogantly thinking my internal clock is set to only wake between certain times. Thus, I must look at the clock. Sometimes, the relief that I still have an hour or two allows me to fall back asleep.
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Enough of your First World Problems, tell us more about the Furry orgy.
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I think all you need to know about a Furry orgy is in the name. What else is there…Except maybe getting faux-fur matted on your nether regions?
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Remember, sleep is a living death and I’m with Debra on the Furry orgy.
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I’m the type of asshole that can just fall right back asleep. Doesn’t matter if it’s 30 minutes or 30 seconds till the alarm. I can fall asleep. I can also sleep immediately after drinking coffee and immediately after a full night’s rest. Perhaps I’m narcoleptic.
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Do you also have trouble falling asleep initially? I find that people who fall asleep easily at the start of the night have an issue staying asleep in the morning.
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I’ve had a lot of trouble with my very nervous pup since we had to put her older buddy down. So we finally decided to have her sleep with us last night. She woke me up licking my face about 15 minutes before the alarm. That’s not too bad, I guess, considering that before last night she was in a kennel and cried and howled at 4 am! How about just reflecting on how to have a really positive day at half an hour before the alarm?
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Dogs belong in the bed anyway.
Love,
Janie
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That, uh, could be misinterpreted. Particularly by Furies.
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When I had my weirdo creepy job teaching high school, which lasted about a month but felt like twenty years, I had to get there early. So early. Very early. I wanted to spend time with my dogs before I left, and I needed time for my tummy to settle down so I could leave without getting sick until I made it to the school, which was about fifteen minutes away with no traffic. So I would set my alarm for 5 a.m., but I always woke up at 4 a.m. Even on the weekend, I woke up at 4 a.m. At the moment, it’s 3:40 p.m. I got up about an hour and a half ago. This is the way to work.
Love,
Janie
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You seem to have issues with your brain in the same way I have issues with mine. Scary, huh? Where’s Master Yodel when you need him?
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I have an alarm but I really don’t need it I wake up easy and I am one who likes to get up and dressed as soon as I wake up and get the day started, I don’t like getting up and staying in my pj’s for an hour or more I know people who do but I am not one of them
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For some reason, I wake up at 4:37 every morning and can’t get back to sleep. I like to think its the ghosts of my house going all Amityville on me.
Hugs!
Valerie
http://www.flyingplatypi.com
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My brain does the exact same thing! It’s so annoying. I also hate it on weekends, when I can’t even sleep in like a normal person.
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