
The coronavirus pandemic has changed our sleep - polm23
https://jeffhuang.com/covid_sleep/
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peckrob
Anecdotally, I can tell you that I am definitely getting up later. Between not
having to be get my daughter to school by 7:20 and then a 45 minute drive to
the office. I can roll out of bed about 7:45 and still be at my desk by 8ish.

Honestly, work from home has been such a quantum leap in my quality of life.
The fact that I am not spending 1.5 hours in the car every day has given me a
surprising amount of time and energy. I don't dread the alarm clock going off
every morning, and I can do fun things (at least, fun things that are COVID-
safe) after work.

I would be perfectly content to never return to an office. Probably won't
happen, so I'll enjoy it while I can.

~~~
baxtr
Today, for the first time, I went back to the office. It was horrible. I had
to get up earlier. I had to shower before my first meeting. Get entirely
dressed. Walk to the subway. Walk, walk, walk. Just to sit at a desk in an
office with my laptop carried from home. What a waste of time and energy!

PS: yes, it was nice to see some colleagues but I don’t wanna do it more than
once a week. Max!

~~~
watwut
The walking part is healthy through.

~~~
baxtr
Absolutely! My smartwatch was quite happy today. I just wasn’t used to it
anymore I guess :D

~~~
HeyLaughingBoy
For me that's the only drawback. I have a 0.75 mile walk from the bus to work
so it forced me to get a minimum of exercise. Now I have to force myself to go
for daily walks. Luckily I have a 10 year-old who will keep asking until I say
yes.

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herf
It's important when doing these kinds of analyses to consider the effects of
DST.

The first graph in the article depicts April 2, 2019 sleep times vs April 7,
2020. But April 2 was just a day after the time change (Dec 31 2019), while
the 2020 week was eight days after (Dec 29 2020).

How people adjust to the time change, given the ability to sleep in, is a very
interesting topic. But it is different than a description of overall sleep,
and it should be a separate analysis.

~~~
cutchin
Yeah, I came here to say exactly this. I would guess that most people's
schedules are based on wall clock times and DST doesn't matter, but I'm not
really sure.

The author doesn't owe me anything, obviously, but I wish he had included a
graph or two showing the normal variance (if any) over the same timeframe in a
non-epidemic year. Then I'd have a bit more faith in his conclusions.

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annoyingnoob
It has definitely changed the sleep habits of my family. However, I've been
working and in the office as usual the entire time and my sleep habits have
not changed at all. My kids have no reason to get up early and really not much
to do in summer. My wife has been mostly off of work, so she maps to what the
kids are doing. The biggest struggle for me is having everyone stay up late -
I previously had some quiet/alone time in the last hour or so of the day, now
I'm going to bed first on many nights.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
> However, I've been working and in the office as usual the entire time and my
> sleep habits have not changed at all.

Same boat here, can confirm no changes in sleeping patterns. At this point I'm
frankly jealous of people who got laid off during this whole thing because all
it has meant for me is wearing a mask everywhere and my gym being closed long
enough for me to get quite out of shape.

~~~
annoyingnoob
Its a mixed bag. Its hard to watch the family be basically on vacation for
months while I get up and go to work everyday. On the other hand, they have
done everything there is to do around the house a bunch of times and are
mostly bored. When the kids were still in school I'd come home to a frustrated
and pissed off family everyday and I have to sit down and do school work with
the kids so that they would get it done. Home school was a real struggle in my
house.

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mprovost
One nice benefit of working from home due to lockdown is that I haven't set an
alarm in months. I just naturally get up fairly early with the sun now, so
it's pretty unlikely that I'll miss my first 10:00 call.

~~~
tayo42
The home being totally redone next door is my new alarm clock. its terrible to
live next to, all day power tools and hammers going.

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drapery
I am not surprise about the findings that people are sleeping later and
longer. The lack of stimuli from going to work, engaging face to face with
colleagues, and coming home feels a like remote working induced fog.

This feeling reminds me of the Mars500 study where astronauts simulates the
trip to Mars and stays in a capsule for 520 days. The study finds that as
repetitive routine sets in, the crew's mood worsened, as a result, the crew
slept later and longer.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3973648/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3973648/)

~~~
themikesanto
It could also be that people who are working from home are more able to fall
into their body's natural/preferred sleep pattern.

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hx2a
Since the pandemic I started getting up around 6 am without an alarm clock. I
never did that before. A big part of that is I go to bed earlier, as there is
nothing worth staying up late for.

I've found I can focus so much more if I get up early and have been super
productive these past few months. I am going to keep doing this when the
pandemic is over.

~~~
frompdx
> Since the pandemic I started getting up around 6 am without an alarm clock.
> I never did that before. A big part of that is I go to bed earlier, as there
> is nothing worth staying up late for.

I was the same way until daylight hours started getting longer and I found a
good page turner. Before that I was out by 9:30 or 10 and up with the sunrise.

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pkirk
I don't know why, at least consciously, but I've started to sleep less with
the lockdown (italian here): from ~8hrs to ~6hrs, more or less, waking up
fresh&ready. I've also been more energic: I started running and started being
more consistent with the weight training, sometimes both in the same day. Also
lost 6Kg in the last 4 months!

But work has been the same: no increase or loss in productivity. Lockdown
forced WFH, but I used to WFH for years. The only difference is that in the
last 10 months I've been going to the office daily because of a new job,
enjoyed the atmosphere and the colleagues. And because it was only an 8
minutes commute.

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cwkoss
I've heard several people say that they are having more vivid and stranger
dreams since quarantine started. I wonder how broadly this is occurring.

~~~
eris_agx
I am having more vivid dreams, also finding it easier to remember them next
morning

~~~
ghaff
I won't say it's a pattern but it happened last night for whatever reason and
the vividness is normally unusual and actually remembering specifics almost
never happens.

