Hello World!

How old are you? Just wondering, I'm also underage =p
And good luck, although a week definitely isn't enough, for me 9 days wasn't.

' and I am really not willing to risk being a ton more tired than usual.'

Sorry, but I don't think polyphasic sleep is for you, then. You're basically doing a deprivation experiment without medical controls and without knowing what the long-term consequences are, if there are any. And, with Everyman you have pretty much no chance to adapt in 9 days even with a perfect adaption, and pretty much no one has a perfect adaption, it just feels TOO bad to be in Zombie mode. Most people need several failed attempts and weeks or even months before they adapt, and in that time they're often constantly tired due to oversleeps.

You should, however, after 9 perfect days be quite functionable. The question is whether that would carry you over the day with pretty much just one nap. You can probably forget it if you have to shift even those naps. Hard exercise, or maybe whole-day school trips, can do that easily.

Im turning 17 this summer, and haven't succesfully adopted to anything as of yet.
I thought I would be able to adapt during a 9 day break, and you can check my blog on how it went. You have the odds against you.

I just think that the challenge alone isn't enough of a motivation to make it through adaption. You'll have several moments where you'll feel really bad, physical AND psychical- for example, when you oversleep your first time for a few hours (and it will happen). I'm sure that all motivation of yours will be gone then, unless you have some kind of important reason you do polyphasic sleeping.

Second reason, if you don't want to take any risk, polyphasic sleeping is probably not good for you either. Experimental sleep-deprivation plans that are related to mind-changing are for risk-takers almost by definition.

And even if you *start* to come out of Zombie mode by Day 9-11, you'll drop back into it some times most likely, when you oversleep.
I'm still in school either, though in Germany and in my senior year, I'm already through my finals, but I was going through two polyphasic attempts while in school, and it didn't affect my grades at all. While you will be more tired in school, maybe, you'll also have all the time in the world to do homework and research... it's hard to spend all that new time.

And third, if advice like that keeps you from trying it anyway, polyphasic sleeping isn't for you either 
I'd be glad to try and help you along in your adaption, and I'm sure most others around here will as well.
I did two (failed) Uberman attempts, that lasted roughly 2-3 weeks, either of them, one pretty successful Everyman 3 adaption (I was on it for the last three weeks and didn't feel tired at all adapting directly from my failed Uberman attempt), and now I'm going off Everyman and on a new schedule just for the kick of it. Yeah, being sleep deprived can be fun, but in an interesting, not in a pleasant way. But it does tell you a lot about your body.

God, I'm writing quite confused. Could be because I had just 7-8 hours of sleep in unregular nap times during the last 3 days...

Oh.. one advice, is it possible to reschedule your naps so that your core covers most of the night? IE, 1-4 or 2-5? For me that's the worst period. Simply doing your core at 3:20 to 6:20 might work too. Essentially, you don't want to do your core during a time in which you wouldn't be in Zombie mode anyway, you want to cover your worst time of the day with it, because you'll always sleep for it, unlike with a nap.

Lyris, please disregard all above statements. When people tell you that you will fail, and you listen, you will most definitely fail. If you ignore the people that are against you, and stay positive, you have a much greater chance of succeeding. I have been very successful for 8 months on the hardest schedule (dymaxion) and I too am only 17. Polyphasic sleep has little to do with your physical strength compared to mental strength. When I started, I was told by everyone that I would not make it. Other polyphasers told me that no one had done it before, and I wouldn't be able to, friends and family told that I would not be able to go even two weeks with only getting 2 hours of sleep a day. I brushed off all these comments, saying that they were the stupid ones, not me. Am I one in a million? Possibly. Was I really the stupid one? Probably. But none of that mattered/matters to me. With enough determination and mind power, anybody can succeed at polyphasic sleep.

So as long as you have approval from your parents, go for it. Tell the people who don't believe in you to screw off, and just go for it. If you do fail, just get right back out and keep trying. It's gonna be hard, but just keep looking forward and realizing how awesome it will be when you succeed.

Last edited by shortyman333 (2010-03-13 16:36:44)

Actually, I really appreciate everyone's being honest. It never hurts to be realistic, and there's no point in being falsely encouraging if that just means I'm going to fail a little later, is there?

Of course, I'm not trying this just for the challenge (dear god, I'm not that insane); I actually made a long, rambly list of why I was going to go through with it. And while I'll probably end up dropping into zombie mode at some point, I refuse to plan for it. Why should I plan for oversleeping where I should be planning to avoid it?

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense that I should to move my core. I am a natural middle-of-the-night person though, so that shouldn't be a terribly bad issue.

Oh, and prepare mentally for the oversleep(s), don't get too discouraged when one appears, something that is almost inevitable.

I actually disagree with this statement. Oversleeps are very bad, and should not be taken lightly. You probably should prepare for oversleeps, but you should definitely get discouraged when one appears. I only overslept once during my adaptation (besides the drug-induced one the night before), and after that oversleep, I got very discouraged and decided to punish myself by adding another 3 miles to my normal 5 mile bike ride. The extra work-out practically killed my body, but since I told myself (and meant it) I would add more mileage anytime I overslept, I never even came close to oversleeping again. If I would have just went on with my day saying "Ah, no big deal, it's just an oversleep", my body would have realized "hey, I should oversleep more often" and I probably would have.

In conclusion, prepare for oversleeps, but do not take them lightly. Get very discouraged and very pissed off at yourself if you oversleep. Make sure your body knows that oversleeping is a big deal and should not happen again.