Am I just lazy?

Post Reply New Topic

I NEED about 11-13 hours sleep or my body and mind feel weak. When it's the weekend I will sleep for this long every day guaranteed, or any opportunity I get whilst I'm not in work. If I get anything less than this I will feel very sleep deprived and depressed.

On weekdays I average around 4-6 hours sleep a night, sometimes with trouble getting to sleep if I am worried about something work related as it will keep me up. This is because I can't go to sleep at 7pm or I would have 1h to myself of an evening before bed then I am back in work again, I won't let work dominate my life. I need to have my free time to do what I like and I will try and squeeze as much as I can before I reach a point where I MUST go to bed, against my preference to stay awake.

I will wake up each weekday morning feeling like absolute death. I know lots of people feel crap in the morning but this is something else. My alarm goes off at 7 am, I need to leave the house at 8:05 latest or I am late to work. I am always cold when I wake up and already feel like crap from getting 1/3 - 1/2 of my desired sleep. My body feels weak and I will hit snooze EVERY day until 7:45. I can't get up at 7 and want as much rest as I can get before having to get up. Most of the time I won't even fall back to sleep I will lie there thinking about having to walk to the train station and spend the whole day in work. And because I will remain in bed until 7:45 I MUST get up or I will be late, and the anxiety associated with having everybody see me arrive late forces me up, against my will.

I will then tell myself I will get a good night's sleep that evening once I'm back from work, and feel better the next day. This doesn't happen as I will get home, want my free time and this process repeats. It is depressing and ruining my life, every day I contemplate just not going in, I would then have to leave my job because I couldn't deal with the stress of going in and having to explain what happened.

Oddly this still happens on a much smaller scale even when I do get my desired sleep, I find it very difficult to actually get up physically, and would prefer to stay in bed and sleep, but can't get back to sleep so I will just get up. It's a lot easier knowing I am not in any rush for anything but the problem is still there. For the longest time I've been called lazy and thought that myself, but it feels so out of my control I feel it must be something else.

Does anyone else go through this and how have you learnt to cope with it if so?

Looks like you're exhausted, not lazy.

Also, looks like you're compensating during the weekends for lack of sleep during the week. It's quite normal for people to do this when they're sleep-deprived.

Are you on any medication that could have fatigue as a side effect? I felt like you do when I was on certain meds...

I am not on any meds no. I forgot to add I have been having 12+ hours sleep for over 10 years now since I was about 13. And not just at weekends, when I was unemployed I hibernated for months basically, sleeping over half the day every day. It's only during times of employment/college I have the main issues in the morning.

Being up early/surviving off <12 hours feels impossible.

This. And I too do not function well on 4-6 hrs of sleep. I can do it but my best is at least 8 per night. I feel even better on 9 hrs but that is not happening on a regular basis. I too make up some hrs on weekends when i don't get them during the week. Sounds like you need more sleep during the week even if it means sacrificing an hr or 2 of evening quiet. Just my 2 cents.

^This. You are not lazy, you are just unreasonable to expect to stay up late every weeknight. If you got more rest during the week, you would be able to do the things you like to do on the weekends, instead of sleeping the whole time.

If you need 12 hours sleep and are only getting 4 to 6 then there is obviously going to be a problem. The average person needs 8 hours sleep to function properly so that would be a minimum amount to aim for.

Most teens need 10 to 12 hours sleep as they are still developing, is it possible you are a late developer, in common with many aspies? There may also be issues with either a too fast or too slow metabolic rate.

It also sounds like you don't like your job, or the commute, at least. Are you using up too much energy trying to maintain this every day of the working week? Maybe you should look at changing one, or both, of these.

As a last, but very not least, point, depression will often make you feel lethargic. Ask yourself if you need to act on this, prevention is much better than a cure.

I sit here...looking around me...

I have done absolutely no housework for about a month...all my dishes, pots and cutlery is out of the cupboard and filthy on the side of the sink...I'm just buying take-away now...

All my dirty clothes are piled up all over the laundry floor...

The carpets are filthy in heavy traffic areas...

The grout in my shower is black with mold and there are 'water rings' inside my toilet...

I have empty packets of chips, chocolates, soda cans and unemptied ashtrays all around the place (I am a smoker)...

I usually get up now at about 10-11am because I just feel totally nauseous, dizzy and start to vomit if I get up any earlier than that...

This has been going on for a month now...not to mention I'm only showering like once a week and only having one small meal a day and not even bothering about my appearance whatsoever...

However, I have also noticed that I am not usually like this! I'm usually very neat, clean and fastidious, to the point of OCD about it....I look at all the mess and just get depressed now...

Then, I tell my mum about it and she's like 'It sounds to me like you are going through another major depressive episode...go back on your meds, please' (I stopped taking them after bad side-effects).

...but she is right! What started out as a 'I'm too sick/depressed to do that right now', has now turned into me living in the middle of a pigsty which makes me depressed even looking at it.

So, over the next few days, I'm going to go 'right! that's it! I'm cleaning this whole mess up' then after I do that, I'm going back to see my psychiatrist for another evaluation.

Upshot of it all....don't confuse laziness with depression and anxiety.

Oh man, MissUnderstood!

I'm somewhat of a slob---but I would say: please clean your place.

It's an unhealthy environment. It's not a moral judgement--it's a matter of you not getting diseases.

Suppose you want to invite some guy over?

I don't invite anybody over and that's why I just 'let it go'...but this time, I have 'let it go' just a tad too much.

Mum said...'the more you let it go, the more you won't feel like cleaning it'.

I guess mum understands me....a bit.

However, you are right. I am attributing the fact I'm feeling like a piece of s**t every morning due to an unhealthy environment (despite the smoking), environmental stress, irregular sleep patterns and a few hours of PC usage...I feel my PC is also making me sick...beyond the clowns I see on the internet.

Still, I have to get up off my arse, because sitting around talking about how messy the place is, is just another excuse preventing me from cleaning it.

i don't believe anyone is actually lazy. there is always some underlying issue that causes the seeming laziness.

You'll feel much better once your place is cleaner.

You've never been around my family, fortunately. Your typical PA German (or Dutch, if you prefer), are of the attitude "Work until you drop dead (literally). Then get your arse up and start working again!" If you don't follow that mantra, you are then a lazy sonofab!tch, who deserves to be thrown out into the night, with all the wailing and gnashing of teeth. In addition, the only reason you do not go to work is if you're on a slab in the Coroner's office, otherwise, you get the same treatment.

I used to catch hell all the time from my mother for sleeping 72 hours straight at a time. Uh, mom, you try going without much sleep for 5 days and see how you feel! It also didn't help that I was later diagnosed as a narcoleptic, partly from the medications, and partly from the hours I kept.

Meistersinger, I grew up with the same thing. My Mennonite ancestors did not understand mental health issues and a lot of ill ppl got labeled "slothful" or lazy instead of getting kindness and any kind of actual help. I still see this but i think, at least in my family, it is getting better as my generation recognizes these genetic illnesses.

But Hubby and i still feel that we need to work hard as much as we possibly can--if i am sick or exhausted, he gets mad at me i if i don't sit down and rest...but i do the same thing to him. We can see the tiredness in each other, and tell each other to rest...but neither of us will quit til we can't go anymore. He has lyme's disease and is currently shutting me out every time i say "you look tired." He is doing better with meds, and we are hopeful he will make a full recovery. But "rest" is still a 4 letter word.

I do like to work hard at things though--keeps sad or anxious thoughts at bay when i am feeling melancholy. So on the flip side, don't discount the therapeutic effect of good hard work and the feeling of accomplishment at the end of a day when you can look back and see what you've done.

I don't require quite as much as you do, but never feel I get enough sleep.

Is it possible that the job is just too much for you to do and still feel healthy? Myself, I feel like I am on an endless treadmill where the weeks just disappear from my life. My job is nothing I love, but I need to do it financially.

One accommodation you might ask for is a slightly reduced schedule. That won't work in every job, but it works in many. I reduced my workload from 40 to 35 hours a week, and that helps. It's a small enough change that many employers could accommodate it.

Thanks for all of your input.

In response to a couple of posts:

I don't mind my job, I neither like or dislike it. It is bearable for the most part it is easy and repetitive and computer/machine based which is what I like. Plus I work on my own most of the day which is a good thing. It is not extremely physically demanding and I don't suffer from physical exhaustion often in work. Mental exhaustion perhaps!

But it is not about disliking work that gets me like this in the mornings, it's just the thought of having to get up after such little sleep and have to leave my house in 15 minutes or miss my train, and spend the next 11 hours of the day outside the house, when I feel like I'm paralysed with comfort and would do anything for more sleep. This happens literally every day and has done to this extent for over a year now.

I know what the problem is and it's that I cannot go to bed early or earlier than I do, it's my routine to stay up late I am naturally nocturnal and as I explained I have to have that time for myself to do the things I enjoy. I can't change it, it couldn't feel further from being possible. I can't change my routines no matter how hard I try. And don't even know where to begin to start trying. Even though I know my habits/routines need to change, and I do want them too, I am too scared of change to really commit.

Unknownentity, my hubby has the same problem. He is just naturally a night person and adjusting to a day shift has always been hard for him. He ended up needing a sleeping med to do so. Obviously, your dr is the one to help you out with that...i can't say whether you should or shouldn't use sleeping pills. They are habit-forming so it is best not to use them unless you absolutely have to. But for him it has been a lifesaver.

The other question i would have is this: Are you sure you don't have an underlying issue such as sleep apnea? Another thing my hubby struggles with. Even on nights when he slept he was always tired during the day. A CPAP machine (a machine that delivers air into your lungs using positive pressure) has also helped a lot for him. He jokes about his space mask and it is annoying...but worth it to have a good night of sleep and feel rested the next day. Also, having been diagnosed with the sleep apnea at a young age is better so it can be treated. Sleep apnea takes a toll on one's body and if you live with it a long time before diagnosis, it can cause damage.

Maybe these things are not issues for you, but it might be worth asking your dr about--especially the sleep apnea if you are feeling exhausted even with a full night of sleep.