Sleep

[Fruitbat]

Well, my caffeine has been cut about in half and I had my last one at 10.30am.

for the first time in months I just slept a whole night and didn’t wake up once. Slept a full 8 and woke up.

weird thing is I feel very tired on waking but I guess I’m just catching up.

I had no idea caffeine was this bad for sleep. I reckon if I gave it up completely I’d be sleeping for 12 hours

 

[BackInTheGame78]

Well, my caffeine has been cut about in half and I had my last one at 10.30am.

for the first time in months I just slept a whole night and didn’t wake up once. Slept a full 8 and woke up.

weird thing is I feel very tired on waking but I guess I’m just catching up.

I had no idea caffeine was this bad for sleep. I reckon if I gave it up completely I’d be sleeping for 12 hours

Probably a good decision. Caffeine disrupts sleep even if you don't realize it. It will change the type of sleep you get, making it less of the deep restorative and more of the shallow surface level sleep where you wake up easier during the night.

Also the half life of caffeine is about 5 hours so even after 10 hours your body is still dealing with 25% of your caffeine intake.

 

[Smartone84]

8-9 hours daily, I don't set alarms, I wake up when I wake up then work out and get to work.

I absolutely love sleep and always have.

What do you do for a living? I wish I could get a job that worked late. I've been working 8-4 and waking around 6:15am for the last 11 years. Always been a drag.

 

[Fruitbat]

TT is pretty useless. What's your Free Test?

*High SHBG leads to High TT and Low FT. Low FT will give you hypogonadal symptoms while your TT is mid-range due to high SHBG.

how do I reduce these. The test cost me money and didn’t give me
This info

 

[Fruitbat]

What do you do for a living? I wish I could get a job that worked late. I've been working 8-4 and waking around 6:15am for the last 11 years. Always been a drag.

8-4 is part time work bro!
To be fair not if you’re in a physical job

 

[kookdekoo]

Sleep is extremely important for me. Just after Covid ended, I set a new routine. Dinner at 6.30 pm. Sleep by 9.00 pm. Wake up at 5.30 pm. Daily. Minimum variation in timing.
I work out in the morning. I find this routine has helped me a lot in staying in shape and have minimum health problems.

 

[Money & Muscle]

how do I reduce these.

From my understanding, some folks supplement Boron to do this.

You want to increase Free Test.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

From my understanding, some folks supplement Boron to do this.

You want to increase Free Test.

Stinging Nettle Root, 100-200mg of Zinc and proper magnesium levels(something 90% of people are deficient in) all help with controlling SHBG.

Magnesium is so important for so many different body functions...zinc also, especially for men. Magnesium is required as a catalyst for at least 300 enzymatic reactions in the body and is a key component in dealing with calcium and zinc is the "male" mineral which and the DNA also has something called "zinc fingers" which are areas of the DNA that control gene expression that are 'turned on" by zinc. Lack of zinc means those genes are not expressed properly. Same with Vitamin D.

As does a higher protein diet.

 

[Money & Muscle]

Stinging Nettle Root, 100-200mg of Zinc and proper magnesium levels(something 90% of people are deficient in) all help with controlling SHBG.

Great list, thanks.

@Fruitbat you might also want to supplement with D3. Most are deficient in it and this is essential for Testosterone production.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

Great list, thanks.

@Fruitbat you might also want to supplement with D3. Most are deficient in it and this is essential for Testosterone production.

D3 is also super important for the immune system and a bunch of other things, including gene expression for a lot of genes...it's actually a pro-hormone produced photochemically in the skin from 7-dehydrocholesterol, which is what it should be called to underlay it's importance for the body in people's minds and not be called a vitamin.

 

[Obee1]

I’ve always underestimated the need for sleep. I’ve just realised something.

I’m an emotional eater and when im run down I hit the pizza. My dieting usually looks like: 3-4 weeks brilliant discipline/work gets hectic/eat **** for one week/ back to discipline.

I’ve noticed my binges are almost ALWAYS tied into:

1. A big night drinking and feeling crap. This leads to almost a week eating crap
2. Poor sleep due to weather or schedule
3. If I travel a lot, usually have very sketchy schedule and just end up pigging out on hotel food
4. Poor sleep from caffeine

I had a boozy business trip with long meetings and I’ve just eaten crap for a full week.

Yesterday by chance I had little caffeine and I slept like a baby and woke up ready for the challenge and with discipline.

so, do you guys find sleep affect appetite?
Do you find caffeine wrecks your sleep?
How important is sleep generally?
How do you maximise the value of sleep?
Or is sleep overrated?

Sleep or lack there of does effect appetite. You'll notice that when very tired or sleep deprived that your body craves sugar. There are several physiological reasons for this. Caffeine can wreck your sleep. It's in your genetic code as to how and at what rate you metabolize caffeine. A 23 & Me or Ancestry Health DNA test can tell you this. Or you can experiment. Then set a caffeine curfew. Mine is 2 pm because the half-life in my body is around 4 hours. Sleep has several stages. Some stages are to repair your body and immune system and other stages consolidate memories while washing away waste from the brain such as Amyloid plaque. People with Alzheimer's have a large build up of these. We've only recently discovered how important Circadian rhythms are. What I've done as far as sleep hygiene is no blue screens 1.5 hours before bed. Or at least use blue light blocking glasses. TV and phone screens stop your body's production of Melatonin which is your body's signal to start the sleep process and release other hormones. Keep room dark and cool like around 68 degrees. Your body temperature lowers during sleep. If it's too warm you'll not have good quality sleep. Try not to eat anything heavy within 2 hours of sleep. Alcohol may help you fall asleep but it has a horrific effect on your sleep stages, breathing pattern and oxygen levels. It increases your heartrate and your body temperature as it tries to rid itself of the poison. And finally, get up at the same time every morning regardless of when you go to sleep. Aim for 6-9 hours. (Everyone is different). Within reason, rising at the same time is more important than getting a couple extra hours of sleep because you stayed up late.

 

[Fruitbat]

The issue I have fella is I also like the benefits of progressive resistance training. I do my workout mainly on a rack in the gym, otherwise I gotta use machines.

if i dont get up at 4.30 to get to gym for 4.50 a load of other cvnts are always there hogging the racks.

ive sacraficed my sleep a lot for this. gyms are always packed full of cvnts near where i live. i wonder if i might go to an expensive one where the cost keeps numbers low.

i prioritised sleep last night so im hitting gym at 6am but i know now its machines only for me which pisses me off.

im guessing you folks would say not to sacrifice sleep for gym equiptment?

 

[DarwinTaurus]

I work shift work. Current roster that we've used for the past few years or more, is two days, two nights, four days off. Each shift is 12 hours. I've had insomnia for nearly two decades. My current routine is to take 3 Valerian Forte tablets, some Magnesium Glycenate power half an hour before bed, and a cup of cammomile tea. Sometimes it helps.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

The issue I have fella is I also like the benefits of progressive resistance training. I do my workout mainly on a rack in the gym, otherwise I gotta use machines.

if i dont get up at 4.30 to get to gym for 4.50 a load of other cvnts are always there hogging the racks.

ive sacraficed my sleep a lot for this. gyms are always packed full of cvnts near where i live. i wonder if i might go to an expensive one where the cost keeps numbers low.

i prioritised sleep last night so im hitting gym at 6am but i know now its machines only for me which pisses me off.

im guessing you folks would say not to sacrifice sleep for gym equiptment?

Buy some heavy resistance bands and workout at home. Problem solved.

Definite no on sacrificing sleep for the gym. You are basically spinning your wheels doing that.

 

[Fruitbat]

Fk me boys, I tapered another 60mg off my caffeine (went from about 800-1000 a day down to about 300 and kept reducing yesterday I forgot a cup and ended up on 210)

just slept 9.5 hours. 9.5 hours. I was getting about 4-6 on highcaf.

Only issue is I wake up and I feel MORE tired. I could go back for another 2 hours easy now.

my body and brain are seriously lapping this up.

funny, when young I could wake up and have a coffee and a spliff and go back to sleep.
Nowadays caffeine spins me out.

anyway to anyone struggle with sleep don’t underestimate how badly caffeine can wreck it

 

[Money & Muscle]

Definite no on sacrificing sleep for the gym. You are basically spinning your wheels doing that.

I disagree.

I went from 30%BF to 12% and added a solid 10+lbs muscle on 5 hours of sleep.

Was it optimal? No. Was it easy? NO. But it can be done.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

I disagree.

I went from 30%BF to 12% and added a solid 10+lbs muscle on 5 hours of sleep.

Was it optimal? No. Was it easy? NO. But it can be done.

Steroids overrides pretty much any of this. You really can't give much advice for a normal human based on your experiences.

 

[Money & Muscle]

Steroids overrides pretty much any of this. You really can't give much advice for a normal human based on your experiences.

I started TRT after I'd already made most of the progress, so this does not apply.

You've also given out advice that absolutely cannot be followed by those with natural hormones.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

I started TRT after I'd already made most of the progress, so this does not apply.

You've also given out advice that absolutely cannot be followed by those with natural hormones.

Why is that? TRT has me at like 600, plenty of people are higher than that naturally.

 

[Money & Muscle]

Why is that? TRT has me at like 600, plenty of people are higher than that naturally.

Not the majority.
Regardless, TT is a terrible metric for serum concentration of testosterone. Free Test is the metric you (and doctors, and everyone else) should be looking at, tested via Equilibrium Dialysis for accuracy.

Did you make more progress on TRT than not? If so, then you were still 'enhanced'. Just saying.

Exogenous T will always have an edge over natural T. A bad night of sleep can't ruin the effectiveness of your next test shot.