Struggling with early mornings...

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I have had severe life long difficulties with getting up in the morning. It has never improved even though I'm 41 years old and have been getting up early for work every day most of my adult life.

When I am woken by my alarm clock the sound goes through me like a knife and the nerves in my whole body jangle until I switch it off. My next thought is "Oh *god*..." and I feel sick, anxious, scared and desperate for more sleep all at once. This happens every day when I have work the next day, even if I get the recommended 8 hours sleep. I literally *never* feel refreshed when I wake up...ever. I feel more tired than I did when I went to bed.

It has been one of the hardest things for me to deal with and no one seems to understand it, especially at work, so I cannot ask to start the day an hour earlier as they would think I was being lazy or something.

I could easily work much later than the others thereby doing the same number of hours, but if you are not a morning person people seem to automatically assume you are lazy when in actual fact you can work just as hard and as long, but just much later in the day.

I was just wondering - is this connected to having Asperger's? Is there a known phenomenon whereby AS people are generally rubbish in the mornings to the point of actually feeling ill/nearly dead, or is it something NTs suffer from as well? I'd love to know!

I'm 40 and never been a morning person or even felt I had a particular sleep pattern. I think normal sleep for me would be to work long stretches then sleep for 8, 10, maybe even 12 hours. Sort of like a free rotating shift.

As for the alarm, I despise regular alarms. I set my cell phone to wake me up by playing music instead of a buzzer.

I don't think this is connected to AS, but it is probably genetic. For most of human history, a group with someone who couldn't sleep at night was a safer group.

Oh my God yes I do too.

There are times where I can be shouted for literally HOURS and not get up.

The recent cold snap hasn't helped either. I just wanna lie in bed till I warm up.

I am exactly the same. I never wake feeling refreshed and I struggle A LOT with being woken up.

I believe some of it's a flexibility of mind thing, with me. The best solution I've found is that I need to wake up extra early, and take 15-30 minutes to myself lying in bed getting prepared for the day - a transition between asleep and awake. Without that time to prepare mentally, I don't do well. I usually keep my laptop by my bed and when I wake, I check all of my usual websites in a routine (hello!), and once I'm done I feel able to start my day.

I have also exchanged an alarm clock for an LED floodlight in Daylight white on a timeswitch so I get my own personal "Sunrise" to wake me in a natural fashion rather than the alarm which always gets a startle and fight flight emergency response in my head.

Yes. I bought a sunlight alarm clock and it helped massively. Then my daughter unplugged it a couple of months ago, and it should be easy but remembering to set it up at again at a sensible time is just not happening. I need to do it again, because it did help so much.

I get up at 6:20am after 6 hours sleep and feel fine.

I was the same way with early mornings as the OP. It is one of the reasons I can't work a normal job. Essentially, I can't hack what you do and gave up. Most days I sleep until I wake up naturally, and am thankful for alternate means of subsistence that allow me to do this.

I easily wake up at 05:00 and could wake up earlier if I wanted. Even on weekends I'm always awake before 07:00. Waking up has never been a problem for me. I don't think it is related to autism. My parents (not autistic) are awake in the mornings too so I thought it could be to do with them.

I struggle with waking up in the mornings too. I usually sleep a lot, sometimes going to bed in the late afternoon and then not waking up until 10 or 11 the next morning because I can't get out of bed until then.

I was always a morning person. I get up at 5:00 and feel good. I have my major drop in energy around 2-3 p.m.

I have the same problem at around 2-3pm. In my case it's the heat buildup in my office - it gets unbearably hot and I start to nod off. Luckily, I finish at 3:30 and can escape!

I think I suffer from sleep inertia for about 5 hours every morning.

Interesting to hear about the sunlight alarms since I was just starting to consider them. Sounds like they are what I need.

It actually is related. Google for cortisol and autism and waking.