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How long can you last without a night's sleep?

agkm800

agkm800

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 18, 2009
672
4
For me, sleep is more important than food. I can last almost a day without food and still function almost normal, but I don't function well at all if I lose sleep or if I don't get enough sleep at night. However, in college, I had seen guys and girls not sleeping in two or more days straight for exams. Which side are you?
 
I've gotten close to 70 hours. After 40 or so it just becomes a blur. Never would want to take exams or any of that on that strategy. Although, adderall might help.
 
I can go 3 days without sleep easily, although I must admit the 3rd day it is hard lol.

I seem to thrive more when it is night though so :D
 
Two days is the longest I've lasted. Now that I'm old though it's hard to go one day without at least 4 - 6 hours of sleep somewhere.
 
Have a baby and you'll find out.

I thought I needed 8 hours every night. Then I had twin girls.

I had to deal with getting up every 3 hours around the clock for 6 months. Its amazing how you can adapt to so little sleep. That doesn't mean I was fine, I was more of the walking undead then part of humanity but you do what you have to.

Mike
 
My record was 45ish off of 3 hours of sleep the night before it started and I had been running off of 3-4 hours a night for about a month at that point. Slept 14 hour straight after that long run.
Every time in the past I have pulled an all nighter I find pushing threw the the 23-25 hour point the hardest. After that point I tend to get a 2nd wind and keep on going.

It crossing that magic hour and getting into your next day that is the hardest. Once you enter you next day cycle it is not to hard to keep on going.

Not sleeping before an exam is not recomend as your ablity to think at the exam is much more difficult. An example of this would be in my fluids class for the life of me I could not think of an basic formal a professor ask for one of the questions so I missed it. The odd part was in one of the harder exam problems he ask I used it. I was one of the only people in the class who got it right. The basic question I blank on because I could not think of a name. I could answer the harder question that used the formal because I was running on autopilot
 
5 days. Not under circumstances I'm ever likely to go through again, nor would I wish it on anyone else. It's just amazing what one can do during times of crisis or stress. Don't really remember many details, nor do I want to, actually.

I'm a big fan of 6 to 8 hours nowadays. It helps.
 
I can lose one night's sleep without feeling much loss. Or put it this way, If I sleep two hours, I'm far worse off than when I just skip one night.
 
I can miss one night without sleep and function moderately well. I've never tried to stay awake longer than that. I've gone several days in a row where I've only had 2 or 3 hours of sleep however and thats when I start to feel like a zombie.
 
I can do 2 days pretty easily without any sleep. As for having little sleep, I can go a couple weeks with having only an hour or two of sleep a night but that is then followed by a week or so of 8 - 10 hours.

Right now I am getting just about 4 hours a night and can do this for the foreseeable future.
 
I think I've lasted 3 nights without sleeping.....

So that'd be (Waking up around noon of one day, not sleeping that night, noon to that day would be 24 hours, then noon to the next day would be 48, then noon to the third is 72, and then I fell asleep around 11 PM of that third day) 80 hours give or take a few.
 
fireshot91 said:
I think I've lasted 3 nights without sleeping.....

So that'd be (Waking up around noon of one day, not sleeping that night, noon to that day would be 24 hours, then noon to the next day would be 48, then noon to the third is 72, and then I fell asleep around 11 PM of that third day) 80 hours give or take a few.
Click to expand...

Why?
 
Used to be a couple/few months using hour catnaps and sleeping 8 hours once a week.

Now with a caffeine sensitivity from doing that a couple times, I've burned myself out and can't stay awake like that anymore.

Read the box on the caffeine pills and I get all the symptoms rather quick these days if I try, so now it's about 20 hrs, using cola and coffee I'll start with a facial twitch and get worse rather quick.

Though if I can get over the first sleep hump without getting too sick, I can probably squeeze another 12 hours out.

---

So if you need someone for a marathon poker game, count me out, plus I suck at poker anyhow.
 
I went 36 hours before collapsing and sleeping for days ;)

I'm sure if I actually had a plan and energy drinks i could stay up much longer.
 
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