Getting enough sleep??

Good Friday morning!  I am a few hours away from the start of my weekend and I am pumped.  I would actually be more pumped if I wasn't feeling so tired right now.

Things just fell into place for this blog post to be about sleep today. 

We'll start at the beginning though with last night.  After getting home from class and watching some TV with my mom (Castle marathon to catch you up before the new season starts) I watched three of my DVR'd shows before going to bed which happened after 11pm.  It's fall so all of my favorite shows are starting back up and there are still those shows that are in the middle to end of their season already that I'm still trying to keep up on.  I love having a DVR so I can record the shows I would be missing because I'm in class or because I'm watching a show on another channel.  But there is a downside to a DVR...it can only hold so many shows at a time!  So, if you don't watch what you record pretty soon you're running out of room to record new shows.

With my night classes I don't get home until 8:30ish twice a week so that is definitely cutting into my TV watching time, forcing me to rely on my DVR to record more shows than ever.  Not necessarily a bad thing because then I can watch them when it's convient for me.  On the flip side though I usually spend time that could be devoted to homework by catching up on the week's shows.  Being more disciplined about doing homework before watching TV is something I'll be working on this semester.

Maybe I'll reward myself with being able to watch one TV show for completeing the week's work for one class when I am home?

Anyways, moving on...

Because I stayed up past 11pm watching TV I got about 6 hours of sleep which doesn't seem to be enough, or isn't at the right time of night, considering when the alarm went off at 5:30am I hit snooze like it was my job for an hour until finally getting up at 6:30am.  Ever notice that getting say 8 hours of sleep, say from 10pm to 6am feels totally different in the morning than say getting 8 hours of sleep by going to bed at 1am and getting up at 8am?

By getting up at 6:30 this morning I only had a half hour to get myself ready and on the road to make it to work by 7:30.  A half hour is not enough time for me to get ready without feeling rushed, and potentially forgetting to take something crucial to my day with me.  If I would wake up at 5:30am I would have plenty of time to get ready, and even have some chill time to check email, Facebook, Twitter, or whatever I feel like doing with that time.  But in order to wake up at 5:30am and not feel like complete crap because I am soooo tired I need to start getting the right amount of sleep.

This brings me to the question of the day.  How do you know what the right amount of sleep is for you?  I can't remember a time in my life where I felt like I was waking up refreshed from getting the right amount of sleep, or if I do I don't recall how many hours of sleep that actually was.

Alexis over at Daily Ramblings was just talking about this yesterday.  For her 7.5-8 hours of sleep per night isn't enough.  As she put it her body needs a solid coma to functiont he next day.  Read her entire post here.

Getting the right amount of sleep is an essential part of leading a healthy life because let's face it, when we run ourselves down and don't get enough sleep we're more likely to get sick, be irritable, and a whole bunch of other bad junk.

So, I'm asking for your help readers...answer me these questions.

How did you find out what the right amount of sleep was for you?

What are your tips to making sure you can get that right amount most of the time?  It's not a perfect world so I realize that there will be times that getting the right amount isn't in the cards.

What's your typical bedtime, or that range you usually hit the hay during, and what time is your usual wake up call?

What I'm currently listening to...
Sunshine Babies - Justin Moore, album - Outlaws Like Me (I miss summer & flip flops!!!)