A FUD File : How Well Do You Sleep?

F

FUD

Moderator
[ Moderators, After careful consideration, I am of the opinion that this thread "fits in" on TheFiringLine because the subject is connected with firearms in the role of self defense. However, I will not be offended if you determined that this is an "off-topic" post and subsequentially closed it. ]

Before getting into the subject matter, a little background is in order in order to first set the stage ... Being on our first child, for the past several months (around the time the little one turned two) the wife and I have been having a difficult time getting our daughter's sleeping pattern adjusted back to normal -- something went wrong somewhere about half a year ago and now the little one doesn't get to bed until 2 or 3 in the morning or if she does go to bed at a normal hour, she'll wake up around 2 or 3 and wants to play until sunrise where she'll zonk out and sleep until noon. As a result, I've become an extreme tired puppy and when I fall asleep, I am dead to the world.

The past few days, our home security system has been acting up (and after what happened last night, I plan on having s service technician come in to check the whole system out) and during the day it would suddenly, and without any apparent reason, give off two or three loud beeps.

Well, last night at about three in the morning (about an hour after we put the little one to bed), the house alarm goes off -- 120dB loud! My wife wakes up and grabs her Browning BDA380 (fourteen rounds of .380ACP). As she reaches for the cordless phone, she looks over at me and I'm SOUND ASLEEP while this 120dB alarm is going off! She shakes my shoulder, and I turn over -- STILL ASLEEP!!

Finally, after several more shoves, I wake up, tumble out of bed, grab my S&W4006 (twelve rounds of .40S&W) and the two of us check out the house (her staying in the doorway with the baby while I shut off the alarm and check tha various rooms for a possible break-in) to discover that it was a flase alarm. Of course, this false alarm woke the baby and we had to spend the next couple of hours trying to put her back to sleep again.

Now, there's nothing wrong with my hearing. As a matter of fact, my hearing seems to be even better than my wife's because I can usually hear the baby waking up in the bedroom when we're in the family room before my wife does. However, I'm a very heavy sleeper and the past several months, I've been more tired than normal which has made my sleeping even heavier.

Just curious if other board members are heavy sleepers and do you see that as a problem in your ability to being able to deal with a threat while you're asleep and dead to the world? Comments? Suggestions?

tff.gif

Share what you know & learn what you don't.

[This message has been edited by FUD (edited September 25, 2000).]
 
I sometimes fall asleep while waiting for the wife to finish her bathroom routine. Other times, she catches me in a semi-sleeping state where I can still talk, but have no recollection whatsoever when I wake up in the morning.

I also usually hear our nearly 4yo first (fortunately, he will go to bed between 7 and 8 pm and wake up about 12 hours later - kindergarten is very tiring).

The Wife, unfortunately, won't let me have a loaded pistol in the nightstand...

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I see no elephant in my cellar. If there were an elephant in my cellar, I would surely see it. Therefore, there is no elephant in my cellar.

http://www.ety.com/tell/why.html
 
FUD your kid will probably end up like uncle Ober, up all night on tfl and sleeping all day until gym time. ;)

During day I seem to wake up normally but then again I get my sleep peacfully as there are no others in my area of operations.
Woke up this afternoon with a very cold feeling on right a$$ cheek, just my 1911, must have grabbed it in my sleep and left it in the bed
while in a semi-consious state. Maybe this is a reason women stay away? :o
And on the tactical thing if the 1911 gets lost in the covers I got my 870 next to the bed also (until benelli gets done at vang)
now if I unconsiously put that 870 in the bed I could do some serious injury rollin over on it. Those ghost rings could snag, and that slide could pinch the skin in a most unpleasant way.

Sorry wasnt much help as I got no kids or wives. (And btw they didnt all die from wounds suffered sleeping in a bed that has a 1911 in the sheets somewhere)

See ya FUD good luck, and good night.
 
I have two sleep modes. If somebody else is on watch I can sleep through purt neah anything. If I am the keeper of the watch I can go from asleep to ready to roll in couple of seconds. This mornin I was up and out at three cause of the sounds of a three pound skunklet walkin around the porch. I do not like havin a firearm under the pillow, fraid I might have a problem while still asleep.

Sam....just cause I'm walkin don mean I awake
 
FUD, I don't know what your chilcare situation is, but you need to not let your kid take a nap during the day if possible. At 2, she should be able to stay up for a 12 hour day, and sleep 10-12 at night. Start by keeping her up as long as you can, putting her down at 5 PM or so. Then keep extending the 'awake time' to a decent hour of 7 or 8 PM. She should go to bed exhausted, and sleep pretty much thru the night.

Bear in mind, I write this after spending half the night on the couch, as my almost 3 year old wound up in our bed at about 2 AM, after several episodes (I want milk, juice, pee pee, etc.) I can't sleep with 3 in a full size bed, so to the couch I go in this situation. This only happens a couple of times a month, made worse by the fact that with her "big-girl" bed, she now has freedom to move around and come into our bedroom.

Instituting 'rituals' work well in this regard. Get into PJ's, Brush teeth, read a story, pray, give kisses, turn on the soft kid's music, nighty-night. Just last week I started with time telling - "When this big line gets to here, it's night-night time" She can get a feel for the pasage of time over a 10-15 minute period.
I do feel your pain, we've had it pretty good. We're in the same situation I suppose you're in - that is, being close enough to neighbors that you can't afford to let your kid cry herself to sleep at 3 in the morning. My community is so uptight I worry about DYFS coming if the nieghbors hear that.

Trial & error. If you're not making mistakes, you're not parenting. Good luck.
 
Set a schedule. They dont have to sleep but they better not get out of bed. Better get hold of this now cause when they start school the free-form schedule will be a real problem.

I dont sleep that heavy. When something happens I'll usually wake up a little. If its nothing I need to be concerned about (read: the wife is already taking care of the problem) I'm back asleep in seconds. If I do need to be up, I'm up and alert pretty much instantly.
 
Once I'm up, I'm alert but GETTING me up requires an A-bomb going off next door.

Figure if the wife was out of town on a business trip, somebody could break in in the middle of the night rob me blind with the alarm going off and I would never know about it.

You're right though about the little one -- gotta get her back on some kind of schedule.
 
I'm a light sleeper unless it's between 3-5am. That's ussualy the time that I'm in deep sleep. I still wake up pretty wuickly but I feel groggy longer during those times. Most times if my cat sneezes I'm up.

If I get 6 hrs sleep I'm good to go. More then 8 and I feel like crap. Less then 5 I feel like crap.
I don't like house alarms for the very reason that flase alarms tend to desensatize reaction time.
I love a well trained dog. They never bark unless they actually hear or sense something. Mind you I did say a well trained dog, not to be confused with a yapping poodle that barks at the wind.

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"It is easier to get out of jail then it is a morgue"
Live long and defend yourself!
John 3:16
NRA lifer
GOA
GSSF
KABA
 
A dog is something to consider when the little one gets a little older (4 or 5). I've always liked Huskies -- had two of them (not at the same time obviously) when I lived in NJ.
 
FUD, a dog was the answer for me. Personally I hate to sleep. It annoys me that humans have to sleep because it seems like such a waste of time. But alas we do. The better we sleep when we do the less time that is required. For most of my career I worked nights. For a brief period early in my career I was without a dog.....sometihng unusual for me. During the period I sleep extremely light. Once I procured a new dog, a large, very aggresive Chow Chow I began to sleep sound. Much like C.R. said, I was comfortable because someone else had the watch. I was free to sleep while he watched my back. That was several years ago and although he is gone now (I miss that dog) I have always kept a male puppy as my current males got older so I am always assured of having at least one mean dog. Over the years I started raising Chows and have had slightly over 400 born into litters of dogs I've owned. Many of these puppies have gone to homes with small children in them. Often times the parents were hesitant to get a dog they knew was going to be big and aggressive around a small child. In every case where the puppy was small when they got it they later reported that the dog was very protective of the child and they had nothing to worry about with the dog....or strangers. A large dog is the best sleep aid and child security you will likely ever find.
To bring this back around a little more to firearms related, I do not sleep any where without a gun. When Terri and I are on the road (where I cannot have a dog with me) attending gun shows the night stand beside the motel bed looks like I am equiping an army. Then as we leave I have to check the room repeatedly making sure I have not forgotten one of my babies (guns).
I'm one of those people that when I am awakened out of a sound sleep I come instantly awake. I would caution anyone who doesn't to place their gun slightly out of arms reach. We've all known people that can wake up, answer a phone, have a conversation, hang up and go back to sleep without remember they even talked on the phone. I would not recommend they keep a gun so close that they can reach it if they sleep so soundly.
 
RH said it all. Our son is almost 2 and since he has his toddler bed, every now and then he wakes up to come sleep on my throat. It' easy to sleep without oxygen.

The other night my son made some noise in his bed as I was dozing off. It sounded like someone knocking on the door. Up I went, couldn't go back to sleep for hours. Gotta love those younguns.
 
FUD,

Just a personal anecdote. Maybe you can see why after.

Our 14 month old went camping with Grandma and grandpa for a week. She did NOT take a nap before, however, during, and since she has taken a 1-3 hour nap in the middle of the day. She now goes to bed about 7:30 pm and sleeps until between 5:30 and 7 am or so.

My theory: she got so wore out with being outside all morning that she needed a nap.
Not being around mom, dad, or her house the old routine was forgotten, and a new routine was instilled, and remains.

Now I am not suggesting a drastic event, however, can she stay with someone (or camp with grandparents?) and see if a new routine can be started. I do not know if this will work, however, it should be worth a try. (Worst case, you get one week of sleep!)

Sleep deprivation can do many things. (I think even I could sleep thru 120db alarm.)

HTH, YMMV

Gfrey
 
Gunslinger

I love Chows too, my grandmother bred and showed chows for years; in fact, when I was ten I got to show one of her dogs, I was the only little boy at the show showing a dog. Guess who won. :) She used to tell me (as I was growing up) that even though I came onto the scene long after she had many of her dogs, she never had a problem with any of them with me. One dog in particular took a special liking to me and she said was VERY protective of me. My wife and I are dogless at the moment, but our plans are to buy an Akita in the next few months (same temperament as a Chow but twice the size). We now have an alarm system like FUD, not as fun and fluffy as a dog, but I feel safer none the less. Just got installed yesterday. :) :) With the system armed and my Redhawk (.45Colt, w/ handloaded 300gr XTPs which will move at about 1250fps) by the bed, I slept very well last night, better than I have in a while. I know what you mean about not sleeping anywhere w/o a gun. When we travel I usually bring my 1911 (Currently in Carson City @ Tussey Custom) or my Redhawk (need to be extra careful in motels, just a weeee bit too much power, don’t need the bullet sailing through five or six rooms before stopping).
 
Gunslinger

I love Chows too, my grandmother bred and showed chows for years; in fact, when I was ten I got to show one of her dogs, I was the only little boy at the show showing a dog. Guess who won. :) She used to tell me (as I was growing up) that even though I came onto the scene long after she had many of her dogs, she never had a problem with any of them with me. One dog in particular took a special liking to me and she said was VERY protective of me. My wife and I are dogless at the moment, but our plans are to buy an Akita in the next few months (same temperament as a Chow but twice the size). We now have an alarm system like FUD, not as fun and fluffy as a dog, but I feel safer none the less. Just got installed yesterday. :) :) With the system armed and my Redhawk (.45Colt, w/ handloaded 300gr XTPs which will move at about 1250fps) by the bed, I slept very well last night, better than I have in a while. I know what you mean about not sleeping anywhere w/o a gun. When we travel I usually bring my 1911 (Currently in Carson City @ Tussey Custom) or my Redhawk (need to be extra careful in motels, just a weeee bit too much power, don’t need the bullet sailing through five or six rooms before stopping).
 
The alarm needs to be fixed. You've had enough false alarms that you know think it's fake. I can sleep through an atomic weapons blast, but if my perimeter alarm makes that little "click," I'm wide awake. Dependability is key. I returned the first system that I used because of this.

Get your child on a schedule NOW. Wake her up early and put her to bed early. My mother said that she used to deliberately keep me awake until midnight as a baby so that I'd sleep through the night. It worked, and now, as an adult, I have a very difficult time falling asleep before 1 AM. My mother particularly disliked her earlier decision when I was a teenager. You will too.

BTW, I like the FUD Files icon.
 
A little twist on sleeping and noise or lack thereof.
25th Inf. Division, Cu Chi, Viet Nam, 1966
The 8 inch and 155 mm guns had been firing without let up for days, it was about zero dark thirty when I awoke, reached for my M14 and sat up, I was sleeping in a 12 man tent and could see others getting up......what the hell was going on? It was quiet, too quiet...the big guns had stopped firing.

The quiet woke us up....and I was up the rest of the night. Go figure. :rolleyes:

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"Lead, follow or get the HELL out of the way."
 
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Mikul:... I like the FUD Files icon.[/quote]Thanks Mikul -- you're the first person to notice/say something. FUD.
 
You could sleep with a chambered Glock in each hand. Nobody will dare to get close. :)
 
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