Whatever. If I go to bed early, I roll in my bed for 2, then 4, then 6 hours and not find any sleep. And that's on a good day. On a bad one, it will be for 8 hours and then it's time to wake up.
When I was a kid, my folks put me in bed every evening at 8 PM, sharing the same false assumption as you. And I spent hours after hours watching the darkness. I would almost always fall asleep later than them, and often not until 2 or 3 AM, sometimes 4 AM.
When I was in middle-school and high-school, it was terrible because there was no mid-week day off as there was in primary school, and because it started earlier (and there was a bit of extra commuting). As a result, since I wouldn't fall asleep before 2 AM on any day, I was actually sleeping as much during the 2 days of the week-end as I was sleeping during the whole rest of the week (5 days).
In high school, I experienced a week there or there when I was totally er... off, in a mist, because of exhaustion. But even that didn't make me able to sleep early. The next year I was so exhausted that I fell asleep at noon one day and woke up 3 days later in the evening.
Then I was in University or Engineering school and those were the good years because attending the lessons was not mandatory and there was nobody to tell me to go to my bed or my room early in the evening.
30 or 40 years later, I am typing this message, it is 5:45 AM and I might fall asleep soon.
I'm exactly the same. In highschool I had to wake up at 6:30 am but could never fall asleep before 1-2 am... I was exhausted all through the week until I could sleep in during the weekend. It was especially tough during spring when the sun would set later. I did not drink coffee then and still do not drink coffee.
It's only once I went to university that I've been able to have my own rhythm and would sleep from 3-4am until 9-10am. I even chose my first job because it allowed me to come a bit late in the morning.
A lot of people seem to think that being an early riser is only a question of motivation but I think it's not a question of motivation but a question of genetic make up.
Thank you for writing this. I had exactly the same experience, since primary school I would stay awake until 2-3AM every night staring at nothing. My biological clock just couldn't accept the 8PM sleep schedule.
Then at some point I decided to start listening to it, and found my most productive hours between 12PM to 4AM, then waking up at around 10AM to start the next day. That's how I rolled my university years, masters, PhD and (entrepreneurial) work. Unfortunately, trying to explain that to conservative "early to bed early to rise" folk is a usually waste of time...
Maybe my parent also has trouble falling asleep early like you. But my point is just that you aren't going to wake up early, unless you fall asleep early- when you fall asleep drives when you wake up.
If you like your sleep schedule, that's fine. It sounds like you are controlled by it though. I have found melatonin helpful for moving my sleep schedule when it gets out of hand.
When I was a kid, my folks put me in bed every evening at 8 PM, sharing the same false assumption as you. And I spent hours after hours watching the darkness. I would almost always fall asleep later than them, and often not until 2 or 3 AM, sometimes 4 AM.
When I was in middle-school and high-school, it was terrible because there was no mid-week day off as there was in primary school, and because it started earlier (and there was a bit of extra commuting). As a result, since I wouldn't fall asleep before 2 AM on any day, I was actually sleeping as much during the 2 days of the week-end as I was sleeping during the whole rest of the week (5 days).
In high school, I experienced a week there or there when I was totally er... off, in a mist, because of exhaustion. But even that didn't make me able to sleep early. The next year I was so exhausted that I fell asleep at noon one day and woke up 3 days later in the evening.
Then I was in University or Engineering school and those were the good years because attending the lessons was not mandatory and there was nobody to tell me to go to my bed or my room early in the evening.
30 or 40 years later, I am typing this message, it is 5:45 AM and I might fall asleep soon.