I thought you mathematicians just took amphetamines as a precaution.
I used to find myself close to nodding off in afternoon classes in college and at work meetings well into my thirties. Interest in the topic helped but engagement or keeping busy mattered more. When I expected it would be a problem I'd snack or drink a soda, more for something to do with my hands than actual hunger, thirst, or chemical stimulation. I'd also try to take notes unrelated to any actual need, just to keep engaged.
I like the idea of doodling during meetings, it feels like it should be more interesting than any of the above, but I never was inspired to it.
Coffee and snacks don't help me. The actual only thing that can override it for me is literal candy, and it has to be steady. I can't just eat candy and coast on it - the moment the sugar ends, I fall asleep - so it has to be something I can slowly nibble on for the entire time. (Or ADHD meds, but I was only on those during Covid, when I wasn't attending many meetings, so I don't actually have much evidence.)
I fell asleep on the first day of sixth grade, in science class. New school, first time changing classes, lots of exciting things that you would think would keep me up, but nope. This is right about the age when it started happening, so I didn't have much experience on how to handle it.
Afterwards the teacher had me stay after class, and she was clearly concerned that I had some problematic home life that she may need to act on. I had to lie on the spot, and I said that I'd been so excited about starting 6th grade that I hadn't been able to sleep the night before. She was willing to accept that.
She might have just been trying to see if you would buy meth from her.
I was on ADHD meds for a few months in late 2018/early 2019 and it made me miserable. A little bit increased productivity and massively increased anxiety. Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad with a tweak to my dosage or something but it definitely wasn't worth it to me.
I've actually been seeing a therapist (LICSW) for a couple months, and considered some more thorough kind of psychotherapy, but it was such a hassle that I basically gave up. Choosing not to take the time for therapy itself, after all the trouble of finding one who was taking new patients and would take my insurance and fit my schedule, feels like a valid form of self-care.
I totally miss the meds. They were great. They just gave me terrible headaches.
Kids weren't meant to sit in classrooms all day. Of course they fall asleep.
I got my ADHD diagnosis I don't even know how many months ago, but still no meds. They aren't writing new prescriptions until the shortage is over.
The diagnosis is validating and explains a lot of what has made me unhappy since childhood, but I really would like to fix it. Good to remember that medicine isn't magic and doesn't work for everyone, though.
so it has to be something I can slowly nibble on for the entire time
I hear they sell fruit by the foot now.
As someone with likely ADHD, it's been so difficult getting my son set up with the meds he needs that I know I'm never going to pull that off on my own behalf.
Someone in this scenario should at least look into whether they might have Sleep Apnea.
(I have sleep apnea and ADHD, the former treated and the latter not. Turns out I like having ADHD, and also the medications were kind of annoying in various ways.)
What I didn't like was having ADHD during the pandemic, but that's because I hated the pandemic not because I hated ADHD.
To be exact, I've felt drowsy many times in classes and meetings. Dozens? Maybe literally hundreds, from high school to college to work right up until covid. (I like to think I was managing it well by then, but probably not perfectly.) But I don't know if I've ever actually fallen asleep. There was one time I'd bet on it, a seminar class in college where the teacher called on me specifically, but in general, I've never noticed my head flat on the desk/table or drool anywhere it shouldn't be, so I'm pretty sure I managed to avoid actually falling asleep.
It's theoretically possible I've successfully hidden being drowsy in all those meetings and classes, but then again it's possible that I've been nodding hard in plain sight of my boss/teacher all along. I've rarely noticed anyone else nodding off; maybe nobody every noticed me nearly doing it! One advantage of working from home is not having to worry about this, I guess.
I broke my arm recently (very minor as far as broken arms go) which meant I took some Tylenol (which I usually studiously avoid because Tylenol overdose is my third biggest medical fear, behind tetanus and rabies, but ahead of chagas disease) and it turns out Tylenol makes me feel "wheee!" the same way anti-anxiety medications do. Which got me reading some research, and apparently Tylenol is an effective treatment of "existential dread."
So is alcohol, but it doesn't help a broken bone so far as I ever heard.
(which I usually studiously avoid because Tylenol overdose is my third biggest medical fear, behind tetanus and rabies, but ahead of chagas disease)
Huh! These are so different than my neuroses. I worry about longterm use of ibuprofen on my kidneys, and to a lesser extent because livers can regenerate, of tylenol on my liver.
Prometheus is wasted on the eagle. Testing drug metabolism would be more useful.
Sure, it seems like a waste to you, but it's job security.
The government should pay eagles to eat the livers out of demigods and then heal them up every day.
I mumbled something about there being so many factors that it's hard to say.
"It's a trade-off."
I think I habituated into falling asleep in class and lecture-like settings. In high school I had to get up at 5:30 to catch the 6:30 bus (for a school day that started at 8:30, went to 4pm, and then I got home on the bus about 6:30pm), and I would fall asleep in the afternoon classes a lot, because I was a teenager and not good at going to bed at 9pm as would have been required to actually get enough sleep. But ever since then I tend to fall asleep in class-like settings, even with an adult schedule and enough sleep, and when I don't tend to fall asleep in the same part of the day if I'm just working.
It's Charles Xavier who has the school.
First you don't want me to hire you as near-slave labor. Now you don't want to starve. Make up your mind!
I recently quit caffeine and was fine for the first two days and then felt as if I were being dragged down to hades. Couldn't keep my eyes open.
I haven't had any caffeine since 1:30 and I'm fine.
I'm another "confirmed ADHD diagnosis" person who has the sleep problem with lectures. It was particularly bad with middle and high school math because I actually needed to pay attention and couldn't rely on my coping strategies of distracting myself or reading under my desk. I also picked up the constant drinking of water or soda habit to help me stay alert.
In terms of helping my students manage this kind of thing (and general lack of sleep or boredom in class), every so often I'll stop class for a couple of minutes and lead them in short movement or stretch breaks. At worst, I threaten them with the prospect of singing call-and-response scout camp songs (a threat I have actually carried out maybe 4-5 times in my career).
AIHPMHB I have a tremendous gift for falling asleep during online demonstrations- to the extent that I would doze off while sitting right next to my boss. To put my talent in perspective, I must acknowledge these were objectively exceptionally boring presentations.
30.2: Your students that survived this probably still have nightmares.
When I went to college, I met a group of guys who had my old babysitter as their high school teacher. Apparently, she got bored while giving an exam one day and stood on her desk to see if anyone would notice. It turns out, yes, they did notice.
I am probably not the first person to remark on the evident correlation between blog commenting and ADHD.
I have also fallen asleep while giving a test. I have not yet fallen asleep while teaching, though.
I have fallen asleep while standing up. I was extremely jet-lagged and extremely embarrassed and disoriented. We were on an extremely dull tour of a castle in Poland. I had thought I'd get to go to the hotel and sleep before having to sight-see.
I toppled over while listening to the tour guide, and kind of stumbled into a slump on the ground, which woke me up, but I was still super out-of-it. I was so disoriented and embarrassed, and the tour guide led me over to a bench by the gift shop, where I could hang out until the tour was over.
I have definitely told this story here before.
32: That's what they get for trying to call my bluff!
My wife can fall asleep instantly while reading or watching TV, but not while driving or bike riding or knitting. It's like her brain is wired only for "welp, I have nothing important to do with my hands and I'm safe from predators, might as well take a nap."
My wife can fall asleep instantly while reading or watching TV, but not while driving or bike riding or knitting. It's like her brain is wired only for "welp, I have nothing important to do with my hands and I'm safe from predators, might as well take a nap."
Yeah. I can barely stay awake reading or watching the TV.
OT: You can buy a whole lamb here. But dead and gutless.
Maybe you can get a live one with guts around Eid.
It's really hard to find anyone here.
Never mind, the Eid sacrifice has to be an adult animal.
There's mostly Russians here for foreigners. And more people speaking Spanish than I usually see in Pittsburgh.
36- ever hear of cataplexy? Tough disease- basically people who do that daily.
Being a tour guide is awful, but it's still a job, not a disease.
I usually studiously avoid because Tylenol overdose is my third biggest medical fear
Tylenol is usually so much more effective for me when I'm sick that I don't use alternatives, but my fear of overdose has led me to be more sparing and now I just use "regular" strength.
I really haven't had a fever in so long that I don't have an opinion on fever medication. I also don't seem to get headaches now that I'm old. Tylenol isn't very good for joint pain, so I rarely take it. I'll damage my liver the traditional way.
I don't remember the last time I had a fever that wasn't a side effect of a covid or flu booster.
I don't have ADHD; my concentration issues tend to be more mood related.
I had something like sleep hypopnea. I went to see a sleep specialist who was also an ENT, and he noticed right away how deviated my septum was. He said most white people have mildly deviated septa. Having undergone one himself, he was a real evangelist for the procedure. I would say that my snoring was initially almost gone and still about 80% reduced. Sleep definitely improved.
When I am really in pain, I go for Excedrin. Like with cramping, I'll go for ibuprofen, but if it doesn't work 90 minutes to 2 hours later I'll grab an Excedrin.
52: I worked on an inpatient med/psych unit. There was this one guy there for bad depression. He had a history of alcohol use disorder and had kicked a Percocet addiction. He had a *lot* of medical problems, but his liver was in great shape. Do Irish people have extra strong livers?
I'm honestly kinda surprised that anyone without ADHD is still commenting here.
That was me.
I think I'm fine, except that the internet has killed my attention span.
I don't think liver strength varies by ethnicity, but speed of metabolizing alcohol might.
Efficacy of metabolism definitely varies.
I blush when I've been drinking, but I blush pretty easily regardless.
For heebie and others - this sounds like a really dangerous thing to have! How much warning do you normally get??
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wait for a change in the fire's behavior, which usually means a change in the weather, or nightfall--a time when bombers don't fly and ground crews rarely work.Is this still right? Isn't it possible with FLIR to bomb the fire at night, and desirable to do so, with the fire naturally subsiding at night?
I'm not sure that firebombers gwerally have FLIR. Also don't they scoop up water from lakes by flying low over them? Wouldn't like to do that at night.
60: Lots of alcohol and acetaminophen together, though.
56: I've taken Ritalin to help with concentration, and it wasn't life changing.
There was a fire in southern California recently where the fire department mentioned using helicopters with "night-vision" capabilities. I don't know if they were actually dropping fire retardant that way.
62: About 5-15 minutes probably. There were some extremely dangerous driving experiences when I was a young idiot, yes.
Now I have strategies to tough it out if I'm only 10 minutes from where I'm going, namely finding a song that I can sing outloud to. For some reason knowing the words and singing them activates enough of my brain to sometimes reverse it. Can't do that during a meeting, but I'm less likely to die if I nod off.
66: good point. My knowledge of this is a bit out of date as I haven't been involved in firefighting for years and I'm not even sure if my parachute qualification is still valid (almost certainly not).
Parachuting at night is probably a whole big deal.
OT: There are so many Doctors Who in this.
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The typewriter, an old manual, hit Hubscher so hard that he lost his footing and slipped into the splintered and nail-studded debris under the backhoe.|>
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They hate their Low Traffic Neighborhood so much they're helping enforce it for free. Like the people who are so mad about the NYC congestion charge they decide they're gaming the system by taking public transit.
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Omg. We were just at the kids' winter piano recital. They were lined up sitting behind the piano, when it wasn't their turn. They were all facing the audience.
Afterwards, Rascal said, "Did you see me making weird faces? I literally got really sleepy all of a sudden and thought I was going to fall asleep! I really fell asleep for a little bit!" He was totally astonished and just couldn't fathom that you could feel sleepy in a situation like this.
At a piano recital, sleeping is about as good as it gets. It means the kids are playing fine.
Sleeping through a kid with a violin is difficult. If the kids have records and you can sleep, see a doctor.
But if the kids do have records, see an IP attorney.
80: But the real question is, did you notice the weird faces, or did he mask them adequately?
He masked them! I thought he was being very still, and I was mostly watching whichever kid was playing.
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liked the Bakhtiari: they looked like "stage assassins," he noted, but made no fuss about the British Empire.|>
No one ever did until it was too late.
79: I hate defending anti-LTN weirdos, but the signage is often really bad. Mostly for the timed ones (also with school streets): the signs are often put at locations where they don't have great visibility on the major road. Even worse, they can be a block of text describing accessible times, which can be hard to process for a driver making a split-second decision. This information isn't commonly published on maps (yet), nor do sat navs know about it.
Also, I'm kind of surprised by the lack of driver education the article mentions. I think the "motorcycle and car in red-bordered white circle" sign to mean "no motorcycles or cars" is weird and unintuitive (put a slash somewhere!), but I wasn't raised with it and that's the standard here. A white circle with red outline is part of the visual language giving an order forbidding something. It's common across Europe and I think most countries outside of North America.
Most of the rest of it is nonsense, though. Drivers wanna drive.
There was an angry old man who used to glare at people who violated the "no left turn" sign that is near me. I think his glaring got unnerving enough that the police came and wrote tickets.
That is, they ticketed the drivers so that the old man would stop standing at the corner. It's legal to glare at people while pointing at a sign.
So many people run the red light near our corner- where our kids have to cross each day- that I've thought about putting up a sign that looks like those announcing a red light camera, and putting tiny print around it that says something like, "Tell your legislator to support red light cameras"
People were ignoring the speed limit sign by my father-in-law, so he put up his own sign with a pointed finger and "this means you" as text.
re: 92
Yeah. My son's school is on a street with a timed LTN to enforce no driving around the time kids are walking to and from school. I think the LTN is a fantastic idea, but the signage isn't great. I think partly because the local council has slightly perverse incentives as some substantial part of their revenue comes from fining drivers.
Similarly, they introduced a load of LTNs during lockdown, and then removed most of them. I was totally in favour of the principle, but they did a really bad job of implementing it, and a lot of the criticisms levelled at it by drivers were correct. I wanted to disagree as I'm totally for reducing driving, and increasing walking and cycling, but it was:
1. absolutely true that the net effect was to funnel people away from affluent streets with houses and onto lower income areas with people in apartments,
2. the resultant traffic actually made public transport _less_ attractive as the buses were sitting in huge jams caused by the LTN introduction,
3. cycling became much more dangerous for anyone not making a short journey east-west (any longer journey now forced you onto the arterial routes where all the traffic had been funneled)
and my son's school had a 14 hr a day traffic jam outside it as it happened to be on one of the only roads in our part of the borough that wasn't an LTN.
They've started slowly introducing them on notorious local rat runs, which is great. I'd also support a lot more of them, generally, if they did put in better cycling provision on the main roads, and did something more intelligent re: public transport provision.
LTNs bar cyclists as well as cars? That seems like a bad idea.
"nor do sat navs know about it"
This is a root of a lot of problems, GPS's are always trying to avoid lights and stop signs and so pushing people onto streets where they shouldn't be. I don't know if there's any way to make it practical, but some kind of direct regulation of GPS's to force them to prefer arterials is needed.
They way Berkeley does this seems much simpler and nicer. Just put giant bollards/planters every few blocks that force cars to turn but let cyclists go straight. Through traffic stayed on the main roads because there were no good shortcuts through the residential areas. Of course you can't make it timed though.
Retractable bollards would. Haven't seen retractable planters yet.
That was me, weird that the first comment remembered and the second one didn't.
100: We have lost the technological heights of 1970's Berkeley. Now it's all flexposts and Jersey barriers.
No disagreement with 97. It's all in the implementation. On top of that the borough system's (awful, backwards, intentionally limiting) fragmentation means quality is going to vary wildly across the city. Around here they did studies to show that the traffic effects on arterials and boundary streets were minimal, but in some cases that backfired as the control "before" study was done near the pandemic traffic minimum.
LTNs don't generally prevent cyclists (dunno what it's like around ttaM), but at some point you're going to have to cross or go along an arterial (hrrm, I might be using that word wrong, most are more like collectors) and if traffic is more concentrated there, with poor bicycle infrastructure, it won't be fun.
99: I suppose the good thing is that the market is pretty concentrated, especially for non-dedicated-device sat navs, so if a country cared they could lean on regulation to fix it. Would probably destroy Waze, though.
They do bollards and planters here, too. Similarly this gate featured on the LTN Wikipedia page is near me, and has always made those blocks (I think there's two or three gates in a row) feel a lot safer.
The Berkeley planters thing was great when I was a pedestrian walking to high school on one of the roads that had them. But even then, in the early 90s, they also added speed bumps on some streets. I think locals (*cough* like my parents *cough*) worked out efficient ways to avoid the planters near their homes and then rejoin the side roads near downtown.
re: 98
No, they didn't block cyclists. But they were placed in a way that meant if you wanted to go any distance, rather than just a short 1 mile hop, you eventually had to go onto one of the non-LTN roads which were now vastly more dense with traffic and which have poor cycle lanes. So the net effect was to make short cycling journeys potentially more attractive to, e.g. kids, but commuting by bike much less attractive.
To be fair, infrastructure for cycling into central London from where I live, if you take one specific route, is vastly better than it was 3 years ago, so it's not all bad. But during the peak LTN period (2020-2021) locally, it was def. worse to cycle any distance.
Another thing that our local council have done with cycling infrastructure is to intentionally weave it through pedestrian infrastructure, e.g. deliberately running it behind bus stops, which works OK if you are pootling along at 5mph but if you are riding at the sort of speed you'll be riding if you are commuting a decent distance, or if you are an e-bike user, is quite dangerous. Pedestrians are often phone zombies with no spatial awareness so they will walk in front of you or unexpectedly move into your path.
I often choose to ride in traffic as I have more chance of maintaining a reasonable speed even though I'm more at risk from cars. And I'm not Lance Armstrong, when I'm commuting I'm probably averaging 12-15mph, not "racing" speeds.
People often point to the Netherlands for that, but actually, having spent quite a lot of time in the Hague for work, Dutch cyclists often ride at quite antisocial speeds through pedestrians, and the experience isn't the harmonious flow of road users that advocates will sometimes have you believe. It's vastly better than roads clogged with cars, obviously, and I'd take it over our current situation in London, but I think there's probably a better mix of cycling infrastructure suitable for commuting and longer journeys and slower mixed-use spaces.
I'm not a zombie, I'm playing Pokémon Go.
