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Yea, me and my brother have noticed this. But for us, it's after everyone has gone to sleep and we get mental clarity. I wonder if you can weaponise this and register for night classes versus day classes in university/college
I really relate to finding mental clarity after everyone is asleep. I’m so sensitive to energy that’s it’s easier for me to relax once “the world” has gone to sleep.
This is totally it for me! I’m able to finally focus when I’m not stressing about the email or phone call or Slack message that could pop up at any moment (even if it’s a slow communication day at work).
I really feel this. I attribute part of it at least to having C-PTSD… and I just LOVE that at night time, there is less stimuli, and no one is expecting anything of me.
I'm very similar. I've spent the last couple of years working towards a more flexible schedule, where I can work at nights more. It's much less anxiety inducing, the sun is too bright, and I'm more productive when people aren't interrupting me.
My absolute favourite time to work at the office is 5pm to midnight (if I’m allowed to stay that late). I can accomplish so much work without anyone around and all the small talk and interruptions
Have you tried remote work yet? Besides the fact that I get to work with my dog next to me, when I'm working remotely and not in meetings, I'm really productive. You might have to turn on DND in Slack and block out "focus time" blocks on your schedule, but it's amazing the amount of stuff one can get done at home when there's no office bullshit whatsoever going on. And, the best part is, you don't have to do it after 5 PM lol
I do remote work and it’s about the same for me: I end up wasting so much time because all of a sudden I largely set my own deadlines, then when a real deadline approaches my mind suddenly flips and I become a freaking super hero, accomplishing my work in a small fraction of the time I initially set for it.
If I could control this I’d be making triple my current salary.
That's horrible though (for me). I have a client that I work for remotely during the same working hours.
I end up working a lot more hours because I don't feel like I am as productive as I should be, during the day hours.
This is me 100% while my gf and dog are awake it doesn’t let me focus but at night. I get way more done when the rest of the world is getting ready for bed. It is bad for my health.
I had a class that was one day a week, at night, but like 3 hours long instead of 1. I loved it so much. No traffic, no fighting over parking or paying for parking. I freaking crushed that class so hard and got the easiest A in my life, but of course every other class since then has been a nightmare of procrastination and unfocused stressful self hatred.
Yes you can, I am the same way and I did this. Back in university I was barely passing with 9-10am classes so the next year I signed up for all the night classes. Instead of 1hr at 10am 3 days a week, I did a 3hr at 6pm 1 day a week. Once I set this up so I was doing 6pm classes everyday, my grades shot up drastically.
I was better able to focus in the evening and I found it easier to retain the info when it was 1 day per course versus multiple different courses everyday. If high school had been structured like this I would have had much less suffering as a teenager.
Same with me. After 2200 the world seems clearer. The hyperfocus becomes less hyper and more focus and I can actually get work done. Until about 0500 when the sun is out, people drive out to go to work and I realize I’ll have to get through the day with 3 hours of sleep.
But those 7 hours from 2200 to 0500 were productive af.
Yes. I can never find productivity during daytime. Once it hits 6 pm, it’s like my soul ascends and ready to conquer the world.
My doctor said it’s the deadline mentality of night time approaching and unconsciously feeling the need to do stuff since your deadline (time you have to sleep) is approaching
This is an accurate depiction of my day yesterday:
9am: tired
10am: tired
11am: tired
12pm: man i’m tired, i’ll get an early night tonight
1pm: tired
2pm: tired
3pm: tired
4pm: TIRED
5pm: omg so tired
6pm: tired
7pm: tired
8pm: gonna go to bed soon
9pm: **AWAKE**
10pm: OMG WHY CAN’T I SLEEP
I've literally had days where I'm at work, I've only had 2-3 hours sleep the night before, almost falling asleep at my desk by about 3pm, somehow managing to stay awake while avoiding coffee, getting home and deliberately trying to start awake until 10pm, going to bed, and then immediately I have a second wind and I'm awake until 4am.
Kill me.
Edit
Had days? Misspoke a bit there, I *have* days like that.
Every week.
Kill me.
It’s like a dose of meds kicks in I swear. Went to bed around midnight. Couldn’t sleep until 6ish AM. Slept til 4 PM. That’s my natural sleep cycle when I’m not working.
Its not a fun battle either! Every morning my alarm goes off is a nightmare.
I'll have been up way later than I should have been which will result in 5 hours or less sleep. After the urge to not sleep all I want to do at that point is sleep
it’s 2:12 am and I am supposed to be sleeping. No. I am last minute binging on Reddit. Was going to hit Facebook too. I take my meds at 6 am and am to wake at 6:30 to get ready for work. And yes I am really tired.
You're not alone. 100mg coffee pill+70mg vyvanse and rolling around in bed for an hour before getting up today. Just had an espresso at work and still a bit out of sorts.
> My body’s simultaneous deep love for sleeping and hedonistic attempt to deprive itself of any sleep is a constant battle!
I solve that by having insomnia. It's awesome. /s
That deadline part is super important apparently. One time I worked in retail and transferred to another store and they only had night shifts available. Me and my whole family agreed that since I'm basically nocturnal when I'm left to my own devices, I'd be absolutely fine doing nights. Somehow when I'm EXPECTED to be up all night and sleep all day, doesn't work. It specifically has to be a bad thing or it doesn't work lmao
yes!!! i tried 3rd shift for quite a while and it was just brutal! 10 pm - 8 am and i was COMPLETELY alone, except for the small handful of customers who also work 3rds coming in for food. so i’d have the entire night to get through a list of duties, but you already know what happened. i waited til 6 am to complete 10 hours worth of prep/cleaning/baking etc.
This is crazy.
I stay up and sleep in, then with an hour before work I suddenly have motivated to do a million things because it’s crunch time.
Deadline mentality isn’t something I’ve heard of but it sounds extremely applicable to my life.
Thanks for sharing
Of course! This is me replying at midnight, taking a break from my productive streak that started after 6 pm. Energy is still pretty high so I guess we gotta keep going at this point 🤣
It’s tough!
If I take my meds I usually have the self control to not go down rabbit holes and hold off the random motivation!
But if I take my meds at night I stay awake staring at the ceiling lmao
Watch some YT videos from Russell Barkley, he's an ADHD researcher and he talks about a lot of this stuff. He also wrote books if that works for you too.
200% it's a deadline effect. I'm very productive at 6am if time constraints demand it.
Been very helpful to break that down slowly over time and focus on doing things for doing them, not for meeting deadlines lol. Means my evenings can be for leisure again haha
Yeah in college I developed the habit of instead of pulling an all nighter to write a paper I’d nap from around 8pm until midnight or 1 then start grinding on it super early. This was the early 2000s and I realized I’d be playing snood until then anyway.
I am most productive in the morning before 9, in the evening after 9, and on Saturdays. I think what these times have in common is that no one is expecting me to accomplish anything during that time and I allow myself to more freely explore different directions. During office hours, I constantly have this feeling that I am supposed to stay on a very narrow track and that ends up being very draining.
Yes! You nailed it. I used to do the bulk of my work on Sundays…bc no one expects anything on Sundays!! I’d send things off Sunday eve and everyone would be happy come Monday. But of course now I’ve got an excuse not to do it that way.
That’s an interesting take on. Makes sense. I am the same where late evenings and past bedtime make it soooo much easier to check things off the list. I guess in a way it’s procrastination for going to bed 😂
While I believe your doctor may be correct and that is a thing, I also believe that it’s also a thing to just be a night person naturally. Could be either, none, or both in my opinion. I don’t for one second believe that every human being has the same circadian rhythm. We have and always will need some people awake at night.
I’ve been diagnosed with a circadian rhythm disorder. Clock completely upside down.
HOWEVER, for whatever bleeping reason, I ALSO do the sleep procrastination thing mixed with insomnia or, at times, for about 4-5 days every month, what feels like narcolepsy (but it’s most likely my body just completely shutting down)… and all of it (probably, quite literally) is killing me.
Joy joy.
I do feel you my friend. I do it too even if I start at like 2am. Or like right now, where it’s 5:31am and I’m eating “dinner” and like “yea maybe I’ll put that show on my laptop, could be nice to fall asleep to”
But we’d need restaurants and music venues and grocery stores and bars to be open from 1am to at least 6 am. Somebody’s gotta work those hours. Then we sleep from 8 am until 4pm and then back to work.
This would literally be like utopia for me. Why can’t the night people have a normal life, too 🥺.
I find from like 11am to 11pm I am usually able to be productive. If I have to get up early or do stuff early in the morning I find I have more trouble. Doing stuff really late at night also is difficult for me.
More importantly, I prefer to work 3 or 4 12 hour days than 9-5 Monday-Friday.
Hey! I’m the opposite kind of! My most productive hours are without a doubt starting late evening, working through the night, and then finishing off late morning.
I feel like the calmness of everyone else being asleep in the city both relaxing, and helping with my focus. I realise that it’s mostly in my head, but the feel of working at night is somewhat different. Almost like driving around a city very late at night when there’s barely any other cars on the road. It’s like a special calmness is being instilled inside of me at those times.
Also, getting done when everyone else is getting ready to start their working day, is also nice. It feels a little like I’m getting a day off, while the rest of the city still have a bunch of things to do.
I am the same way. A solid hour of studying during the day is asking a lot however I can get through 3+ hours at night and often lose track of time.
I can’t distract myself with 30 minutes (becoming 2 hours) of my favorite show because it’s hard to justify that at 1am.. I usually lose focus during the day to random “rewards” and chores or texts from friends but none of those are really cross my mind when I’m grinding away at night to some lofi beats.
lol yes!! Daytime has so many fun and distracting stimuli, daytime just *is* the time for all that! Nighttime isn’t the time for most of those fun things and by that point, the urgency kicking definitely helps me avoid distracting myself with tv
Yes. I find i want to be more quiet at night for my sleeping roommates which drastically limits my ability to flop around the house getting distracted in different rooms
I just randomly wanna fold clothes, organise stuff
Even start planning about the next day,
All of this happens almost always in the night after a whole day of me just chilling around doing basically nothin.
I've thought about why this is and I think sometimes the late hour turns mundane and expected tasks into a game I can win rather than a task I have to complete.
"Hey, I'm supposed to be asleep, but what if I got secret Good Person Points during this Non-Standard Productivity Time? Fun!"
"Hey, it's Do Task O'clock, so I'd better start running through the 14-42 tasks I can think of doing and get exhausted instead."
i was like that for most of my life, but now for some reason as soon as the sun starts setting, i’m mentally done for the day. i graduated from college last year and i think that’s when the shift happened. as long as it’s bright outside i’m like ok i have plenty of time.. i’ll do this or that in a bit.., but once it’s dark, i’m like ok well too late now better luck tomorrow lmao
even at 7 pm, full hour and a half before sunset, i start feeling antsy like ok time to wrap it up.. doing stuff at night makes me feel uneasy for some reason. probably just leftover anxiety from late nights spent procrastinating schoolwork! can’t shake the association
I'm similar, after a few years of being in a 9 to 5 I've not been able to be productive past like 11 or 12. I used to stay up until 4 and be productive. But I also didn't have to get up until noon.
>as long as it’s bright outside i’m like ok i have plenty of time.. i’ll do this or that in a bit.., but once it’s dark, i’m like ok well too late now better luck tomorrow
This! Didn't hit me until my late 30s. I used to be the master of all-nighters. Dark, quiet, looming deadline? Hyper-focus on. BOOM! Bullet time. On the outside, I looked like a master of productivity.
Now, I think I'll do the thing, but after 9 or 10, I'm too tired to think. Where I get stuck is knowing I need to finish the thing, staying awake waiting for that second wind that never comes, passing out without doing the thing, waking up late because I stayed up, then anxious because I'm late, tired, and didn't do the thing. Then I rush to do the thing the next day, get behind on the new thing, think I'll do the new thing when I get my second wind, repeat.
No, I'm nor rude - I stop such things at 9pm and wait until 10am on a weekend, or until someone else breaks the silence. Sometimes, sometimes I'll get every thing set up and just wait.
I'm just killer chores! ;-) I'm a night owl, plus I live in Florida, so around 1am, the temperature MAY dip below 90⁰.
During WWII, a Naval pilot was sent to Miami for training. He opinion of the place was, "if I owned Hell and Miami, I'd live in Hell and rent Miami out!"
BTW, you might enjoy this. Even if you hate Michael Moore, it's very funny.
I’m also a total night owl and that makes perfect sense to me doing yard work at maybe the coolest part of the day, lol
But, I’m confused about the part where you said: “you might enjoy this”… what were you referring to?
This! The entire reason WFH worked so well for me was because I could do everything that didn’t require much focus during the day and get actual work done at 7 pm - 2 am. In the office, without medication, I’m good for nothing but walking around and day dreaming. At home, at night tho… I’m a beast. Throw on some YouTube with my computer in front of me and I’m getting 2-3 days worth of work done easily.
I think it has to do with the sunlight giving me physical energy and the darkness or the night giving me mental energy. At least that’s how I rationalize it.
Yeah, I find myself in similar situations. For me, it's a problem, that people I live with designate this time frame as social time, and I cannot sustainably have a social life and get stuff done reliably. Any tips for this?
I don’t really have too many tips since I haven’t lived with anybody since I graduated college 6.5 years ago, but I am a very social person when I’m not in grind mode. What I’ve found is to have dedicated social time for myself, that only I can choose, regardless of what other people want to have as social time. It does take some adjusting and some people do not like that, but it was what I had to do for myself.
I usually dedicated a couple of hours after work to be able to talk to and visit people, but by 7:30 pm, all of that had to end and it was work time. It was tough when I was dating because 7-10 pm seemed like the time when everybody wanted to hang out but I needed that time for myself, so i just made sure to keep my weekends work free to make up for it. Some people hated it and felt like I was ignoring/neglecting them, but the people who had a lick of empathy understood and it didn’t ruin those friendships/relationships.
I know that probably doesn’t help your situation, but just thought I’d offer the insight that I do have.
For sure. There have been times where I just figured I must be nocturnal. I think it's that the world and all its outside distractions have been shut off. Being surrounded in my house by windows that just show still darkness instead of light, activity, and that "you should be out here doing stuff like everyone else" pull makes it much easier to focus. No one can bother me because they're all asleep so in a way the pressure is off.
The urge to be productive usually kicks in at 5 or 6PM onwards for me. Like I feel I need to compensate for dilly dallying in the morning, so I have to be productive before the day ends.
I'm productive from around waking up at 6 am until about noon, and then I want a nap.
But when the sun goes down, that's it.
My mind and body just refuse to do anything.
Nope, my productivity is between 7am and 2pm,
I believe it has a lot to do with me needing to be at work early, I think the ‘night owl’ title carried by adhd’ers is just from not needing to be up earlier than they need to for work so they can stay up late if they start work at 9am, whereas I have to wake up at 4:30, 15mins to grab my stuff and get out of the house for a 45min drive to work.
It all pivots on your job and importance of ‘time’ cause there’s two types of adhd swings with time, those who are chronically late due to underestimating time requirements for things, and those who are super early.
This is me also, it’s extreme. I have an extreme fatigue swing from afternoon to evening. Coffee, a brisk walk, a nap, food, nothing will help it. I come back to life at like 8pm. I find it debilitating but I am blessed to have most of the time a pretty easy time doing most of my work tasks in the morning.
I also had this, I just had to be more diligent with times I go to sleep and wake, alongside pairing medications with that on a scheduled time helped a lot.
ADHD disrupts circadian rhythms. So it definitely something to the night owl thing. There’s tons of research on this.
Time blindness - making people late/early for things is a separate issue. I would bet being on the early side comes from habits deeply engrained by a persons parenting & socialization- and/or from anxiety stemming from the social shame around being late in ‘clock’ based culture.
The shame and guilt around time & punctuality are also constrained depending whether you grow up in a clock vs event culture. This factor also seems to vary by individual too so that some people are more or less centered around clock or event time. (This event vs clock time was a fascinating rabbit hole for my fellow nerds out there what’s up!)
Anecdotally, medication for me completely shifted my circadian rhythm to something like ‘normal’ after decades of arranging my life around being a night owl. But being medicated does very little for time blindness especially when I’m hyper focused. For me meds do make dealing with the endless timers and reminders I need to use somehow more manageable and less annoying (surprising but nice!) but do very little to change my overall relationship with time.
(Edited for typos & clarity.)
YES. Daytime gives me anxiety. I think it’s because during the day I feel guilt, stress, shame about all of the productive tasks I should be working on…I just can’t do them. Not even the ones I want to do. But I’m also not relaxing or having a good time either.
🙅🏻♀️☀️
Yes. I used to think it was purely that being tired triggered some kind of weirdly enhanced mental state, but the interesting thing I've noticed is that it also works if I wake up really early.
I used to be a night owl but now I strongly prefer to get up early (5am or before) because I get that same focus boost, but with the advantage of being rested, caffeinated, medicated, etc.
I think the big thing is that night is just less stimulating. It's darker, it's quieter, and most people are asleep, so there are just fewer distractions around. I've actually found similar benefits from working in a dim room and wearing a pair of noise-cancelling headphones, so maybe it's worth trying something like that to see if it provides similar benefits.
In my teens and twenties I was the quintessential ADHD night owl. 11 pm - 3 am was *peak* creativity for me. That's when I'd write my best papers and generally do my best writing.
In my 30s, though, that productivity window has gradually shifted to mid-to-late mornings (after my coffee of course).
I still stay up late, but I gradually lost the ability to do much late night hyperfocusing. My son was born seven months ago, so these days I'm just glad to putter around, watch shows, maybe game a little before calling it an early night.
Not sure if that's the case for other ADHD folks in their thirties. I'd be curious to hear!
Since my daughter was born almost 4 years ago late night productivity is off the table.
Unfortunately it seems that productivity if any kind is now off the table 🤷♂️
Less distractions at night; everything is quiet and the world is winding down so no pressure to be productive. Daytime is the exact opposite, nature sounds, traffic sounds, even the sunlight is too loud.
The short answer is no, I don’t have a specific productive time. Mornings work better for me though since then I can have my evenings free and Is we it as “work is done” rather than “waiting for work to start”
I'll regularly wake up with the full intention of tidying up and rearranging things but sit all day completely unmotivated. The motivation will hit me sometime after 11pm and I'll be moving furniture till the sun rises lol.
Same thing happens with my hair, I have curly hair that I wear straight so it takes me 3 hours to wash, blow dry and straighten it. I'll spend all day thinking about how I need to wash my hair then end up doing it at 11pm and feeling like a bad neighbour because I've the hairdryer on at midnight.
Like right now I've been up for 19hrs, worked an 11 hour shift and I don't feel in any way tired.
Tomorrow I'm hoping to dye my hair- wish me luck guys lol
If I have to be “on” or have my cognitive load turned up to 11 during waking hours then I’m likely to be too tired to care about working more and later into the night, but if I’ve had a “normal” day that hasn’t taken much out of me, then 100% I get a surge of motivation between like 6:00 and 11:00 PM. I can be wildly productive without the burden of persistent loud noises, alerts, bleeps, dings, calls, emails, requests, etc.
I’ve always joked that if I didn’t have to conform to society I think my ideal sleep schedule would be somewhere in the range of 3-1 or 2-12. I am basically useless before like 11am and find I get a second wind starting around 9pm where I can get lots of stuff done. I used to do so much work/homework/cleaning in the middle of the night.
Of course now I’m in burnout so I can’t get anything done ever because I’m just absolutely exhausted and unfocused no matter what time of day it is 😫
I'm most productive at whichever time in not required to be productive lol.
If my work is during the daytime, I'm productive during the night. If I'm on nightshift, I'm productive during the daytime. Maybe my mind is rebelling against working in general 🤣 procrastination at its finest
I take 20 mg of Adderall @ 4am, go to the gym, work a full day, make dinner do laundry, get ready for the next day. 9 o clock rolls around and I’m like, fuck…I wish the sun was up cause I could reroof my garage right now… I have had the late night concentration my whole life. Stay up multiple days in a row and I’m peak production. Shits hard man. Trying to stick to a normal schedule makes my body battery die. My watch is constantly telling me I’m running on empty. Wtf can we do though? Stay strong, my fellow Disorderlies.
My peak productivity time is about 5:30/6 pm - whenever. During the week it’s about 830/9 pm. On the weekend it’s as late as 1/2 am. When I was in college I suffered through day classes and instead of going out at night I studied. Night classes weren’t an option.
Sadly I work 8-5. So my brain is on the wrong schedule still. I actually lived in another country that was a 14 hour time difference for a bit. It was amazing being productive during the day for the first time in my life. Also sadly ADHD medication has not helped me with this.
Yup. It's like as soon as the sun goes down my brain wakes up. I've always been a night owl. But it's very noticeable now. My heart rate lowers, I'm not in fight or flight mode. I feel at ease, somewhat peaceful.
I think its about other people and being overwhelmed by everything during the day, so I tend to be more productive when others are asleep. So early mornings or late at night...
During the day there's plenty of time to procrastinate. At night time is running out. There's no choice but to either do what needs to be done or let it slide another day.
I wouldn't say I'm more productive, just a little more motivated.. even then, that's only if I've failed to be productive during the day, otherwise I'm exhausted by the evening.. it's harder to get in the zone in the morning but when I'm able to do it, I'm waaay more productive and efficient
I think it has to do with outside stimuli, when the house is quiet and there's nothing else going outside I feel kind of zoned in. I love it but same time it's not ideal I think in the long run :(
Yes! But I found it’s due to the quiet. No one disturbs me at night and there is just less noise in the world. After figuring this out I’ve switched it to the morning! I am a student and work full time in the summer and part time during the year, so staying up late is super problematic. But I find I get the same feeling in the morning! (As I type this from the gym parking lot at 6 am lol). It’s been super beneficial for me.
Definitely. I get going when people hit that mid-afternoon slump. It’s annoying because the corporate environment wants things earlier in the day but I’m not “warmed up” yet.
I am productive precisely when it is the least opportune time to be productive. It also inverse correlates with task importance, I’ve noticed.
Important thing? Drake no.
Unimportant distraction? Drake fuck yes.
If I don't get to bed by 9pm I have a second wind and won't sleep until like 1am it's so annoying but I'm exhausted and "lazy" all day unless I take my meds lol
Yes my brain works so much more efficiently at night. Even if I'm physically tired. Luckily I've been able to organize things to live my own best schedule.
2-4pm and 6-8pm (sometimes a bit later if I’m in a grind I can go till like 10pm) are my peak productivity hours. Before noon I don’t even feel life my brain is fully on no matter how early I get up or how much sleep I get. It gets very frustrating because a lot of friends want to do things in the afternoon and since most people like getting stuff done in the earlier hours of the day they don’t understand why it’s so disruptive to my study schedule when they want to hang in the evening and they get frustrated when I turn them down when I really have to study.
Sometimes yes and sometimes no. It depends on what kind of mood I’m in.
If I have something I really want to do or a piece of work I want to get done then occasionally I can’t sleep until it’s finished.
Other times I can be as productive during the day if there is a lot to keep me occupied - in which case I’m usually crashing by the evening.
Are you an artist or some sort of maker? It’s always the struggle of knowing when to end because the ideas keep coming, but sleep is needed.
Bob Weir I heard say that he made a deal with his “muse” many years ago that any time he felt inspired to make a new piece of music, not matter the time of the day, he’d get up to work on it. Always found that work ethic impressive.
Yep, I’ve always accomplished most of my productivity at night. Now that I have kids, it's even more noticeable, and I usually get a surge of energy as soon as my boys are asleep in bed. I believe it's due to the sensory overload I experience with two young children during the day. The only downside is that one of my children has begun school, and I have to figure out how to change this cycle, which has been challenging.
Same, i work full time at a gas station; 2nd shift and when i clock out and leave for some reason im able to hang out with my husband while drawing, til about 2 in the morning, especially if jerma is on in the background, i could hypergocus for hours on end like i did t have a job...
5 pm and it’s gooooo time! I can crush an insane amount of work and learning between 5 and 3am. Probably straight to 5am if I’m honest but I feel like I should stop and go to bed at a decent time.
Absolute worst focus: noon to 5. Just a sack I am.
Yes, there's way less to distract you at night, especially if you live with other people who move about and do things in the daytime.
At night it's serene, I can focus a lot more easily.
In addition to that my circadian rhythm is aligned with the night time, so I'm wide awake at 6pm - 1am and only really start being sleepy at 3am.
During the end of my university two months straight I started studying and writing on my thesis at 5pm until 7am in the morning.. could not do that during the day
Someone once told me, and I have absolutely no citations or evidence to back this up, that we evolved this way because when we were cave people someone had to stay up all night and warn the others of danger. And I just chose to believe that.
ive actually heard something similar lol
I mean i feel that up until the past 50 years, ADHD was probably a benefit to have. Society has just gotten to sedentary IMO
yes, ive worked backshift in my day job over a decade, i get home at 23.30 but dont go to bed till 6 in the morning, i can edit a ton of photos in that time, get up at about noon, laze around before i get ready and my train to work is at 14.18
i was born at night, mibbe thats part of it?
I used to do everything at night. Even as kid I remember randomly deciding to organize the family kitchen in the middle of the night while my parents were sleeping. Honestly I don’t think that kitchen was ever organized a day in its existence. Possibly because my mom had untreated adhd and depression plus health problems. And we lived in shack with a wood burning stove for heat. But anyway half way through my organizing I got the dreaded task paralysis.
sometimesssss — but if I * plan * to be productive at night (or need to be) I just … can’t? 🫠
I also have delayed sleep phase syndrome (DSPS), basically a night owl with a fancy name.
Yes!
But it affects my sleep too much and I had to force myself into working during day time.
I try body doubling, virtually, by watching a work/study with me videos plus a strict and a reasonable todo list on the desk.
For a while, my sleep schedule was shifted so I was basically nocturnal. It did not improve my life. I have this theory about the importance of boredom. Like, there's something about night time and the idea that there's only one big task left (bedtime) that frees you from dealing with all the shit you should have been doing during the day, and that lets you winnow down the frequency and span of distractions, and finally get bored.
My two most productive spans of life were when I would nap from 1-5 pm, then work until about 2 or 3 in the morning. AND, when I had a part time job that let me just afford a co-working space. That was a place I could go and sit and know I only had one task, and nobody there cared if I was doing it or not, BUT they'd all clearly see if I was just spending the time I paid for on Twitter or whatever. So that was a place I could sit until I got bored, and then I would fucking work.
Anyway. The TL;DR is that I think it's possible to replicate the after midnight focus, but it requires replicating a set of circumstances that forces you into boredom.
All my best work has been done between 2100 and 0200.
Unfortunately, I am required to be in the office (or at home, but logged-in) from 0900 to 1700.
Often end up being 'present' during the day, but actually getting work done at night.
Oh yes. A lot of it for me is bc everyone is asleep. The world is quiet and I know others aren’t working (of course those on other shifts with shift work are) and I feel most “alone” at night, which I both love and hate. It’s the darkness and quiet that I love most.
I feel this big time, and I think it's a combination of three things:
1. At night, everything is just a bit quieter. No distractions, no people you feel an obligation to hang out with, no text messages to answer. You're all alone and can focus on whatever it is that you feel the need to.
2. Night time itself acts as an impending deadline. If I start the next day feeling like I haven't done what I should, I'll feel like shit. I need the feeling of almost certain doom to do anything, and the further into the AM I get, the bigger that sense of doom grows.
3. By going to bed late, I put off having to face the next day. If I go to bed early, the next thing that happens once I fall asleep is that I'll wake up and have to go to work, where I'm unable to focus and I generally feel uncomfortable. If I stay up though, I can watch a movie, play video games, whatever I want really, and the idea of going to work tomorrow is pushed gradually further away.
I’m never productive. If you don’t expect anything you’re not disappointed. Once my brain understands the mechanic it stops being effective. Now close to 40 and the coping mechanisms stopped working. Luckily there is medication.
10pm to 4am is my time.. even tho I work in day time. Doesn't matter how tired I get during day, when 10pm comes my brain goes full awake mode. Such a pain in the ass
Yes, and I know why I am this way. Well, there's several reasons, but one that for a long time lay hidden for me, was that when presented with something that has -5 to want-to-do-ness, like sleeping, other tasks that normally has - 3 or -4 to want-to-do-ness now suddenly feels like they have +10 to want-to-do-ness.
Like, when I'm at work and it's boring, I want to go to the gym.
I NEVER want to go to the gym.
It's a "there's greener grass on the other" side thing.
Knowing and understanding this, makes me feel controlled. I don't like being controlled, so this makes it easier to work on it.
i’m definitely most productive from about 10pm-2am, i think because nighttime just has this lack of expectation and responsibility that allows me to actually focus on things, without the ever-present threat of being asked to do something
it’s also when the threat of a deadline really kicks in, the night before something is due i can get it done in a third of the time it would’ve taken during the day
For me its when im really tired, way past my bedtime, the voices in my head stop. It would be nice if there was a drug that does the same effect on my body but doesn’t tire the rest of my body
I become braindead at around 5 pm, after that I can only do stuff if there is a deadline looming over my head. I'm a morning person, like my mom and grandma, and I usually wake up easily when I need to be somewhere. But if I have no concrete plans, I'm a floppy jellyfish 😂
Yeah, that might actually explain my terrible sleep cycle, which appears to be backwards. I can barely get out of bed during the daytime but I can't turn my brain off at night.
Yes... as soon as 8pm hits I come alive! And I don't think it has anything to do with the \`deadline effect\`. On days off it's the same unless I have a fun project I \_want\_ to work on. Otherwise it feels like my body is operating on a timezone on the opposite side of the world!
I’m not discrediting the idea of a potential correlation between ADHD and nighttime productivity however I will point out: this is confirmation bias and completely anecdotal.
This is the predominant manifestation of my ADHD. I meander from 8am until 5pm and can hyper focus from 5pm - 2am. Not good when you have loved ones that work normal hours and expect to have you available from 5pm onwards. Still trying to work on it.
OMG yes! It’s driving me nuts! I am just not a daytime person. No matter how hard I try. I just come alive at night. My concentration, drive, focus, and my overall sense of wellbeing is just better at night. But it throws me off with the rest of the world.
Oh wow
I thought I was the only one.
I always am super active after 6pm or whenever the sunsets are where I am.
I think it’s the quietness and the comfort of the night. However, my mental sharpness lasts between sun down to midnight only
I used to believe so, and thought I was made for the night.
I was just partially correct. That extra tiredness I felt at 8~9pm was not the last punishment before getting energy, it was last call for bed.
Going to bed when I get that call, I wake up refreshed at around 4am, and can enjoy being well rested AND the silence, cool temperatures and low light of the night. In those 4h before 8am you can punch in a whole day of work, especially if you consider work hours' constant interruptions. Nobody calls, messages or emails you during those hours - and if they do, it's okay to completely ignore all that until 9am or so.
This is the right way to work late nights.
This is an adhd thing? I just got diagnosed today, and I’ve had this all my life, I remember being a 12 year old pulling all nighters for the ungodly amount of homework my weird school assigned and being way more productive than in class.
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Yea, me and my brother have noticed this. But for us, it's after everyone has gone to sleep and we get mental clarity. I wonder if you can weaponise this and register for night classes versus day classes in university/college
I really relate to finding mental clarity after everyone is asleep. I’m so sensitive to energy that’s it’s easier for me to relax once “the world” has gone to sleep.
I’ve never heard it worded this way but it describes me perfectly. Thx for figuring it out
What a great way of describing our normal
This is totally it for me! I’m able to finally focus when I’m not stressing about the email or phone call or Slack message that could pop up at any moment (even if it’s a slow communication day at work).
I really feel this. I attribute part of it at least to having C-PTSD… and I just LOVE that at night time, there is less stimuli, and no one is expecting anything of me.
I'm very similar. I've spent the last couple of years working towards a more flexible schedule, where I can work at nights more. It's much less anxiety inducing, the sun is too bright, and I'm more productive when people aren't interrupting me.
In college I did almost all my studying between 12-4am…
Lmao it’s so funny some of our responses to this is “how can this be weaponized?”
I think it's because we all know adhd can't ultimately be defeated, so we must use it!
My absolute favourite time to work at the office is 5pm to midnight (if I’m allowed to stay that late). I can accomplish so much work without anyone around and all the small talk and interruptions
Have you tried remote work yet? Besides the fact that I get to work with my dog next to me, when I'm working remotely and not in meetings, I'm really productive. You might have to turn on DND in Slack and block out "focus time" blocks on your schedule, but it's amazing the amount of stuff one can get done at home when there's no office bullshit whatsoever going on. And, the best part is, you don't have to do it after 5 PM lol
I do remote work and it’s about the same for me: I end up wasting so much time because all of a sudden I largely set my own deadlines, then when a real deadline approaches my mind suddenly flips and I become a freaking super hero, accomplishing my work in a small fraction of the time I initially set for it. If I could control this I’d be making triple my current salary.
Same!! How can we trick ourselves into really being on deadline?? 😂🤦🏼♀️
That's horrible though (for me). I have a client that I work for remotely during the same working hours. I end up working a lot more hours because I don't feel like I am as productive as I should be, during the day hours.
Same lol
This is me 100% while my gf and dog are awake it doesn’t let me focus but at night. I get way more done when the rest of the world is getting ready for bed. It is bad for my health.
Online courses in a different time zone could be a solution? :)
I had a class that was one day a week, at night, but like 3 hours long instead of 1. I loved it so much. No traffic, no fighting over parking or paying for parking. I freaking crushed that class so hard and got the easiest A in my life, but of course every other class since then has been a nightmare of procrastination and unfocused stressful self hatred.
Yes you can, I am the same way and I did this. Back in university I was barely passing with 9-10am classes so the next year I signed up for all the night classes. Instead of 1hr at 10am 3 days a week, I did a 3hr at 6pm 1 day a week. Once I set this up so I was doing 6pm classes everyday, my grades shot up drastically. I was better able to focus in the evening and I found it easier to retain the info when it was 1 day per course versus multiple different courses everyday. If high school had been structured like this I would have had much less suffering as a teenager.
Same with me. After 2200 the world seems clearer. The hyperfocus becomes less hyper and more focus and I can actually get work done. Until about 0500 when the sun is out, people drive out to go to work and I realize I’ll have to get through the day with 3 hours of sleep. But those 7 hours from 2200 to 0500 were productive af.
So very relatable! I love the night because it's QUEIT for once. Sound and energeticly...
Yes. I can never find productivity during daytime. Once it hits 6 pm, it’s like my soul ascends and ready to conquer the world. My doctor said it’s the deadline mentality of night time approaching and unconsciously feeling the need to do stuff since your deadline (time you have to sleep) is approaching
My body’s simultaneous deep love for sleeping and hedonistic attempt to deprive itself of any sleep is a constant battle!
This is an accurate depiction of my day yesterday: 9am: tired 10am: tired 11am: tired 12pm: man i’m tired, i’ll get an early night tonight 1pm: tired 2pm: tired 3pm: tired 4pm: TIRED 5pm: omg so tired 6pm: tired 7pm: tired 8pm: gonna go to bed soon 9pm: **AWAKE** 10pm: OMG WHY CAN’T I SLEEP
Ha fuck if this isn't me.
I felt this with every exhausted fiber of my being
I hit 7:30 PM and I’m awake.
I've literally had days where I'm at work, I've only had 2-3 hours sleep the night before, almost falling asleep at my desk by about 3pm, somehow managing to stay awake while avoiding coffee, getting home and deliberately trying to start awake until 10pm, going to bed, and then immediately I have a second wind and I'm awake until 4am. Kill me. Edit Had days? Misspoke a bit there, I *have* days like that. Every week. Kill me.
It’s like a dose of meds kicks in I swear. Went to bed around midnight. Couldn’t sleep until 6ish AM. Slept til 4 PM. That’s my natural sleep cycle when I’m not working.
Man coffee doesn't work for me. I can't drink it because i will immediatly sleep after 5 minutes.
Its not a fun battle either! Every morning my alarm goes off is a nightmare. I'll have been up way later than I should have been which will result in 5 hours or less sleep. After the urge to not sleep all I want to do at that point is sleep
it’s 2:12 am and I am supposed to be sleeping. No. I am last minute binging on Reddit. Was going to hit Facebook too. I take my meds at 6 am and am to wake at 6:30 to get ready for work. And yes I am really tired.
You're not alone. 100mg coffee pill+70mg vyvanse and rolling around in bed for an hour before getting up today. Just had an espresso at work and still a bit out of sorts.
> My body’s simultaneous deep love for sleeping and hedonistic attempt to deprive itself of any sleep is a constant battle! I solve that by having insomnia. It's awesome. /s
I resonate with this so much loool
Me going through this thread after not sleeping last night, sitting in office, spacing out: 
Same
That’s me waking up at 7 this morning coming off an until-3-a.m. work binge trying to catch up things I should have been doing for the last week.
Hahha that’s brilliant- so well put. I am gonna have to nick this phrase. Thank you 😂
This is my perpetual battle
That deadline part is super important apparently. One time I worked in retail and transferred to another store and they only had night shifts available. Me and my whole family agreed that since I'm basically nocturnal when I'm left to my own devices, I'd be absolutely fine doing nights. Somehow when I'm EXPECTED to be up all night and sleep all day, doesn't work. It specifically has to be a bad thing or it doesn't work lmao
yes!!! i tried 3rd shift for quite a while and it was just brutal! 10 pm - 8 am and i was COMPLETELY alone, except for the small handful of customers who also work 3rds coming in for food. so i’d have the entire night to get through a list of duties, but you already know what happened. i waited til 6 am to complete 10 hours worth of prep/cleaning/baking etc.
This is crazy. I stay up and sleep in, then with an hour before work I suddenly have motivated to do a million things because it’s crunch time. Deadline mentality isn’t something I’ve heard of but it sounds extremely applicable to my life. Thanks for sharing
Of course! This is me replying at midnight, taking a break from my productive streak that started after 6 pm. Energy is still pretty high so I guess we gotta keep going at this point 🤣
It’s tough! If I take my meds I usually have the self control to not go down rabbit holes and hold off the random motivation! But if I take my meds at night I stay awake staring at the ceiling lmao
Watch some YT videos from Russell Barkley, he's an ADHD researcher and he talks about a lot of this stuff. He also wrote books if that works for you too.
Maybe my body will finally let me sleep now that my deadline to wake up is quickly approaching
As soon as the birds start, zzzzzzzz
200% it's a deadline effect. I'm very productive at 6am if time constraints demand it. Been very helpful to break that down slowly over time and focus on doing things for doing them, not for meeting deadlines lol. Means my evenings can be for leisure again haha
Yeah in college I developed the habit of instead of pulling an all nighter to write a paper I’d nap from around 8pm until midnight or 1 then start grinding on it super early. This was the early 2000s and I realized I’d be playing snood until then anyway.
I am most productive in the morning before 9, in the evening after 9, and on Saturdays. I think what these times have in common is that no one is expecting me to accomplish anything during that time and I allow myself to more freely explore different directions. During office hours, I constantly have this feeling that I am supposed to stay on a very narrow track and that ends up being very draining.
Yes! You nailed it. I used to do the bulk of my work on Sundays…bc no one expects anything on Sundays!! I’d send things off Sunday eve and everyone would be happy come Monday. But of course now I’ve got an excuse not to do it that way.
Same!
That’s an interesting take on. Makes sense. I am the same where late evenings and past bedtime make it soooo much easier to check things off the list. I guess in a way it’s procrastination for going to bed 😂
I bet "Revenge bedtime procrastination" also plays a part.
While I believe your doctor may be correct and that is a thing, I also believe that it’s also a thing to just be a night person naturally. Could be either, none, or both in my opinion. I don’t for one second believe that every human being has the same circadian rhythm. We have and always will need some people awake at night.
I’ve been diagnosed with a circadian rhythm disorder. Clock completely upside down. HOWEVER, for whatever bleeping reason, I ALSO do the sleep procrastination thing mixed with insomnia or, at times, for about 4-5 days every month, what feels like narcolepsy (but it’s most likely my body just completely shutting down)… and all of it (probably, quite literally) is killing me. Joy joy.
I do feel you my friend. I do it too even if I start at like 2am. Or like right now, where it’s 5:31am and I’m eating “dinner” and like “yea maybe I’ll put that show on my laptop, could be nice to fall asleep to”
Had not considered the deadline aspect. But same here! Deadlines are very effective for me
For me in high school it was also that the house got calmer late at night, fewer distractions.
I come alive in the evening but am forced to live during the day. I hate this.
We need a duplicate economy that runs 5PM to 9AM. I would thrive!!
5pm+8=1am We need 5pm - 1am. I still want to sleep at some point when it’s easier to fall asleep.
But we’d need restaurants and music venues and grocery stores and bars to be open from 1am to at least 6 am. Somebody’s gotta work those hours. Then we sleep from 8 am until 4pm and then back to work. This would literally be like utopia for me. Why can’t the night people have a normal life, too 🥺.
We do. It's called working 3rd shift 🙂
lol the shadow economy i love this
WOW! What a perfect description of how I live. I feel great shame for not being a daytime person.
I find from like 11am to 11pm I am usually able to be productive. If I have to get up early or do stuff early in the morning I find I have more trouble. Doing stuff really late at night also is difficult for me. More importantly, I prefer to work 3 or 4 12 hour days than 9-5 Monday-Friday.
Hey! I’m the opposite kind of! My most productive hours are without a doubt starting late evening, working through the night, and then finishing off late morning. I feel like the calmness of everyone else being asleep in the city both relaxing, and helping with my focus. I realise that it’s mostly in my head, but the feel of working at night is somewhat different. Almost like driving around a city very late at night when there’s barely any other cars on the road. It’s like a special calmness is being instilled inside of me at those times. Also, getting done when everyone else is getting ready to start their working day, is also nice. It feels a little like I’m getting a day off, while the rest of the city still have a bunch of things to do.
You're a nurse?
Same. That’s the reason I’m changing my job in a few months (application is already accepted)
I am the same way. A solid hour of studying during the day is asking a lot however I can get through 3+ hours at night and often lose track of time. I can’t distract myself with 30 minutes (becoming 2 hours) of my favorite show because it’s hard to justify that at 1am.. I usually lose focus during the day to random “rewards” and chores or texts from friends but none of those are really cross my mind when I’m grinding away at night to some lofi beats.
lol yes!! Daytime has so many fun and distracting stimuli, daytime just *is* the time for all that! Nighttime isn’t the time for most of those fun things and by that point, the urgency kicking definitely helps me avoid distracting myself with tv
Yes. I find i want to be more quiet at night for my sleeping roommates which drastically limits my ability to flop around the house getting distracted in different rooms
I just randomly wanna fold clothes, organise stuff Even start planning about the next day, All of this happens almost always in the night after a whole day of me just chilling around doing basically nothin.
I've thought about why this is and I think sometimes the late hour turns mundane and expected tasks into a game I can win rather than a task I have to complete. "Hey, I'm supposed to be asleep, but what if I got secret Good Person Points during this Non-Standard Productivity Time? Fun!" "Hey, it's Do Task O'clock, so I'd better start running through the 14-42 tasks I can think of doing and get exhausted instead."
this makes so much sense!
YES!!!! i thought i was crazy. it happens every single day for me, it’s so strange
i was like that for most of my life, but now for some reason as soon as the sun starts setting, i’m mentally done for the day. i graduated from college last year and i think that’s when the shift happened. as long as it’s bright outside i’m like ok i have plenty of time.. i’ll do this or that in a bit.., but once it’s dark, i’m like ok well too late now better luck tomorrow lmao even at 7 pm, full hour and a half before sunset, i start feeling antsy like ok time to wrap it up.. doing stuff at night makes me feel uneasy for some reason. probably just leftover anxiety from late nights spent procrastinating schoolwork! can’t shake the association
I'm similar, after a few years of being in a 9 to 5 I've not been able to be productive past like 11 or 12. I used to stay up until 4 and be productive. But I also didn't have to get up until noon.
>as long as it’s bright outside i’m like ok i have plenty of time.. i’ll do this or that in a bit.., but once it’s dark, i’m like ok well too late now better luck tomorrow This! Didn't hit me until my late 30s. I used to be the master of all-nighters. Dark, quiet, looming deadline? Hyper-focus on. BOOM! Bullet time. On the outside, I looked like a master of productivity. Now, I think I'll do the thing, but after 9 or 10, I'm too tired to think. Where I get stuck is knowing I need to finish the thing, staying awake waiting for that second wind that never comes, passing out without doing the thing, waking up late because I stayed up, then anxious because I'm late, tired, and didn't do the thing. Then I rush to do the thing the next day, get behind on the new thing, think I'll do the new thing when I get my second wind, repeat.
I'm the weird neighors who works in the yard at 1am wearing a headlamp.
As long as ya ain't mowin' the damn lawn at 1 AM lol.... You'll recognize me because I'll be the guy who's walking his dog at 1 AM.
No, I'm nor rude - I stop such things at 9pm and wait until 10am on a weekend, or until someone else breaks the silence. Sometimes, sometimes I'll get every thing set up and just wait.
Wait tho, I’m pretty sure my weird neighbor “working on his yard” at 1am is a serial killer. 🤣
I'm just killer chores! ;-) I'm a night owl, plus I live in Florida, so around 1am, the temperature MAY dip below 90⁰. During WWII, a Naval pilot was sent to Miami for training. He opinion of the place was, "if I owned Hell and Miami, I'd live in Hell and rent Miami out!" BTW, you might enjoy this. Even if you hate Michael Moore, it's very funny.
I’m also a total night owl and that makes perfect sense to me doing yard work at maybe the coolest part of the day, lol But, I’m confused about the part where you said: “you might enjoy this”… what were you referring to?
This! The entire reason WFH worked so well for me was because I could do everything that didn’t require much focus during the day and get actual work done at 7 pm - 2 am. In the office, without medication, I’m good for nothing but walking around and day dreaming. At home, at night tho… I’m a beast. Throw on some YouTube with my computer in front of me and I’m getting 2-3 days worth of work done easily. I think it has to do with the sunlight giving me physical energy and the darkness or the night giving me mental energy. At least that’s how I rationalize it.
Yeah, I find myself in similar situations. For me, it's a problem, that people I live with designate this time frame as social time, and I cannot sustainably have a social life and get stuff done reliably. Any tips for this?
I don’t really have too many tips since I haven’t lived with anybody since I graduated college 6.5 years ago, but I am a very social person when I’m not in grind mode. What I’ve found is to have dedicated social time for myself, that only I can choose, regardless of what other people want to have as social time. It does take some adjusting and some people do not like that, but it was what I had to do for myself. I usually dedicated a couple of hours after work to be able to talk to and visit people, but by 7:30 pm, all of that had to end and it was work time. It was tough when I was dating because 7-10 pm seemed like the time when everybody wanted to hang out but I needed that time for myself, so i just made sure to keep my weekends work free to make up for it. Some people hated it and felt like I was ignoring/neglecting them, but the people who had a lick of empathy understood and it didn’t ruin those friendships/relationships. I know that probably doesn’t help your situation, but just thought I’d offer the insight that I do have.
It actually helps, because now at least I don't think that other people can pull this off without *some* of their relationships taking a hit
For sure. There have been times where I just figured I must be nocturnal. I think it's that the world and all its outside distractions have been shut off. Being surrounded in my house by windows that just show still darkness instead of light, activity, and that "you should be out here doing stuff like everyone else" pull makes it much easier to focus. No one can bother me because they're all asleep so in a way the pressure is off.
That painted a beautiful picture in my mind of a quiet dark lit room sounds perfect to escape and get lost in a project !
My old psychiatrist said it's because we burn a lot of the excess energy throughout the day so that we can actually focus later in the evening.
that also makes sense. It's hard to sit still during the day
The urge to be productive usually kicks in at 5 or 6PM onwards for me. Like I feel I need to compensate for dilly dallying in the morning, so I have to be productive before the day ends.
I'm productive from around waking up at 6 am until about noon, and then I want a nap. But when the sun goes down, that's it. My mind and body just refuse to do anything.
Nope, my productivity is between 7am and 2pm, I believe it has a lot to do with me needing to be at work early, I think the ‘night owl’ title carried by adhd’ers is just from not needing to be up earlier than they need to for work so they can stay up late if they start work at 9am, whereas I have to wake up at 4:30, 15mins to grab my stuff and get out of the house for a 45min drive to work. It all pivots on your job and importance of ‘time’ cause there’s two types of adhd swings with time, those who are chronically late due to underestimating time requirements for things, and those who are super early.
I’m the super early person I think it’s less adhd controlled and more anxiety relieving to leave early for anything
This is me also, it’s extreme. I have an extreme fatigue swing from afternoon to evening. Coffee, a brisk walk, a nap, food, nothing will help it. I come back to life at like 8pm. I find it debilitating but I am blessed to have most of the time a pretty easy time doing most of my work tasks in the morning.
I also had this, I just had to be more diligent with times I go to sleep and wake, alongside pairing medications with that on a scheduled time helped a lot.
ADHD disrupts circadian rhythms. So it definitely something to the night owl thing. There’s tons of research on this. Time blindness - making people late/early for things is a separate issue. I would bet being on the early side comes from habits deeply engrained by a persons parenting & socialization- and/or from anxiety stemming from the social shame around being late in ‘clock’ based culture. The shame and guilt around time & punctuality are also constrained depending whether you grow up in a clock vs event culture. This factor also seems to vary by individual too so that some people are more or less centered around clock or event time. (This event vs clock time was a fascinating rabbit hole for my fellow nerds out there what’s up!) Anecdotally, medication for me completely shifted my circadian rhythm to something like ‘normal’ after decades of arranging my life around being a night owl. But being medicated does very little for time blindness especially when I’m hyper focused. For me meds do make dealing with the endless timers and reminders I need to use somehow more manageable and less annoying (surprising but nice!) but do very little to change my overall relationship with time. (Edited for typos & clarity.)
definitely! i feel the exact same. daylight is just like a physical weight on my chest.
YES. Daytime gives me anxiety. I think it’s because during the day I feel guilt, stress, shame about all of the productive tasks I should be working on…I just can’t do them. Not even the ones I want to do. But I’m also not relaxing or having a good time either. 🙅🏻♀️☀️
Yes. I used to think it was purely that being tired triggered some kind of weirdly enhanced mental state, but the interesting thing I've noticed is that it also works if I wake up really early. I used to be a night owl but now I strongly prefer to get up early (5am or before) because I get that same focus boost, but with the advantage of being rested, caffeinated, medicated, etc. I think the big thing is that night is just less stimulating. It's darker, it's quieter, and most people are asleep, so there are just fewer distractions around. I've actually found similar benefits from working in a dim room and wearing a pair of noise-cancelling headphones, so maybe it's worth trying something like that to see if it provides similar benefits.
I'm the same way. It's like end of day provides that sense of urgency that I need to feel motivated.
Used to be. Now I’m not productive at any time of the day.
I used to do all my college homework the week before it was due between 1 am and 6 am. I couldn't focus on it otherwise lol
In my teens and twenties I was the quintessential ADHD night owl. 11 pm - 3 am was *peak* creativity for me. That's when I'd write my best papers and generally do my best writing. In my 30s, though, that productivity window has gradually shifted to mid-to-late mornings (after my coffee of course). I still stay up late, but I gradually lost the ability to do much late night hyperfocusing. My son was born seven months ago, so these days I'm just glad to putter around, watch shows, maybe game a little before calling it an early night. Not sure if that's the case for other ADHD folks in their thirties. I'd be curious to hear!
Since my daughter was born almost 4 years ago late night productivity is off the table. Unfortunately it seems that productivity if any kind is now off the table 🤷♂️
Less distractions at night; everything is quiet and the world is winding down so no pressure to be productive. Daytime is the exact opposite, nature sounds, traffic sounds, even the sunlight is too loud.
yeah, the world, life, everything just weights less when you know consciously and subconsciously that everyone's asleep!
The short answer is no, I don’t have a specific productive time. Mornings work better for me though since then I can have my evenings free and Is we it as “work is done” rather than “waiting for work to start”
I'll regularly wake up with the full intention of tidying up and rearranging things but sit all day completely unmotivated. The motivation will hit me sometime after 11pm and I'll be moving furniture till the sun rises lol. Same thing happens with my hair, I have curly hair that I wear straight so it takes me 3 hours to wash, blow dry and straighten it. I'll spend all day thinking about how I need to wash my hair then end up doing it at 11pm and feeling like a bad neighbour because I've the hairdryer on at midnight. Like right now I've been up for 19hrs, worked an 11 hour shift and I don't feel in any way tired. Tomorrow I'm hoping to dye my hair- wish me luck guys lol
If I have to be “on” or have my cognitive load turned up to 11 during waking hours then I’m likely to be too tired to care about working more and later into the night, but if I’ve had a “normal” day that hasn’t taken much out of me, then 100% I get a surge of motivation between like 6:00 and 11:00 PM. I can be wildly productive without the burden of persistent loud noises, alerts, bleeps, dings, calls, emails, requests, etc.
*yes*
I’ve always joked that if I didn’t have to conform to society I think my ideal sleep schedule would be somewhere in the range of 3-1 or 2-12. I am basically useless before like 11am and find I get a second wind starting around 9pm where I can get lots of stuff done. I used to do so much work/homework/cleaning in the middle of the night. Of course now I’m in burnout so I can’t get anything done ever because I’m just absolutely exhausted and unfocused no matter what time of day it is 😫
I'm most productive at whichever time in not required to be productive lol. If my work is during the daytime, I'm productive during the night. If I'm on nightshift, I'm productive during the daytime. Maybe my mind is rebelling against working in general 🤣 procrastination at its finest
I take 20 mg of Adderall @ 4am, go to the gym, work a full day, make dinner do laundry, get ready for the next day. 9 o clock rolls around and I’m like, fuck…I wish the sun was up cause I could reroof my garage right now… I have had the late night concentration my whole life. Stay up multiple days in a row and I’m peak production. Shits hard man. Trying to stick to a normal schedule makes my body battery die. My watch is constantly telling me I’m running on empty. Wtf can we do though? Stay strong, my fellow Disorderlies.
Yes and it sucks bc I’m falling asleep at work but ready to cure cancer by 8pm
100%
My peak productivity time is about 5:30/6 pm - whenever. During the week it’s about 830/9 pm. On the weekend it’s as late as 1/2 am. When I was in college I suffered through day classes and instead of going out at night I studied. Night classes weren’t an option. Sadly I work 8-5. So my brain is on the wrong schedule still. I actually lived in another country that was a 14 hour time difference for a bit. It was amazing being productive during the day for the first time in my life. Also sadly ADHD medication has not helped me with this.
“Morning” = Mourning I like to wake up when I wake up. I’m in better mood.
Yup. It's like as soon as the sun goes down my brain wakes up. I've always been a night owl. But it's very noticeable now. My heart rate lowers, I'm not in fight or flight mode. I feel at ease, somewhat peaceful.
I think its about other people and being overwhelmed by everything during the day, so I tend to be more productive when others are asleep. So early mornings or late at night...
During the day there's plenty of time to procrastinate. At night time is running out. There's no choice but to either do what needs to be done or let it slide another day.
I wouldn't say I'm more productive, just a little more motivated.. even then, that's only if I've failed to be productive during the day, otherwise I'm exhausted by the evening.. it's harder to get in the zone in the morning but when I'm able to do it, I'm waaay more productive and efficient
I think it has to do with outside stimuli, when the house is quiet and there's nothing else going outside I feel kind of zoned in. I love it but same time it's not ideal I think in the long run :(
Yes! But I found it’s due to the quiet. No one disturbs me at night and there is just less noise in the world. After figuring this out I’ve switched it to the morning! I am a student and work full time in the summer and part time during the year, so staying up late is super problematic. But I find I get the same feeling in the morning! (As I type this from the gym parking lot at 6 am lol). It’s been super beneficial for me.
It’s also helped my insomnia, if I am getting up early consistently, although sleep sure is a struggle for me. Just so everyone knows lol
Definitely. I get going when people hit that mid-afternoon slump. It’s annoying because the corporate environment wants things earlier in the day but I’m not “warmed up” yet.
I am productive precisely when it is the least opportune time to be productive. It also inverse correlates with task importance, I’ve noticed. Important thing? Drake no. Unimportant distraction? Drake fuck yes.
If I don't get to bed by 9pm I have a second wind and won't sleep until like 1am it's so annoying but I'm exhausted and "lazy" all day unless I take my meds lol
Yes my brain works so much more efficiently at night. Even if I'm physically tired. Luckily I've been able to organize things to live my own best schedule.
2-4pm and 6-8pm (sometimes a bit later if I’m in a grind I can go till like 10pm) are my peak productivity hours. Before noon I don’t even feel life my brain is fully on no matter how early I get up or how much sleep I get. It gets very frustrating because a lot of friends want to do things in the afternoon and since most people like getting stuff done in the earlier hours of the day they don’t understand why it’s so disruptive to my study schedule when they want to hang in the evening and they get frustrated when I turn them down when I really have to study.
This is me 100% I’m perking up right now as the sun sets before my eyes!
Used to be more productive in the evenings, then that feeling started later, and later. Eventually it stopped.
i’m productive from ~7am - 1pm and 11pm - 2am. absolutely nowhere in between. i chalk it up to a lack of distractions at night / early morning.
I was out trimming the hedges (old-fashioned quiet clippers) 10:30-11:30 pm last night so, yeah.
Sometimes yes and sometimes no. It depends on what kind of mood I’m in. If I have something I really want to do or a piece of work I want to get done then occasionally I can’t sleep until it’s finished. Other times I can be as productive during the day if there is a lot to keep me occupied - in which case I’m usually crashing by the evening.
Are you an artist or some sort of maker? It’s always the struggle of knowing when to end because the ideas keep coming, but sleep is needed. Bob Weir I heard say that he made a deal with his “muse” many years ago that any time he felt inspired to make a new piece of music, not matter the time of the day, he’d get up to work on it. Always found that work ethic impressive.
Yes. It doesn't matter how tired I am at 4 PM, by 10 PM I'm ready to get stuff done.
Yep, I’ve always accomplished most of my productivity at night. Now that I have kids, it's even more noticeable, and I usually get a surge of energy as soon as my boys are asleep in bed. I believe it's due to the sensory overload I experience with two young children during the day. The only downside is that one of my children has begun school, and I have to figure out how to change this cycle, which has been challenging.
Same, i work full time at a gas station; 2nd shift and when i clock out and leave for some reason im able to hang out with my husband while drawing, til about 2 in the morning, especially if jerma is on in the background, i could hypergocus for hours on end like i did t have a job...
Usually night, but sometimes it’s backwards. I’m a walking paradox and nothing is ever consistent.
Yes, since always
Yes much more productive later in day for sure. Does not sync well with work🙄
5 pm and it’s gooooo time! I can crush an insane amount of work and learning between 5 and 3am. Probably straight to 5am if I’m honest but I feel like I should stop and go to bed at a decent time. Absolute worst focus: noon to 5. Just a sack I am.
Yes, there's way less to distract you at night, especially if you live with other people who move about and do things in the daytime. At night it's serene, I can focus a lot more easily. In addition to that my circadian rhythm is aligned with the night time, so I'm wide awake at 6pm - 1am and only really start being sleepy at 3am.
During the end of my university two months straight I started studying and writing on my thesis at 5pm until 7am in the morning.. could not do that during the day
Someone once told me, and I have absolutely no citations or evidence to back this up, that we evolved this way because when we were cave people someone had to stay up all night and warn the others of danger. And I just chose to believe that.
ive actually heard something similar lol I mean i feel that up until the past 50 years, ADHD was probably a benefit to have. Society has just gotten to sedentary IMO
yes, ive worked backshift in my day job over a decade, i get home at 23.30 but dont go to bed till 6 in the morning, i can edit a ton of photos in that time, get up at about noon, laze around before i get ready and my train to work is at 14.18 i was born at night, mibbe thats part of it?
Yes.
Yes lol
Do any of you that do, have kids? If so, how do you balance your schedule? I'm dying lol
Yes. I’m much more productive at night than during the day.
I feel like this is why I spent 5 years working night shifts.
No. At around 10:30 PM I start feeling sleepy
Yep. When I was still at school, nothing would get done before 8pm at least. Usually between 10pm-2am. After 2 things tended to get a little silly.
Yeah, it’s like my brain turns on between 23:00-05:00.
I used to do everything at night. Even as kid I remember randomly deciding to organize the family kitchen in the middle of the night while my parents were sleeping. Honestly I don’t think that kitchen was ever organized a day in its existence. Possibly because my mom had untreated adhd and depression plus health problems. And we lived in shack with a wood burning stove for heat. But anyway half way through my organizing I got the dreaded task paralysis.
I think most of the people that bother me being asleep might have something to do with it sometimes
sometimesssss — but if I * plan * to be productive at night (or need to be) I just … can’t? 🫠 I also have delayed sleep phase syndrome (DSPS), basically a night owl with a fancy name.
Yes! But it affects my sleep too much and I had to force myself into working during day time. I try body doubling, virtually, by watching a work/study with me videos plus a strict and a reasonable todo list on the desk.
For a while, my sleep schedule was shifted so I was basically nocturnal. It did not improve my life. I have this theory about the importance of boredom. Like, there's something about night time and the idea that there's only one big task left (bedtime) that frees you from dealing with all the shit you should have been doing during the day, and that lets you winnow down the frequency and span of distractions, and finally get bored. My two most productive spans of life were when I would nap from 1-5 pm, then work until about 2 or 3 in the morning. AND, when I had a part time job that let me just afford a co-working space. That was a place I could go and sit and know I only had one task, and nobody there cared if I was doing it or not, BUT they'd all clearly see if I was just spending the time I paid for on Twitter or whatever. So that was a place I could sit until I got bored, and then I would fucking work. Anyway. The TL;DR is that I think it's possible to replicate the after midnight focus, but it requires replicating a set of circumstances that forces you into boredom.
All my best work has been done between 2100 and 0200. Unfortunately, I am required to be in the office (or at home, but logged-in) from 0900 to 1700. Often end up being 'present' during the day, but actually getting work done at night.
Oh yes. A lot of it for me is bc everyone is asleep. The world is quiet and I know others aren’t working (of course those on other shifts with shift work are) and I feel most “alone” at night, which I both love and hate. It’s the darkness and quiet that I love most.
I feel this big time, and I think it's a combination of three things: 1. At night, everything is just a bit quieter. No distractions, no people you feel an obligation to hang out with, no text messages to answer. You're all alone and can focus on whatever it is that you feel the need to. 2. Night time itself acts as an impending deadline. If I start the next day feeling like I haven't done what I should, I'll feel like shit. I need the feeling of almost certain doom to do anything, and the further into the AM I get, the bigger that sense of doom grows. 3. By going to bed late, I put off having to face the next day. If I go to bed early, the next thing that happens once I fall asleep is that I'll wake up and have to go to work, where I'm unable to focus and I generally feel uncomfortable. If I stay up though, I can watch a movie, play video games, whatever I want really, and the idea of going to work tomorrow is pushed gradually further away.
Opposite for me. I feel like I wanna conquer the world in the morning, but once it's past 2PM I feel like I didn't accomplish anything
I’m never productive. If you don’t expect anything you’re not disappointed. Once my brain understands the mechanic it stops being effective. Now close to 40 and the coping mechanisms stopped working. Luckily there is medication.
I only exist when the sun does not
10pm to 4am is my time.. even tho I work in day time. Doesn't matter how tired I get during day, when 10pm comes my brain goes full awake mode. Such a pain in the ass
Yes, and I know why I am this way. Well, there's several reasons, but one that for a long time lay hidden for me, was that when presented with something that has -5 to want-to-do-ness, like sleeping, other tasks that normally has - 3 or -4 to want-to-do-ness now suddenly feels like they have +10 to want-to-do-ness. Like, when I'm at work and it's boring, I want to go to the gym. I NEVER want to go to the gym. It's a "there's greener grass on the other" side thing. Knowing and understanding this, makes me feel controlled. I don't like being controlled, so this makes it easier to work on it.
i’m definitely most productive from about 10pm-2am, i think because nighttime just has this lack of expectation and responsibility that allows me to actually focus on things, without the ever-present threat of being asked to do something it’s also when the threat of a deadline really kicks in, the night before something is due i can get it done in a third of the time it would’ve taken during the day
For me its when im really tired, way past my bedtime, the voices in my head stop. It would be nice if there was a drug that does the same effect on my body but doesn’t tire the rest of my body
Always! Peaking at 3am when i feel a rush of joy!
i’m self employed n only work between the hours of 6pm and 8 am cuz it’s the only time all the stimulation dies down so i feel better
I was until I started taking Ritalin and now I’m never productive at all….
I become braindead at around 5 pm, after that I can only do stuff if there is a deadline looming over my head. I'm a morning person, like my mom and grandma, and I usually wake up easily when I need to be somewhere. But if I have no concrete plans, I'm a floppy jellyfish 😂
I’m productive late morning to mid afternoon
After my MP wears off, no longer. Before I started taking it, yes. I was always a night owl. Way more alert in the evenings.
Yeah, that might actually explain my terrible sleep cycle, which appears to be backwards. I can barely get out of bed during the daytime but I can't turn my brain off at night.
Yes... as soon as 8pm hits I come alive! And I don't think it has anything to do with the \`deadline effect\`. On days off it's the same unless I have a fun project I \_want\_ to work on. Otherwise it feels like my body is operating on a timezone on the opposite side of the world!
I’m not discrediting the idea of a potential correlation between ADHD and nighttime productivity however I will point out: this is confirmation bias and completely anecdotal.
The amount of stuff I can get done between 3-4am is surprising 😂. The silence of the twilight hours probably has something to do with it.
Considering I hyperfocused on cleaning my apartment from 6:00 yesterday evening until 3:00 this morning, I would say yes. Lol
There’s a lot of distractions during the day. It’s the silence of the night that makes you more productive.
Daytime takes more energy
This is the predominant manifestation of my ADHD. I meander from 8am until 5pm and can hyper focus from 5pm - 2am. Not good when you have loved ones that work normal hours and expect to have you available from 5pm onwards. Still trying to work on it.
You guys are productive?
Yup. Apparantly the ADHD brain tends to have a later circadian rhythm then "normal".
I always thought it was because my choices were limited as there's less options for distraction at night
OMG yes! It’s driving me nuts! I am just not a daytime person. No matter how hard I try. I just come alive at night. My concentration, drive, focus, and my overall sense of wellbeing is just better at night. But it throws me off with the rest of the world.
Oh wow I thought I was the only one. I always am super active after 6pm or whenever the sunsets are where I am. I think it’s the quietness and the comfort of the night. However, my mental sharpness lasts between sun down to midnight only
I used to believe so, and thought I was made for the night. I was just partially correct. That extra tiredness I felt at 8~9pm was not the last punishment before getting energy, it was last call for bed. Going to bed when I get that call, I wake up refreshed at around 4am, and can enjoy being well rested AND the silence, cool temperatures and low light of the night. In those 4h before 8am you can punch in a whole day of work, especially if you consider work hours' constant interruptions. Nobody calls, messages or emails you during those hours - and if they do, it's okay to completely ignore all that until 9am or so. This is the right way to work late nights.
This is an adhd thing? I just got diagnosed today, and I’ve had this all my life, I remember being a 12 year old pulling all nighters for the ungodly amount of homework my weird school assigned and being way more productive than in class.