I taught myself to wake up without an alarm in a week. Here's how it fixed my sleep

Ally Hirschlag discovers that waking up naturally can be surprisingly easy, if you take care of other sleep essentials.

My reliance on alarms has varied a lot through my life. When I was a teenager, I habitually woke up on school days before my alarm went off. I wasn't exactly jumping out of bed, but my internal alarm clock was reliable enough that I never worried about being late. That partly had to do with my always-on routine, which typically ended at 11pm, when I would crash out.

Then, in college, my sleep routine broke down due to a less structured schedule, and I began depending far more on my alarm. When I later entered the workforce, I switched back, reverting to a largely consistent sleep schedule and easily waking up alarm-free once again.

In my mid-30s, though, I found myself relying more and more on my alarm, and now I'm past 40, sleep doesn't come as readily at night, while groggy mornings have me regularly mainlining caffeine. 

So when my editor suggested I test out learning to wake up without an alarm, based on tips from sleep researchers, I eagerly accepted. My circadian rhythm needed a tune-up, and I was ready to put the work in to fix it.

After talking with experts, I decided a week of no alarms would be a reasonable time to try to reprogramme my own internal alarm. It involved a little preparation, however. 

The researchers I spoke with all suggested taking a few days to find my true sleep rhythm before starting (more later on how to adjust your circadian rhythm if this ends up not fitting your schedule).

I typically sleep for seven to eight hours, but my bedtime can be anywhere between 11pm and 2am. Occasionally, I'll fall asleep watching TV on the sofa, only to wake up at 2:30am, which makes it a real challenge to get back to sleep.

Thankfully, I happened to be going on a cruise and had ample time to observe when I naturally felt sleepy at night and ready to wake up in the morning. It turned out to be about 11:30pm and 8am – an eight-and-a-half-hour sleep period.

Getting adequate sleep is vital for our bodies and minds to function properly, and adults should generally aim for seven to nine hours (anything below six increases the risk of premature death by 20%). But there's no magic number that suits everyone.

"Eight [hours] is the middle, but some people are fine with seven, while some need nine," says Eti Ben Simon, associate director of the Sleep Innovation Labs at the University of Texas at Dallas. There will be some biological variability, based on your circadian rhythm, she says.

So how could I maintain this during a work week, when higher anxiety – and worrying about managing to sleep eight hours a night – often impacts my sleep quality?

The experts I spoke to say what's important is not just getting enough sleep, but adhering to a consistent schedule. "You want to make sure that you're going to bed at a pretty regular time, and that it's early enough that you'll be able to get that eight [and a half, in my case] hours that you need," says Helen Burgess, co-director of the sleep and circadian research lab at the University of Michigan in the US. "That regular routine will feed back, and often our bodies will start to relax as we get into that routine."

That advice was very reassuring as I was already anxious about potentially waking up too early (something I tend to do when I've an important event the next day).

Light and winding down 

My new routine also needed to incorporate natural light, to help sync my internal clock with my sleep schedule. Ideally, these work in tandem, so you're "tired at night and awake during the day", says Simon. Light plays a major role in this partnership by activating the hormones that signal sleep and wakefulness.

"Light is the single biggest regulator of the circadian clock," says Anna Joyce, a chartered psychologist, sleep specialist and researcher at Regent's University London. "It tells melatonin to turn off, and that it's time to be awake." Studies have also........

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