Sleep is so important to us grown ups. Yet when we have children sleep can be quite limited. If you have a child that wakes up multiple times at night or you just gave birth to a newborn. In that case you are trying everything you can to get a decent enough sleep. Sleep when the baby sleeps (yeah right!) or take a nap during the day.
I love my sleep, I have to admit that. If I don’t get a certain amount of sleep into me, I don’t function properly and can be quite grumpy. The average amount of sleep for an adult is 7 – 8 hours every 24 hours. As long as you get that, you feel quite refreshed.
For my birthday in January I received a Fitbit Charge HR from hubby. Mainly it is to track your steps, heartbeat, weight loss but also to track your sleep. I wear my Fitbit all the time that includes the nighttime. I love using it to track my sleep. Of course I am tracking my steps and the weight I am losing, too. We have a Wifi Fitbit scale which is pretty handy. All you do is step on it and it connects to your Fitbit and updates the weight.
Fitbit now has a new feature that allows you to setup a sleep schedule.
You set your bedtime which in my case is 22.30pm. You should aim to wake up and go to bed within 30 minutes of your target time. Waking up and going to bed at a consistent time can help you sleep better and get more sleep. It means I should be in bed at 22.00pm. This usually works out great when I am on at night with the kids.
You can specify which day during the week you would like to have this setup and also get a reminder on your phone when it’s bedtime. The coolest thing I personally like is the wake up alarm. The Fitbit vibrates telling you to wake up. To turn it off, you have to press the button to deactivate it, otherwise it will vibrate every 10 mins. Pretty much like a snooze button on your phone.
Sunday 26th June
Tuesday 28th June
Wednesday 29th June
It’s so funny to see the sleep pattern difference between days I am minding the kids at night and days I am off duty. As you can see Sunday was one of them days I was off duty. I’d nearly get 9 hours sleep if I wanted to.
The sleep quality is then divided into the times you were awake, how many times you were restless and both of it put into the minutes you were awake/restless.
I am quite obsessed with this app now as you can probably imagine. I can’t recommend a Fitbit enough to others. There’s always offers on to get it a bit cheaper.
If you have a Fitbit, what do you like most about it?
As a insomniac this seems like a good idea, although it may just show how little i really do sleep!`
Author
Oh I don’t know how you function lol I love my sleep too much. If you go to bed at a decent enough time, it’s actually easy enough to get a huge amount of sleep. x
I loved my Fitbit app. It was really interesting. I haven’t had anywhere near the amount of sleep you have in over 3 years.
Author
Brilliant Ross. Thanks a mill.
Author
Yeah, i can’t remember what my sleep pattern was like when Chloe was 7 months old. Not like it is now anyways. xx
I need to get this and try it. I have the most disturbed sleep but then I have a 7 month old baby so I guess it’s understandable lol x
Thanks Janine, sorry for the duplicate comment!
#FitbitLinky sounds class, I’ll defo be involved in that!
Just liked you on FB & followed you on Twitter so looking forward to seeing more about it. Ross.
Author
I think you got your blog sorted now on the comment luv so I just approved this comment 🙂
Stay tuned if you have a Fitbit so because I am in the process of setting up a Fitbit Linky for all bloggers. x
Have to say I love mine too. My sleep pattern is fairly similar to your’s actually! However, My Missus pattern is very different – she is averaging 3.5-4 hrs of sleep only – and this is nearly every night – and somehow she still functions as well as I do on 7hrs !!! I don’t know how she does it, I’d be in bits.
My primary use of the Fitbit is the HR function for when I’m exercising. I had 4 stents inserted into my heart in January so keeping my heart rate within a certain zone is crucial and it’s why I love my fitbit.
http://thestentedpapa.com/so-whats-this-all-about-then-ha/
I’ve got a Fitbit Charge as well and as someone who’s suffered with insomnia for years, i’ve found it fascinating to be able to track my sleep. xx
I would love to track my sleep too – lately I’ve been struggling with waking up during the night and feeling wrecked the next day!
I definitely need my sleep. This is so interesting. I normally lie in bed for a good 10 hours but how much I actually sleep during that time I don’t know! I need this app! X
I’d quite like to track it to prove to my other half why I need a rest day 😉
I’d be interested to see these results for myself. I get quite a lot of sleep but still always feel exhausted!
I love my fitbit 🙂 I do like tracking my sleep, and my sleep patterns have improved since I became more aware of how (badly!) I was sleeping…
Author
You will especially when you have kids and get little sleep anyway 🙂
Heya,
Great blog post ? I offered myself a fitbit and I am so looking forward to get it. I think I will be just as obsessed like you ?