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[xylocarp]

Just wondering, did anyone out there take the LSAT in a month other than June while being very much not a morning person? Did it throw you off to wake up so early? I'm asking because I might be taking the October (or December or February) LSAT and the time at which it is administered is something I'm really worried about. No I am not focusing on this instead of studying.

I live with my SO and he's a bar manager - his work day goes from 7 PM to about 4 or 5 AM. At first I thought, when he got this job, that we would just have to see each other a lot less because one of us would always be sleeping, haha, but I've actually somehow been able to get my schedule to be so that we sleep around the same hours at basically no detriment to my life or goals so far. However, when, on occasion, I do have to wake up early, I'll take a sleeping pill at around 9, but even after 10 hours of sleep I feel weird and groggy, maybe because I'm just not used to it?

Basically I'm wondering if anyone has bad a similar problem, how they dealt with it, and hopefully how they ended up acing the LSAT anyway

Thanks in advance!

[lalalany]

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[xylocarp]

Alyson Hannigan? Are you hoping that doing well on the LSAT will help you land a role on Law & Order, or that it will help you relate to your lawyer husband on that show that you're on?

All of the above.

Regarding your question, I don't really have any great advice, other than my own plan, since I'm not really a natural early riser either:

I've been slowly getting to sleep earlier and waking up earlier over the past few months, for no particular reason other than the fact that it's time to grow up. (Nice coincidence that it'll help to get up early for the LSAT.) I used to wake up around 10 a.m., but now I'm getting up around 8 a.m. or so. At this point, I plan to to set my alarm to wake me 2 minutes earlier per day until it's consistently 6:00 a.m., which I plan to keep up until the test (and beyond?). At that rate, I will be waking up at 6:00 a.m. by early September, a full month before the test.

Maybe a similar strategy will work for you.

I wish I could do this, but if you read the first post, my schedule kind of forces me to be nocturnal right now (I think I might have not quite gotten that across). The best I could do would probably be to try to quickly adapt my schedule in the few days, or maybe week, tops, before the test, but I'm afraid this might throw me off.

[aboo5674]

If you want to perform at your best for the LSAT, you're going to have to adjust your sleep schedule back to going to bed early and getting up early before the test; I'd say a month or so before you need to start gradually adjusting back and should be at an LSAT sleep schedule at least a week before the test.

[TheMostDangerousLG]

Remembering that the LSAT is in the morning every month other than June makes me seriously reconsider retaking...

[ScottRiqui]

Remembering that the LSAT is in the morning every month other than June makes me seriously reconsider retaking...

I had to take the June test out of town, so I drove up the night before and stayed at a hotel near the testing center. I gotta say that waking up around nine, rolling into a late breakfast at IHOP and then leisurely making my way to the test center was *very* nice. I had a hard time getting to sleep the night before, so having to get up at six wouldn't have been pleasant.

[TheMostDangerousLG]

Remembering that the LSAT is in the morning every month other than June makes me seriously reconsider retaking...

I had to take the June test out of town, so I drove up the night before and stayed at a hotel near the testing center. I gotta say that waking up around nine, rolling into a late breakfast at IHOP and then leisurely making my way to the test center was *very* nice. I had a hard time getting to sleep the night before, so having to get up at six wouldn't have been pleasant.

Oh yeah, the night difference between February and June in terms of relaxation and wakefulness for me was like night and day. Or like the difference between 9 AM and 1 PM.

[xylocarp]

I had to take the June test out of town, so I drove up the night before and stayed at a hotel near the testing center. I gotta say that waking up around nine, rolling into a late breakfast at IHOP and then leisurely making my way to the test center was *very* nice. I had a hard time getting to sleep the night before, so having to get up at six wouldn't have been pleasant.

That sounds wonderful...

[RuleSubstitution]

Wait, people are actually able to sleep before the LSAT?

[xylocarp]

Wait, people are actually able to sleep before the LSAT?

I'm afraid of this too, since I have a history of not being able to sleep the night before a whole host of less important things (e.g. first day of high school, undergrad... volleyball tournaments...)

[LSACownsme]

Wait, people are actually able to sleep before the LSAT?

haha same here! I can never sleep before anything exciting! I'm wired and wide awake before first day of class (every semester), flights (esp international), friends visiting, interviews - errrythinggg! we need to start a "sleep training club" haha

[xylocarp]

Wait, people are actually able to sleep before the LSAT?

haha same here! I can never sleep before anything exciting! I'm wired and wide awake before first day of class (every semester), flights (esp international), friends visiting, interviews - errrythinggg! we need to start a "sleep training club" haha

I wonder if there's a thread about this in the lounge. I could use some sleep advice, haha.

[UnderrateOverachieve]

Xanax the night before and Modafinil the day of?

[TheMostDangerousLG]

Xanax the night before and Modafinil the day of?

Note to self...

[patfeeney]

At least for the week beforehand, try to go to bed and wake up at the time you would on test day.
If you really have trouble falling asleep the night before, take a Benedryl or a ZZZquil and you'll sleep deeply.

[LSACownsme]

At least for the week beforehand, try to go to bed and wake up at the time you would on test day.
If you really have trouble falling asleep the night before, take a Benedryl or a ZZZquil and you'll sleep deeply.

When i take Nyquil and similar stuff, it makes me groggy in the morning. Be careful with those, it can kill you during your test or you may simply oversleep. Happened to me before when I took Nyquil before an 8am... woke up at 11, didn't hear any of my 4 alarms. And yes, I took the correct dose

[michaelbluth]

I live with my SO and he's a bar manager - his work day goes from 7 PM to about 4 or 5 AM. At first I thought, when he got this job, that we would just have to see each other a lot less because one of us would always be sleeping, haha, but I've actually somehow been able to get my schedule to be so that we sleep around the same hours at basically no detriment to my life or goals so far. However, when, on occasion, I do have to wake up early, I'll take a sleeping pill at around 9, but even after 10 hours of sleep I feel weird and groggy, maybe because I'm just not used to it?

It sounds like your schedule doesn't force you to be nocturnal but, rather your SO's schedule forces your SO to be nocturnal and you've chosen to adapt. There's a difference, and that difference is everything. (If I'm misreading and your schedule does, in fact, force you to be nocturnal, I'd suggest taking a week off. Seriously.) I was in a similar boat before the October LSAT a few years ago. I have serious insomnia problems (which are better managed now than they were then. Thank you 1L for forcing me into 9am classes) and when I have my druthers, I default to being nocturnal, and have done my whole life. I can't take sleeping pills/NyQuil/whatever because sedatives give me severe panic attacks.

On average, when not being an insomnia-plagued stressball, I sleep about 7-8 hours a night if I go to bed when tired and let myself wake up naturally. I also do poorly with gradual schedule adjustments - I can never stick to them. The only way I've ever managed to set/reset my schedule is with a drastic, shock-to-the-system type of adjustment.

Here's what worked for me. I knew I needed to be up and out of bed around 6:30-7am on exam day. About a week before the exam, I got up at my usual mid-afternoon time and forced myself to stay up as late as I physically could the next day. I think I was up for about 30 hours straight. (Sleep deprivation's bad for you. Don't do this regularly and for the love of God don't drive or do anything of consequence on no sleep.) I set an alarm for 5am (earlier than I'd need to be up on exam-day) and finally let myself crash at about 9pm. Then I forced myself out of bed at 5am everyday that week and to bed/sleep by 9:30 or 10. Two nights before the exam I stayed up until about midnight so that the night before the exam I'd be working on less sleep than usual and thus, more likely to be tired. I also set my exam-day alarm for 6:30 (and 6:45, and 7am) instead of 5am so that I had a 90-minute insomnia window. (I.e., I could toss-and-turn for up to 90 minutes but still get enough sleep.) On exam-day, I actually woke up a few minutes before my alarm. Then I beat my PT average by 1 point.

TL;DR: About a week before the exam, force yourself to stay up until you're so sleep deprived that you pass out. Then get up in the morning and keep getting up in the morning for a week. Suck up the week of not seeing your SO that much.

[xylocarp]

It sounds like your schedule doesn't force you to be nocturnal but, rather your SO's schedule forces your SO to be nocturnal and you've chosen to adapt. There's a difference, and that difference is everything. (If I'm misreading and your schedule does, in fact, force you to be nocturnal, I'd suggest taking a week off. Seriously.) I was in a similar boat before the October LSAT a few years ago. I have serious insomnia problems (which are better managed now than they were then. Thank you 1L for forcing me into 9am classes) and when I have my druthers, I default to being nocturnal, and have done my whole life. I can't take sleeping pills/NyQuil/whatever because sedatives give me severe panic attacks.

On average, when not being an insomnia-plagued stressball, I sleep about 7-8 hours a night if I go to bed when tired and let myself wake up naturally. I also do poorly with gradual schedule adjustments - I can never stick to them. The only way I've ever managed to set/reset my schedule is with a drastic, shock-to-the-system type of adjustment.

Here's what worked for me. I knew I needed to be up and out of bed around 6:30-7am on exam day. About a week before the exam, I got up at my usual mid-afternoon time and forced myself to stay up as late as I physically could the next day. I think I was up for about 30 hours straight. (Sleep deprivation's bad for you. Don't do this regularly and for the love of God don't drive or do anything of consequence on no sleep.) I set an alarm for 5am (earlier than I'd need to be up on exam-day) and finally let myself crash at about 9pm. Then I forced myself out of bed at 5am everyday that week and to bed/sleep by 9:30 or 10. Two nights before the exam I stayed up until about midnight so that the night before the exam I'd be working on less sleep than usual and thus, more likely to be tired. I also set my exam-day alarm for 6:30 (and 6:45, and 7am) instead of 5am so that I had a 90-minute insomnia window. (I.e., I could toss-and-turn for up to 90 minutes but still get enough sleep.) On exam-day, I actually woke up a few minutes before my alarm. Then I beat my PT average by 1 point.

TL;DR: About a week before the exam, force yourself to stay up until you're so sleep deprived that you pass out. Then get up in the morning and keep getting up in the morning for a week. Suck up the week of not seeing your SO that much.

Thanks for the advice! His schedule is the one forcing him to be nocturnal, but I've sort of built my schedule around that - but not at all to as drastic an extent. What you did would work for me except that I wouldn't be able to go to sleep quite at 9 because I have a class until 9:50 a few times per week and office hours at my student publication until 10:30 the remaining week days (although I could almost certainly modify the latter for a week or two). After reading your success story, I'm thinking I might do what you did, or a variant, and try to go to sleep around 10 or 10:30 every day in the week leading up to the test, then the night before take a sleeping pill EARLY (maybe like 7 or something) (I don't have any problems with sedatives), and wake up by 4 or 5 to give myself some time to just be awake (given that it probably won't be a rapid process).

...Or I'll just take it in June.

[rambleon65]

It sounds like your schedule doesn't force you to be nocturnal but, rather your SO's schedule forces your SO to be nocturnal and you've chosen to adapt. There's a difference, and that difference is everything. (If I'm misreading and your schedule does, in fact, force you to be nocturnal, I'd suggest taking a week off. Seriously.) I was in a similar boat before the October LSAT a few years ago. I have serious insomnia problems (which are better managed now than they were then. Thank you 1L for forcing me into 9am classes) and when I have my druthers, I default to being nocturnal, and have done my whole life. I can't take sleeping pills/NyQuil/whatever because sedatives give me severe panic attacks.

On average, when not being an insomnia-plagued stressball, I sleep about 7-8 hours a night if I go to bed when tired and let myself wake up naturally. I also do poorly with gradual schedule adjustments - I can never stick to them. The only way I've ever managed to set/reset my schedule is with a drastic, shock-to-the-system type of adjustment.

Here's what worked for me. I knew I needed to be up and out of bed around 6:30-7am on exam day. About a week before the exam, I got up at my usual mid-afternoon time and forced myself to stay up as late as I physically could the next day. I think I was up for about 30 hours straight. (Sleep deprivation's bad for you. Don't do this regularly and for the love of God don't drive or do anything of consequence on no sleep.) I set an alarm for 5am (earlier than I'd need to be up on exam-day) and finally let myself crash at about 9pm. Then I forced myself out of bed at 5am everyday that week and to bed/sleep by 9:30 or 10. Two nights before the exam I stayed up until about midnight so that the night before the exam I'd be working on less sleep than usual and thus, more likely to be tired. I also set my exam-day alarm for 6:30 (and 6:45, and 7am) instead of 5am so that I had a 90-minute insomnia window. (I.e., I could toss-and-turn for up to 90 minutes but still get enough sleep.) On exam-day, I actually woke up a few minutes before my alarm. Then I beat my PT average by 1 point.

TL;DR: About a week before the exam, force yourself to stay up until you're so sleep deprived that you pass out. Then get up in the morning and keep getting up in the morning for a week. Suck up the week of not seeing your SO that much.

Thanks for the advice! His schedule is the one forcing him to be nocturnal, but I've sort of built my schedule around that - but not at all to as drastic an extent. What you did would work for me except that I wouldn't be able to go to sleep quite at 9 because I have a class until 9:50 a few times per week and office hours at my student publication until 10:30 the remaining week days (although I could almost certainly modify the latter for a week or two). After reading your success story, I'm thinking I might do what you did, or a variant, and try to go to sleep around 10 or 10:30 every day in the week leading up to the test, then the night before take a sleeping pill EARLY (maybe like 7 or something) (I don't have any problems with sedatives), and wake up by 4 or 5 to give myself some time to just be awake (given that it probably won't be a rapid process).

...Or I'll just take it in June.

Melatonin. It's your friend when you need to change sleeping habits. And a hell of a lot better for you (supposedly) than sleeping pills.

[exacerbated_recluse]

I have other issues with concntration and sleeping (I normally fall asleep around 4-5am) but having just satisfactorally taken the lsat in june, I would not even consider taking it earlier in the day. Concentration is more important than anything else for a top score, so unless you feel the effects of taking it in the mornjng are very minimal in your case or do not mind rolling the dice and cancelling if necessary then I would not recommend it.

[bizzybone1313]

It is a bunch of bullshit in the first place that the LSAT is given in the afternoon only once and 3 times in the morning. It should at least be around 10:00 a.m. and not this 8:30 a.m. bullshit. There are all types of studies that show that little children don't learn that well at that time of the day and that schools should start later in the morning.

[Icculus]

It is a bunch of bullshit in the first place that the LSAT is given in the afternoon only once and 3 times in the morning. It should at least be around 10:00 a.m. and not this 8:30 a.m. bullshit. There are all types of studies that show that little children don't learn that well at that time of the day and that schools should start later in the morning.

Actually, studies show little kids are morning people and are up earlier and it's not until adolescence that people go from being morning people to needing more sleep. Therefore it makes more sense to start elementary school earlier and high school later. The reason this doesn't happen is because of bus scheduling and the need to fit athletic practices/extra curriculars/etc after school. As for the LSAT, you're an adult who wants to be a lawyer, fucking suck it up. Like, seriously, if you can't deal with one early morning for a test find another profession.

P.S.: Bizzybone, the more I read your posts the happier I am I will never be in law school with you. You seem like someone I would never want to interact with. You also seem exceptionally self centered and self important.

Everyone else ITT needs to learn that as a grown up you need to wake up. Get used to it.

[rinkrat19]

If I let it, my sleep schedule naturally shifts to bedtime at 4am/wake up at noon. This process takes 2 days. I am the opposite of a morning person.

It takes me one day to shift it back to regular working hours, because I am a grownup and understand that sometimes you have to do what the alarm clock is telling you.

Man up, buttercup.

[Icculus]

If I let it, my sleep schedule naturally shifts to bedtime at 4am/wake up at noon. This process takes 2 days. I am the opposite of a morning person.

It takes me one day to shift it back to regular working hours, because I am a grownup and understand that sometimes you have to do what the alarm clock is telling you.

Man up, buttercup.

+ 1000.

[bizzybone1313]

It is a bunch of bullshit in the first place that the LSAT is given in the afternoon only once and 3 times in the morning. It should at least be around 10:00 a.m. and not this 8:30 a.m. bullshit. There are all types of studies that show that little children don't learn that well at that time of the day and that schools should start later in the morning.

Actually, studies show little kids are morning people and are up earlier and it's not until adolescence that people go from being morning people to needing more sleep. Therefore it makes more sense to start elementary school earlier and high school later. The reason this doesn't happen is because of bus scheduling and the need to fit athletic practices/extra curriculars/etc after school. As for the LSAT, you're an adult who wants to be a lawyer, fucking suck it up. Like, seriously, if you can't deal with one early morning for a test find another profession.

P.S.: Bizzybone, the more I read your posts the happier I am I will never be in law school with you. You seem like someone I would never want to interact with. You also seem exceptionally self centered and self important.
Everyone else

ITT needs to learn that as a grown up you need to wake up. Get used to it.

Nothing in my quoted post indicates self centeredness or self importance. I am a pretty chill guy in person. I get along just fine with people. Thank you very much. Why u hatin? The GRE can be scheduled at more conveient times unlike the LSAT. Maybe one day Adcoms won't reward lazy people like you that couldn't even muster a 3.0 in college just because you scored high on an overweighted stupid test. The morning time for the LSAT does negatively impact people every year and it does suck.