A FINE LINE....

My last four day trip for the month of  May was challenging.  

Every morning we had a check-in that was so early, the "chickens" hadn't even gone to bed the night before!  San Jose.  Seattle.  Reno.  First flight of the day.  That meant I was getting up at 2 am every day.  I kept counting my blessings it was Pacific time and NOT Eastern time.  I know that's a silver lining!

I also noticed another unusual phenomenon.  Although it was very difficult to begin shutting down early evening the night before and be in bed by 8 pm,  albeit I couldn't really get to sleep until about an hour later, my back didn't ache from being in bed too long.  

Oh, believe me, I was plenty tired.  My eyes were drooping even more than they usually do when I sit down and am not actively moving.  I was yawning in the passengers' faces, and desperate for even a 15 minute cat nap if the possibility presented itself.

But...I was still nimble.  My back didn't ache.  I could WALK across the floor when I jumped out of bed instead of hobbling into the bathroom.  Those are the symptoms I notice when I get eight hours of sleep--and one wonderful night when I slept and slept and slept until I had been in bed for TEN hours.  (That doesn't happen very often.  In fact in my whole lifetime, maybe a handful of times.)  Staying in bed for a lot of hours makes it so I'm not "sleepy tired", but it takes a lot longer to get moving in the morning.

So, I have decided there is a FINE LINE between being in bed for a small amount of time and not getting enough sleep...and getting enough sleep but being in bed so long that my body doesn't function.  And now I'm wondering, WHAT IS THAT MAGICAL NUMBER OF HOURS IN BED?

I'm looking into that "Fine Line"...Does someone have an answer?