When my husband was in grad school and I was working, I would get up at 5:45, get ready for work, go to work, prep my classroom, and have taught my first reading group or two before my husband was even out of bed. Since he went straight through from college to undergrad, I wondered if he'd be able to get up for a "real" job. Obviously, this was a pretty condescending position for me to have about my kind, responsible husband.
Fast forward to now, and the tables have turned. Now he's working and I'm in school, with about six years of full-time work under my belt. But now I'm the one who's struggling to get up while he's up, dressed, and out the door. Seems like grad school is the real culprit.
Sleeping in sounds great, until you realize it actually makes you feel crappy on at least three levels: the level that tells you you are being an irresponsible adult, the level that tells you this is not a Saturday and everyone who has a real job is already hustling, and the level that tells you you have way too much to do to be snoozing. This summer I wanted to figure out how I was going to get up, get fed, exercise, get ready, and be "in the office" by 8 A.M.
As it turns out, it only took two steps.
Step 1: Alarmy
Alarmy is the best app I could find to get me out of bed. When I was a kid I had a little analog clock with no snooze button. With that baby I always got up for school when it went off because I knew if I didn't there were no second chances. I didn't have my first snooze button until college, when the downward slide of mornings began. Alarmy takes away the snooze button and forces me to get out of bed for it to turn off by requiring a task rather than a simple button slap. Mine is set so that I cannot snooze it, and I have to take a picture of a painting in my bathroom to turn it off. It has easily gotten me up at 6:15 every day since I started it, even when I really, really didn't want to.
Step 2: Re-vamped Morning Routine
One of the greatest things I learned being an elementary school teacher was how much I enjoy routines. Not that I don't love being spontaneous. But when I want to be efficient and feel accomplished, routines help me out a lot. The problem with my routine during the last academic year was one half not getting out of bed and one half not including transition times. It also made me do something I hate as soon as I got up: exercise. I wanted to wash my face and drink coffee, not pretend to kickbox.
(I have spent way too much time in my adult life trying to figure out how to incorporate physical activity into my life. I'm not a fan of exercising just to exercise, I never played sports, and I had been pretty fit (read as thin not actually healthy) so I didn't really care. But I figured this was not sustainable (and I realized I had just been thin not actually healthy and now I wasn't thin anymore either), so I've been slowly figuring it out over the last 3 years. And yeah, after 3 years it's STILL a work in progress!)
Anyhow, suffice it to say, the thought of exercising did not make me want to get up. The thought of coffee was slightly more motivating. So my new routine gives me what I want. And it has plenty of transition times. Before, it was like get up at 6:15, exercise from 6:15-6:45, shower 6:45-7:00, etc. Well, guess what, you can't start exercising the minute you get out of bed and you can't get into the shower as soon as you finish exercising because you are too hot. So it failed every day and then I just stopped exercising. So now I have plenty of transition time.
Weekday Morning Routine
6:15-6:30 - Get up, put on exercise clothes
6:30-6:45 - Drink coffee, eat breakfast, download news podcast, skim the paper
6:45-7:15 - Exercise
7:15-7:25 - Feed cats, make kefir smoothie, make bed, cool down
7:25-7:40 - Shower
7:40-8:00 - Get dressed
8:00 - in the "office" if working for home or leave to commute
So far, it's working. Since I started it in the summer, and I've stuck to it, I think it has a pretty good likelihood of working out through the semester. We'll see.
So, if you're in graduate school or are in some other situation and you are finding it is hard to get up, you are not alone. You are also not a worse adult than people that get up just fine in the morning. You may just need to think about what motivates you to get up (e.g. coffee) and use some kind of app that really gets you out of bed and prevents your brain from tricking you into staying in bed.
Good luck!
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