The Army finally realizes sleep is a good thing, encourages naps

| October 2, 2020

From Task and Purpose;

Sleepy soldiers everywhere, rejoice: The Army has officially endorsed naps.

Guidance in the Army’s new Field Manual 7-22, which outlines the service’s holistic health strategy, stresses the importance of soldiers getting enough sleep.

“Even for those who regularly obtain the generally recommended 7-8 hours of sleep per night, more sleep can result in even better alertness and mental acuity,” reads the document, dated Oct. 2020. “In brain health and mental functioning, there is no such thing as too much sleep.”

The guidance goes on to lay out a very detailed analysis of when and how soldiers should sleep, pre-sleep routines to adopt (“listening to soothing music, reading, or taking a warm shower or bath”), and says that in an instance when you’re unable to get enough sleep: nap like your life depends on it.

The Army even says how much caffeine you should have (400mg) and how often you should have it (every four hours). They also want you to not forget “productive self-talk” and mindfulness.

Being a chemical guy we always had MOPP suits lying around. They may or may not make excellent pillows when a tactical nap is necessary.

More at the source.

Category: Army, Army News, Big Army, It's science!

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26Limabeans

(“listening to soothing music, reading, or taking a warm shower or bath”)

Make love not war.
Lose the bayonet and shoulder a teddy bear.
Replace Hoorah! with ooh…ah..
No more canteen cups. Just sippy cups…..

Slow Joe

FIRST !!!!111

26Limabeans

wake up!

A Proud Infidel®™️

What took them so long to realize that?

Ex-PH2

Naps? I thought that only applied when Joe Shmoe didn’t show up for his watch section to relieve you so that you could home and get some supper and hit the sack.

Sapper3307

That’s Green Ramp, Pope AFB. I power knapped on that ice cold concrete many times.

Former 13D

Been there, done that. 2/319 AFAR Demon.

OlafTheTanker

The Tanker-specific gas mask bags that contained the mask and the canister you could connect to the internal filtration system with a hose also made great pillows.

Former 13D

I remember an NCO telling me that as a private, you’re guaranteed only 4 hours of sleep a night (and not necessarily 4 continuous hours of sleep.). In the field, we’d end ops at 12 midnight and wake up at 0600 am. As the FNG and a PV2, I’d have to sleep from 0001 until 0200, be woken up for radio watch, relieved at 0400 and have up to 0600 to catch some Zzzz’s….

5th/77th FA

Sgt Rizzo would be proud that this is finally official.

Harry

Next thing you know BUD/S will shorten Hell Week to 6 hours.

26Limabeans

With a nap in between.

5th/77th FA

Maybe my computer and I will BOTH take a nap between 1600 and 1700 hours this afternoon.

But FIRST, I gots to take a ride into the Big City….DAMN IT!

Bob Drennan

Yep those warm bath and USO bath bomb turned the battle. Yea the navy said the same thing a few years ago…didn’t do shit but they said it.

26Limabeans

Guard Duty:

“Specialist beans I am here to relieve you”

Uh..what?….oh..ok..uh…yeah…thanks.

Jeff LPH 3, 63-66

Used to grab “nooners” in the A/C cold water chiller space where we had a mattress on top of one of the chiller tanks that couldn’t be seen on entering the space. Had plenty of girlie magazines up there also.

26Limabeans

Used to work in a “secure” room while performing certain military industrial
complex materiel testing. Nobody comes in, nobody goes out while the
“test in progress” light is on.

I got more sleep in that room than at home.

Green Thumb

The Army has been asleep for a few years.

Its about time they wake up.

Green Thumb

Infantry has catnapped for years.

And the Army is now just figuring out that this works.

7711C20

That’s why they gave you a gas mask, self contained pillow.

timactual

I thought I knew how to sleep until I joined the Army. Concrete-no problem; wrapped around trees to keep from rolling downhill–no problem; curled up at the bottom of a hole–no problem; sitting, horizontal, vertical, and all angles in between–no problem.

The movie projector on which we ‘watched’ training films was called “the sleep machine”.

Green Thumb

Yep.

Hanging off a tree in the water, no issue.

10 degrees or less, no issue.

100 degrees or more (with monkeyass), no issue.

The one thing though that I always hated was fucking snoring.

11B-Mailclerk

Snored in formation at some presentation by a drone-on-and-on BC.

And not just one “Snerrk..”
“…SHHHNOOOOZZZZZZZZZZZZ….”

I have no idea how I stayed standing. I was -out-.

timactual

Used to own a mastiff. One morning I half woke up and while still mostly asleep I heard me, my wife, and the mastiff all snoring. Woke up laughing. Surprised the neighbors didn’t complain.

David

When you had the annual 6 hour MOPP4 exercise, off duty folks learned how to sleep in MOPP.

26Limabeans

Learning how to properly make up a bunk is a major deal in Basic.
Now we know why.

timactual

They let you sleep on bunks? Why, in my day…..

Dave

My wife says I’m a champion napper. I can sleep anywhere. I learned this skill at Fort Knox in 1972, in the back of a cattle truck. You always grabbed sleep where you could. When the time came, you got up and moved on. Whether it’s in the back of a 5 ton dump truck, lying on a toolbox or in a water filled hole. I didn’t know I was being deprived. You did what you had to.

Buckeye Jim

Serving onboard a destroyer at sea is a major exercise in sleep deprivation. It is definitely a young man’s job– could not possibly do it now.

Three fundamentals of life at sea are (1) long periods of routine boredom, (2) test everything, and (3) put it in the log no matter how trivial. As an example, during a boring, uneventful mid watch (midnight to 4 AM for you land lubbers) the OOD (Officer of the Deck) probably a LT or LTJG was leaning back into the Captain’s chair (NOBODY but the CO could use that chair !!). After a while the OOD actually sat in the chair and fell asleep. As the CO unexpectedly stepped on the bridge and the watch standers announced, “Captain on the bridge”, the OOD immediately woke up, jumped to his feet, and said, “Captain’s chair works, log it.”

USAFRetired

Napping ? Hell I was just inspecting the insides of my eyelids for light leaks.

A Proud Infidel ®™️

Inner eyelid PMCS!

rgr769

Gee, does this mean Ranger school is going to allow Ranger students to get 7 or 8 hours of sleep at night and have nap-time when on patrol?

timactual

LOL.

Topski

I was straight leg more than Mech, but nothing better than hooking your arm through the hand strap of a M113 head on bicep and snoozing as you rumble across the FRG.

thebesig

The guy was napping, tried to baloney his way out…

timactual

I can empathize but not sympathize with the poor SOBs situation.