Why can’t our body clock always determine how long we’ve been sleeping for? Why does a 15-minute nap sometimes feel like 3 hours when we wake up, and vice versa?
In: Biology
I think this varies from person to person. For example I woke up earlier and knew it was 4pm, checked my phone and it was 4:04pm because I knew I’d slept about 7 hours.
My wife however can lay down for 3 hours and think it was 30 minutes like you said.
Some people just have a better read on their internal clocks than others. I also have a good sense of time and an idea how long I’ve slept based on how I feel when waking.
Your “body clock” is not a real clock. Life isn’t a video game with numeric stats that work perfectly the same way every single time.
When you are asleep, you have **literally lost consciousness.** You are not accepting much sensory input from the outside world. Large segments of your “CPU” have been switched off, so to speak.
When you regain consciousness, your brain starts deducing things about the world based on the *new* sensory inputs — such as the sunlight changing around you, which might clue you in to what time it is. But this won’t be perfect, you will screw up, you will be confused, etc.
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