I’m going to be sincere here. If you are regularly tired, lacking sleep, or have the “Leave me alone until I’ve had coffee” archetype; look for work at a different shift. Seriously. I was completely miserable at my java web dev job right out of college circa 2001. After a couple of years, I believed that I could not do my hobby as a job because I was completely miserable. Time passes with shitty dev jobs until 2003, I somehow got an apprenticeship doing machining. It was 2nd shift exclusively. It revolutionized me as a person. I’m 2nd shift, through and through. I guess that my point here is that if your eyes don’t naturally open really early, there are options and you should listen to your body.
I used to think I was a night owl, so I got an overnight shift. Was up most of the day at times. Eventually a doctor recommended I take provigil (which didn’t do much). Moved to a different job on second shift. Still miserable sleep. Learned enough that I got promoted into a 24/7 on-call role with lots of 5am start times for various projects and 9-5 meeting availability. Misery (which should not be a surprise).
I suspect my body isn’t on a 24-hour cycle. But good luck getting a doctor to take that seriously.
If you can, find a neurologist who specializes in sleep disorders. I know someone who described something similar after self-referring to a sleep doc and the doctor’s first words were, essentially, “you’re on an adjusted sleep cycle naturally, but we’re going to start tackling things in order of importance based on your symptoms and needs.” Was fantastic for them to get a doc who took it seriously, was sympathetic, but also realistic that biology might not mesh with what the world required of that person.
