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View Full Version : tPF Combat Fatigue With the Army's 'Aggressive Napping' Strategy



DGUtley
10-06-2020, 09:17 AM
After more than a century with an image problem, napping is getting a rebrand, courtesy of the U.S. Army. Many of our perceptions of naps—and the kind of people who take them—go back to Victorian times, when women were seen as physiologicallyweak and frail (https://www.utoledo.edu/library/canaday/exhibits/quackery/quack4.html) and prone to fainting, requiring periods of rest and recovery to get through the day. Between the tight corsets and rampant “hysteria” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3480686)—a made-up diagnosis for wide range of psychological and physical symptoms associated with “female trouble”—Victorian women were perceived as fragile and childlike, requiring access to chaise lounges and rest cures.


Not only have naps been associated with weakness, but they’ve also been viewed as indulgent or lazy (https://elemental.medium.com/its-a-right-not-a-privilege-the-napping-resistance-movement-54fc147ba32b)—only for those who had the extra time to devote to sleep. So this week, when the Army released the latest version of their Holistic Health and Fitness (https://armypubs.army.mil/epubs/DR_pubs/DR_a/ARN30714-FM_7-22-000-WEB-1.pdf) manual, the inclusion of what the New York Times refers to as “strategic and aggressive napping” (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/01/us/army-naps.html)stood out. Here’s what you need to know about the practice.

https://thepoliticalforums.com/newthread.php?do=newthread&f=70


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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3y1XxNaCxA


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bYuq1JmPvI

Peter1469
10-06-2020, 10:03 AM
When I was enlisted it was common for soldiers to nap in garrison during the lunch hour. At some point in the early 1990s that started to be frowned upon for some reason.

Casey Jones
10-06-2020, 10:59 AM
Napping as a substitute for regular sleep/wake routines...doesn't cut it. As a 25-year railroader, I had a lot of experience with this.

We had erratic work schedules - on a list, next-up, next-out. No day/night differentiation. Shifts were 12/14 hours, in later years...when I got into it, shifts tended to be 6/9 hours with occasional 12-hour days. Basically you were done when the run was done, with a FRA limit of 12 hours of working.

Point is, when you try to nap, when you're on down-time...as, being held at a control point waiting for other trains or movements...you don't get the benefits of sleep. Any more than a candy-bar is a substitute for regular healthy meals. It might make it possible for you to finish the run without falling asleep; but without REM sleep, you do not get rejuvenating benefits of sleep.

And a long period of living like this, months or years, will cause health issues. Primarily, metabolism.

So...I say to this...no. Find a way to get the soldiers in the front lines, into some quality rack-time.