Friday open thread: jet lag cures

[dolorosa_12]

Today’s open thread is access locked because I’m travelling. I’m in Australia, visiting my family, and I’m at the stage of jet lag where I feel seasick, like the floor is pitching. My prompt, therefore, is selfish: tell me your tried and true cures for jet lag.

Mine is my mum’s favourite method: arrive on a flight that gets you into the country in the morning, and spend the first day awake, as physically active as possible. This tires you out, so that you can hopefully get to sleep at the appropriate time, even if it feels like daytime to you. In my case, this involved swimming 1km in the best outdoor harbourside pool in Sydney. Time will tell if I’m able to sleep — and stay asleep — tonight.

What about you?

Comments

[thawrecka]

Hoping to get everyone's tips because I'm taking a 7am flight to Tokyo next week, so I'll have to be at the airport insanely early. I've somehow managed to sort it so I'll be jetlagged even though it's only a two hour time difference! Frankly, I'm at the stage of life where even a daylight savings change gives me jetlag, so I need all the help I can get.

The tip about exercise on the first day is probably a good idea! I know on work days I know will be tiring, I exercise first thing in the morning to give me a boost of energy all day.

[dolorosa_12]

I hope you have found the comments here useful, in that case! And I hope you have a fantastic time in Japan.

[pauraque]

Easy, have a completely fucked up sleep cycle to begin with so you don't notice! (Okay, I wouldn't recommend that one, but it was true for me when I was younger.)

[dolorosa_12]

Oh no! That sounds absolutely awful!

[tetralogy]

I didn't particularly struggle with jetlag while I was in Australia in March, but it hit me like a truck when I came back to the States, so I'm not sure how helpful my advice would actually be if I only half-mitigated it lol. But I found two things that seemed to help: 1) spend a lot of time outside in the sun, and 2) eat when the locals do. Large doses of delicious Australian coffee in the morning probably helped too :)

This review in the Lancet is surprisingly readable (even if it refutes my second tip about food lol): https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60529-7. I'm assuming you have access to it through your work (or through other means), but if you don't, I can share the PDF. At the very least, maybe reading it will help put you to sleep :p

[dolorosa_12]

I’ve certainly been enjoying my share of Australian coffee! It’s one of the things I miss most. Getting enough sunlight is definitely not a problem — it’s so warm, and I’ve been swimming, hiking, and generally outdoors a lot.

I think jet lag is worse when you go against the rotation of the Earth (so west to east) — for me going to Australia is always harder than the return to the UK, so that would explain why you found it worse going back to the US.

Thanks also for the Lancet article!

[oracne]

Getting sun helps, and getting to bed a bit earlier than normal in the new location.

[dolorosa_12]

You’re not the first person to mention sunshine — I’m doing my best in that regard.

[chestnut_pod]

I'm afraid your mom's advice is my advice too! I will say that the gentlest and most effective sleep-drug I've tried is bonine or dramamine, the motion-sickness medications.

[dolorosa_12]

Thankfully the seasickness went away after the first night here, and the exercise (swimming! hiking! more swimming!) took care of the rest. It really does work better than anything else.

[isis]

Ugh, I've never felt seasick from jet lag - that sounds terrible.

I usually don't have too much trouble traveling (not zero, but not a lot) which I attribute to being very much a morning person, and trying to get natural light when I can. I don't sleep well on airplanes (even on lie-flat seats) so if I get somewhere first thing in the morning I usually still need a nap, but I do try to spend most of the day active and go to sleep at the appropriate local time.

Good luck!

[dolorosa_12]

I think the seasickness was due more to being in the air for 20 hours (and because of how the journey was broken, the second leg of the flight was 13 hours long), so that even after I stepped off the plane, my body felt as if the ground was rocking. I also can’t sleep well on planes, although this time around I managed five hours in total, which is better than the last three times I’ve made this trip, when I didn’t sleep at all!

I’m also a morning person, and you’re right that it helps. We arrived two hours later than the scheduled 7am, but even so it was obviously still morning, and I forced myself to stay awake until 8.30pm, which did a lot to help.

[corvidology]

Exactly the same method, actually. It's the only thing that's really worked for me in all the years I've been travelling.

[dolorosa_12]

It’s definitely effective, although it feels like hell on the first day.

[corvidology]

I've developed a strategy for the first day as well that doesn't feel bad and aids faster adjustment to the different time zone. Just because you have to stay awake, doesn't mean you have to be enormously active that first day.

I don't arrange to do anything elaborate with family and friends that involves leaving the house or garden. They're welcome to stop by and visit.

I only drink water or tea, no alcohol and no caffeine beyond the low levels in tea. Hey, I have to share tea with the family and friends that stop by! Limit sugary foods or, better yet, skip them. They'll still be there tomorrow!

While you should immediately start eating on the same schedule as the 'residents', eat lightly - your stomach is still on a different time zone and this is the fastest way to adjust that as well.

It's a good idea to stay seated, relaxed and not to move around a great deal. Stretching is good but while I know exercise invigorates so it seems counter-intuitive, it works against your body's time zone adjustment.

[nerakrose]

I've never had jetlag, so I have no advice. the closest I have to it, is when I've got a super early morning flight of the kind where I'll have to get up at, say, 2-3-4am in the morning to leave, I will about 10 days before travelling, set my alarm half an hour earlier each morning (and go to bed earlier) until I hit the departure day. If I don't I will feel terribly sick and awful and battle low blood sugars all day no matter how much or often I eat/snack.

I imagine I will do a similar thing if I ever have to fly somewhere with a massive time difference: gradually acclimatise to a different sleeping pattern ahead of time.

I hope your jet lag eases sooner rather than later!

[dolorosa_12]

That is really clever! I hate those early morning flights and just suffer through waking up at 4am or whatever, but your method sounds much gentler.

Thankfully, my mother’s tried and tested method proved effective (although I’m still waking up at 3am, four days later).

[lowhours]

last time i went through a big timezone change (16 hrs diff) i used the timeshifter app first free plan (https://www.timeshifter.com/) which gives instructions for a few days before, during and after both ends of teh trip. I found the overall experience pretty positive although i was more careful with caffeine than they really instructed. i didn't have heaps of flexibility around what i could do wrt waking up earlier or later in the leadup, but the crucial decision re: when to sleep on the plane and for how long (and when to dose with melatonin!) seemed to make a big difference. I found it rougher on the return for whatever reason; i dont know if there's any science on if it's easier to go "forward" or "backward" or if i was just exhausted from the second shift in a 2 week period lol. hope your shift back goes well!

[dolorosa_12]

That’s very detailed and structured (much better than my ‘sleep badly on plane, arrive in the early morning exhausted, do exercise and force yourself to stay awake to get even more exhausted, grimly staying awake until the evening and then collapsing into bed’ approach).

I don’t know if there’s any solid science behind it, but in my experience going west to east is much worse than going east to west — it always is way worse when I come to Australia than when I go back to the UK. I assume because you lose a day and go against the turn of the Earth.

[peaked]

WELCOME BACK TO AUSTRALIA! I hope you're enjoying the weather lol.

When I went to America 10 years ago, Mum told me to sleep on the flight when it was nighttime in America, not when it was nighttime for us. I think the flight even dimmed the lights in sync with the American clock. I think I just intentionally refused to sleep and instead spent that first day trying to get settled. (I remember I had SIM card problems.)

I think your mum has very good advice!

Other tip: Don't ever leave Australia. That's the easiest way to stay on the timezone lol.

[dolorosa_12]

Hahahaha! If Australia was otherwise unchanged in every way apart from being very close to Europe, I would never ever leave! I am indeed enjoying the weather, and swimming in the ocean, and the food, and the coffee, and being in the same place as my family!

I can barely sleep on planes, but I definitely did my best to follow what your mum advised. I stayed awake for the whole first leg of the flight, which was in UK nighttime, and then tried to sleep after they’d fed us on the second leg (which was Australian night time). My aim was to wake up and be fed breakfast on the plane, then land in Australia in the morning. I only got about five hours’ sleep in two separate chunks, but it helped.