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Jet Lag Guide
Managing Jet Lag Before Your Depart
Ask anyone with enough travel miles under his belt and you'll soon discover that everyone has a different "magic formula" for avoiding or overcoming the insomnia and sleep disruption associated with jet lag.
While, of course, no magic formula exists – and certainly no magic sleeping pill or sleep enhancer – you can do a lot before your departure to help you to maintain a productive and restful sleep cycle no matter what, and good preparation is the key.
First and foremost, making a few simple lifestyle adjustments to get a better night's sleep before you even decide to travel anywhere will help to ensure a smooth transition into (and out of) the new time zone.
As such, maintaining a consistent sleep cycle when you are at home represents the single most important way for you to overcome jet lag.
If you aren't currently going to bed and getting up at the same time each day, your body's circadian rhythms are already disrupted, making it all the more difficult for you to adjust and increasing the likelihood that you will suffer from jet lag induced insomnia. If you already suffer from insomnia, taking the necessary steps to deal with it before you travel is strongly advised.
Sticking to a balanced, healthy diet and exercise routine can also prove significant in pro-actively managing jet lag induced insomnia.
As with maintaining a regular sleep pattern, diet and exercise represent important components of a better night's sleep, regardless of whether you plan to travel. However, they become even more important when it comes to properly equipping your body to manage the stresses of international travel and the jet lag symptoms that results.
Regular exercise can significantly improve the consistency, quality and duration of your normal sleep cycle, as will including an appropriate balance of whole grains, proteins, fruits and vegetables in your diet. In other words, the more you commit to a lifestyle that promotes a good night's sleep, the easier it will be to overcome jet lag and the more likely you'll be to enjoy a good night's sleep upon arrival.
On a more specific dietary note, many medical professionals and experienced travelers strongly suggest gradually reducing, and then eliminating, your alcohol and caffeine consumption during the two weeks before your trip and especially during the week immediately prior to your journey.
For many people asking them to give up caffeine is a bit like asking them to cut off their right arm. So, if you can't give it up then try limiting your intake to the mid-afternoon period between about 3 pm and 5 pm.
Caffeine when taken late in the day tends to speed up your internal clock, while taking it in the morning tends to slow your clock down. Taken during the middle of the day, caffeine has little or no effect on your internal body clock.
If you look at the subject of caffeine a little more closely, you'll see that the commonly held belief that drinking coffee (or any other caffeinated drink) during the evening keeps you awake is, in fact, incorrect.
If you drink coffee during the course of the morning it will slow down your internal clock and it is this that causes you problems in getting to sleep in the evening. Coffee taken late at night speeds the clock up and in fact results in your waking early in the morning. This myth is of course not normally exposed because coffee drinkers will often drink coffee morning, noon and night!
You can also begin to "manage" your body clock by gradually and slowly adjusting your bedtime and wake up time in the week or two prior to your departure.
This one can be a little complicated so let's look at an example:
If you are traveling east to a destination that is ahead of you in terms of time you should gradually bring your bedtime forward by ten or fifteen minutes each day to bring it closer to the time at which you will be going to bed at your destination.
Confused? Let's say that you normally go to bed at 10 pm and the country you're traveling to is four hours ahead, so that at your normal bedtime the time there is 2 am.
At your destination you should have gone to bed four hours ago so, by gradually bringing your bedtime forward each night you are narrowing the gap. If you manage to bring your bedtime forward by two hours before your departure you'll find that when it comes to bedtime (10 pm at your destination) it will only seem like 8 pm to your internal clock, rather than 6 pm.
The same argument applies when flying west, except that in this case you need to gradually delay your bedtime by ten or fifteen minutes each night to close the gap.
Altering your bedtime in the week or two before your departure can be extremely helpful in countering the effects of jet lag, but don't try to alter your bedtime by more than about two hours. It might help to close the full gap of say four hours, but the disruption caused to your schedule at home will probably outweigh the benefit gained.
Remember too that one major factor affecting your internal body clock remains unaltered until you arrive at your destination and this is the actual period of daylight that your body experiences at home.
Also remember that your body adjusts slowly, so going to bed an hour earlier, or later, the night before your flight is only going to further disrupt your sleep cycle.
One other very important thing that you can do before your departure is to take steps to reduce your stress levels in the week or two before leaving.
Don't leave everything to the last minute and then run around in circles trying to do 1001 things all at once. Plan ahead and make sure that, as far as possible, everything that you need do at home before your departure is completed well ahead of time. Then, relax as much as possible in the days before leaving and try to make specific time available for this.
Also make sure that your journey itself is as stress-free as possible. Leave in plenty of time to get to the airport, allowing for weather and traffic conditions. If possible, take a taxi to the airport or have a friend drive you there so that you can get dropped off right at the terminal building and don't have to worry about parking the car.
Keep your luggage to a manageable size and weight and carry all of your documents separately from your hold luggage and easily accessible.
The information contained here should NOT be used as a substitute for the advice of an appropriately qualified and licensed physician or other health care provider.
The information provided here is for educational and informational purposes only and in no way should be considered as an offering of medical advice.
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