Jet lag
 

Dragging ass. Any tips?
I jogged five miles this morning which was like midnight to my internal clock.

Did you gain or lose? Hydrate. Limit caffeine. Make it thru to the normal end of a day. Try a melatonin if you have trouble getting to sleep.

Gained. I'm in Taipei. Tokyo next week. Yeehaw

Limit caffeine. Oops.

Well, limit it to strategic doses. No more at bedtime minus 4 hours. Also, go high protein on foods until you reset. Carbs make you sleepy.

Grab some water bottles and pound them, the heavy hydration keeps me as alert as caffeine does for the first 24-30 hours. Then it's a power nap and good for another 8. Peeing every 15 minutes helps too, forced exercise.

Worst case, stay awake for a full cycle and then retire at the end of the day. It's a pretty good circadian rhythm reset. Works for me, YMMV.

When I go to Europe I try to stay drunk for the first 24 hours or so. Same when I get home. I may be jet lagged, but I don't care.

Hey Dragon Ass is better than the other Asian disease, lack-a-nookie.

Sleep is the best cure for dragon ass.

I completely disregard the no caffiene/alcohol advice. I've been to India many times. Its 12 hours time difference, and the flight takes 22-32 hours depending on luck. It doesn't matter what you do, your toast. If your going to be a zombie at 9 am, you might was well be a slightly buzzed zombie.

I do use melatonin, and it works for me.

Near Brisbane this week. I was in Wellington and Auckland last week. At some point you just crash and get over with it. Scotch works for me.

I used to fly east coast to southeast asia and back quite a bit, I read somewhere about a technique which really worked well for me. Simply stop eating when you leave for the airport, stay well hydrated but eat little to nothing on the fligt, then tough it out on the far end and don't eat until breakfast local time, when you should eat a big meal. This really worked like magic for me, ymmv.

You have to eat, drink and sleep whenever you can while traveling. For sleep, I recommend Xanax. I am not a doctor.

Traveling east, I would take Ambien for a couple of days to help get me on schedule for sleeping. And massive amounts of espresso during the day to stay sharp. Traveling west (home) I would pretty much just suck it up...

Always worst heading east.
I used to just stay up until my normal bed time (local).
I would adjust within two days max.

Carter

The first thing I do is to try and have little sleep the night before flying. I then set my watch to the destination time zone as soon as the flight takes off, and immediately start living according to that time.

Given that I, due to little sleep the night before, am then already tired it is typically easy to fall into the routine of sleeping at the right time. Just two weeks ago followed this routine on 24 hour flights between Johannesburg and Miami (7 hours difference) and slipped right into the next work-day on either end with no issues whatsoever.

I have in the past tried the no-caffeine thing, bat that makes me a far worse person to be with than even jet-lag!

Your body adjusts to local time by about an hour a day. Being exposed to the sun helps adjust your body clock as well. I was perscribed Lunesta a few times when we went to the Sand Box. Worked well and didnt feel drowsy in the morning. I found out, by accident, if you stay awake for about 30 minutes past taking Lunesta you will see more halucinations than Jim Morrison on a saturday night. Just sayin'

I find this works for me too - I'm usually switched over to 'local time' within 24 hours. Best thing to counter jet lag is to force your body to switch over to the new time zone ASAP.

I travel to Germany from NJ about once a year (6 hour difference), and what I do is switch over to local time as soon as the plane lands. This includes eating -- I may not be hungry when I land, but I have a normal breakfast at around 8am, a lunch around noon, and dinner around 6-7pm.

As far as going to bed -- I will push myself and go to bed LATER than I normally do at home - around midnight or so. This assures me that I will sleep through the night. Next morning, I can wake up at 7am and I'm ready to go, and I'll be only slightly tired by day's end.

On one trip, I missed my connecting flight from Amsterdam to Stuttgart, and was stuck in the airport all day - instead of trying to sleep, I kept myself away by walking around, window shopping, eating...etc. When I finally got to Stuttgart, it was around 10pm. That night, I slept soundly, and was ready for work the next day.


-Z

When I do big time zone switches now, I've found that Ambien at night and coffee in the day gets me over the hump within about 2-3 days max. That doesn't help you today though...

I'm sure that flies in the face of the holistic/organic method, but it works!

Travel to Europe and Asia regularly. Z Man has it right....only addition I can make is if you have a very early arrival in your destination (say 8 am), then if you get desperately tired and cannot stay awake until the evening bedtime, take a 1 hour maximum nap early in the afternoon, say 1 pm. Force yourself to get up afterwards and move, go have dinner etc. You will feel like crap, but if you make the mistake of sleeping longer than the 1 hour max, you will do dastardly things to your internal clock and it will be a bad jet lag recovery.

I deliberately do not go to bed for the nap, rather sit in my comfy chair so I don't go to sleep too soundly (its not that comfy).

Dennis

Thanks everyone. Feeling pretty normal now. Just got back from a 5:30am jog. (Krap! That isn't normal!)

Eating too much.

Arrived from Brisbane a few hours ago. Having a beer or three. NZ Airlines Business Class is soooo nice. Slept a good 8 hours from Auckland to LAX. Left a not cheap, not expensive fleece jacket in the trunk of the rental car, I think. I just know I didn't have it when I got home. Normally, I "inventory" everything important with every plane/rental car change. Wallet, cell phone, passport, check.