Jetlag!

[elye]

I'm looking for advice on what I can take to help with jetlag. We are travelling to Europe in the summer, so I will be suddenly faced with a six hour time difference. Now, this will be bad enough for my diabetes control (timed injections and meals...things will be quite screwed up the first couple of days!), but I'm equally concerned about getting to sleep at the new time and not waking up at silly times, etc. I've heard good things about melatonin, but I'm not sure of how to take it...right before my new, temporary bed-time? Should I start taking it before we leave? Valerian has always worked for me on the odd night when sleep just won't come, as has coffea...any suggestions? (Can you tell I'm no world traveller...I've only done one time change before--three hours, to Vancouver--and it was very tough)!

[Mango04]

The best thing to do is drink LOTS of water before and during the flight. The one time I did that I hardly experienced any jet lag at all.

[VydorScope]

I always try to arrange travel so I sleep through the time change. It might take altering your schedule a bit before you leave, and short changing your self a bit on the sleep the day you travel but it does seem to help.

[Fiddle-Faddle]

Good advice above, and I would add that you MUST get outside as much as possible during daylight hours. Exposure to sunlight (or cloudlight or rainlight, whatever the weather!) is what will help your body reset its internal clock.

Naps during the day for the first couple of days are fine (heck, downright necessary), but be very careful not to nap more than 2 hours, or you will have major trouble sleeping at night. This will be very difficult, as your body will think that you've gone to bed for the night and will not want to get up, but drag yourself out of bed anyway and throw yourself in the shower.

You could try to be a hero and go without the nap for the first day, but in my experience, it turns out worse, because I could never stay awake the whole time, and would end up falling asleep during dinner, which (besides for being embarrassing) screwed up falling asleep at night.

For some reason, I have always found returning to the US to be much more difficult jet-lag-wise than leaving the US, but I don't know why.

Good luck!

[elye]

Great suggestions, everyone. Our flight is six hours, and we leave at 7:30 pm. I guess I'll take a valerian once we're in the air (I can NEVER sleep on planes!) and maybe get up extra early that morning so I'll be tired...I drink a ton of water normally, so extra water will be no problem. I may have to do my morning injection at 4 am for the last couple of days here...