Pretending you have jet lag to help overcome insomnia

Pretending you have jet lag to help overcome insomnia
Originally posted on Friday, August 26, 2005

CHANGE YOUR SLEEP PATTERN TIPS: I read a number of articles and chose to include the suggestions I kept coming across.

1 - Drink lots of water.

2 - Forget your old sleep pattern - those days are over (well, at least while you're on your trip) and work with local times only.

3 - Take sleeping pills before bed to help you a) get to sleep and b) stay asleep throughout the night. Lots of articles mentioned taking melatonin - interesting hormone. You can get it from health food stores, but not in Canada because it's banned here. Also, if the thought of taking sleeping pills doesn't jive with you, you might want to consider making an exception just for jet lag (real or imagined) because it really will help you get to sleep and stay asleep if you've had trouble doing so in the past.

4 - Wake up and stay up. Some articles said short naps were ok, but that would never work for me. Keep yourself busy, surf the net, play video games, go for a walk - whatever it takes. This day might seem really loooong. That's OK, it'll be over soon and tomorrow won't be as bad.

5 - Use caffeine if you wish, but don't over do it, drink lots of water and don't use it near bedtime. If you have too much you may find that you feel exhausted, but no matter how hard you try, you can't sleep - extremely frustrating.

6 - And this one is just from me - eat breads and pastas to help settle your stomach if you're not feeling good.

And Further Suggestions for Fake Jet Lag:
I asked myself what I would do if I were catching a plane to England (which I used to do once a year when my dad was working out there). The flights would always leave in the evening and arrive in their morning. I could never sleep on the plane, so I would end up staying awake for a day, night and day. Then, I would make sure I go to bed at a reasonable local time (that means 10 or 11pm for me) and get up at 8 or 9am (again, reasonable for me) and stay awake the entire day, doing the same thing all over again.