How to beat jet lag: 8 expert tips to put you on holiday time
Wide awake at midnight, asleep by lunch? Here’s how to fix jet lag and get your holiday off to a flying start.
Wide awake at midnight, asleep by lunch? Here’s how to fix jet lag and get your holiday off to a flying start.
You’ve finally arrived for your long-awaited holiday. The hotel is lovely, the weather is glorious and it’s time to relax. There’s just one problem – your body still thinks it’s somewhere over the Atlantic.
Jet lag happens when your body clock falls out of sync with the time zone you’ve landed in. Your internal clock, known as your circadian rhythm, is set by cues such as daylight, so when you cross several time zones in a matter of hours, it simply can’t keep up. The result? Tiredness at odd hours, trouble sleeping and foggy thinking, all while your body tries to work out where you actually are.
While you can’t beat jet lag entirely, symptoms usually ease after a few days as your body clock adjusts. To help speed things along, we asked the experts, including one of Saga’s own travel team, for their best ways to beat jet lag and start enjoying your holiday sooner.
Few people know jet lag quite like Cassie Stickland. As a senior product manager for Saga Holidays, she’s a regular long-haul flyer, often hopping between time zones in quick succession, so she’s learned exactly what works when it comes to getting your body clock back on track. Her first tip? Start adjusting before you fly.
“Planning is key,” Stickland says. “I know it isn’t the most fun tip, but it really is the crucial point.”
She recommends shifting your bedtime by half an hour each night in the week before your trip, going to bed later if you’re travelling west, earlier if you’re heading east. Even four or five days of gradual adjustment can close half the time-zone gap before you leave.
It’s a strategy backed by research, too. A 2005 study found that gradually shifting sleep earlier before an eastbound trip, combined with morning bright light, helped advance circadian rhythms and could reduce jet lag once you arrive.
The direction you’re flying makes a real difference to how jet lag hits you, and the good news is that age may actually work in your favour. As we get older, our body clocks naturally shift forward, making you ready to go to bed and wake up earlier.
Dr Mike Gradisar, head of sleep science at Sleep Cycle, explains that if you’re naturally an early riser, you’re already better suited to eastbound travel.
“The earlier you’re awake, the more suited you are to a location to the east of you,” he says.
Westbound trips, where you effectively gain hours and need to stay up later, can feel a little trickier, but adjusting your bedtime in the days before you fly can help bridge the gap, as Stickland suggests above.
Your journey doesn’t start when you land; what you do in the air matters just as much. Stickland says the key is matching your sleep on the plane to the time zone you’re heading into.
“If you’re arriving in the morning, do everything you can to sleep on that flight,” she says. “If you’re landing in the evening, try to stay awake. Take extra snacks, download something to listen to, even have a nap before you leave for the airport so that you’re wider awake.”
She’s also a fan of night flights where possible.
“I think it’s easier to sleep on a plane at night,” she says. “The airport experience is tiring enough, so by the time you board, your body’s ready for it."
When it comes to resetting your body clock, nothing beats natural light. According to Dr Gradisar, bright light is the most effective way to shift your circadian rhythm. His advice? If you’ve travelled east, get outside into morning sunlight to help your body catch up. If you’ve gone west, seek out evening light instead to help you stay up a bit longer.
It’s something Stickland swears by, too.
“Get out in the morning as soon as you can,” she says. “And when the sun goes down, try lowering the lights in the evening so that your body realises it’s nighttime.”
Most people think of extreme tiredness or the inability to sleep when they hear the words jet lag, but that’s not the only way skipping time zones affects your body.
According to the NHS, jet lag can also reduce the quality of your sleep and cause problems with concentration and memory. It can sometimes lead to digestive issues such as constipation, indigestion or nausea, and, in some cases, mild anxiety.
It might be tempting to leave the first couple of days of your trip wide open to recover, but Stickland says that’s a mistake she learned the hard way.
“If you’ve got nowhere you need to be, you just sleep when you shouldn’t sleep,” she says. “You might go to sleep at 2pm for a quick power nap, and the next thing you know it’s 8pm and you’re wide awake for the night.”
She’s not suggesting anything strenuous, just make sure you have enough going on between roughly 10am and 6pm to keep you from drifting off. You can still go to bed early and sleep in a little, but keeping those core daytime hours busy is key.
Stickland is a firm believer in eating according to local time.
“Sticking to set mealtimes is great,” she says. “Even if you don’t feel like eating, it’s another trigger that helps your body realise what’s going on.”
A 2017 study supports this idea, finding that shifting meal times by five hours was enough to alter peripheral circadian rhythms, suggesting that when you eat can help nudge your body clock into line. Dr Gradisar is less convinced, noting he hasn’t seen compelling evidence that meal timing has a big influence on circadian rhythms.
The science may not be fully settled, but if it helps you feel more anchored to local time, it certainly won’t hurt. On the less debatable front, stay hydrated and go easy on the alcohol, which can disrupt sleep further.
Melatonin is a hormone your body naturally produces in the evening to signal that it’s time to sleep. Taken as a supplement, it may help nudge your body clock towards the new time zone. A Cochrane review found that it can help prevent or reduce jet lag, particularly after journeys across five or more time zones, and especially when travelling east, and Dr Gradisar rates quality melatonin supplements as a close second to bright light for shifting circadian rhythms.
In the UK, melatonin is licensed for short-term treatment of jet lag in adults, although it may not routinely be available on an NHS prescription. That said, timing is important. NHS guidance recommends taking it at your normal bedtime in the new time zone, not before 8pm or after 4am.
It’s worth checking with a pharmacist or GP before taking it, particularly if you take other medicines or have an underlying health condition.
A few small items in your hand luggage can make a real difference. Stickland recommends an eye mask for blocking out light when you need to rest, whether that’s on the plane or in a hotel room where the curtains aren’t quite up to the job. She also suggests downloading a mix of audio before you travel.
“You might want something really relaxing if you’re trying to drift off," she says, “and then something really energising for when you’re waking up and your body thinks it’s 2am.”
Dr Gradisar agrees that low-stimulation activities can help bridge the gap.
“When you’re lying awake waiting for sleep, sometimes a low-stimulation activity like watching TV or listening to a podcast can be a helpful bridge until your body clock catches up,” he suggests.
Finally, don’t expect to bounce off the plane feeling completely normal – nobody does. Dr Gradisar points out that people adapt at very different speeds, with some able to shift their circadian rhythm by 45 minutes a day while others manage just 15.
Research suggests that older adults may find this adjustment particularly challenging, as ageing can make it harder to sleep well at the “wrong” time and to shift the body clock quickly, but that’s no reason to be put off.
Stickland says jet lag hits at any age, and the key is simply to be prepared.
“It’s all about planning, and being kind to yourself as you’re adjusting,” she says. Build in a few days’ grace, expect a wobble, and you’ll enjoy the trip all the more for it.
[Hero image credit: GettyImages]
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