This week, I’ve been feeling, somehow, a little more than usual that my work isn’t going very smoothly. Everything seems to start at the wrong time. I get sleepy too early in the evening, and by 10:30 a.m. I’m already itching to take my lunch break. Reflecting on a couple of unproductive days, it hit me—of course, it’s that darn clock change.
In the spring, Michael—the boss from the office sitcom—can crack his “that’s what she said” joke about setting the clock back, but in the fall, the clock is set forward by an hour. But between us, it makes no difference—in both cases, your rhythm is thrown off for a week. For some reason, I sometimes find this one-hour shift even harder to adjust to than the several-hour time differences you encounter when traveling. I suppose the reason is that when adjusting to a longer time difference, you actually take steps to make up for it. An hour’s difference seems like nothing, but in reality, it really is something.
Governments around the world are constantly debating and analyzing whether to change the clocks or not, whether it’s beneficial or not, and whether to stick with daylight saving time or standard time. Ordinary people, however, have thrown their already fragile sleep patterns into disarray, and instead of saving energy, we end up with reduced productivity. So what can be done?
I Googled how to adjust my body to the time change and found an article titled "Adjusting to daylight savings time". So what’s the solution?
Adjust Gradually
First, it’s recommended to shift your daily routine in 10- to 15-minute increments, starting a week before the clocks change. This approach would certainly work for younger children, but if someone is used to watching *Aktuaalne Kaamera* followed by *Välisilma* and then drifting off to sleep, they probably don’t want to miss the last 10 minutes of the show, do they?
Of course, it’s clear that sleep experts don’t recommend watching TV before going to bed. Reading a book is a better option. Snatching 10 minutes from a book is definitely more logical than turning off the TV in the middle of a sentence.
Stick to Your Routine
The second recommendation might seem a bit contrary to the first one—namely, the advice to stick to your routine no matter what and not give in to the temptation to go to bed early. By the way, as someone who is hopefully interested in fitness (FitQ is, after all, a platform largely focused on workouts), it’s especially important to note that it’s generally not recommended to work out less than 4 hours before going to sleep. Raising your body temperature isn’t recommended if you want to sleep well. This advice applies even outside the period when you’re adjusting to the time change.
Establish a pre-sleep routine
Third recommendation: Sleep rituals help. They aren’t just for children and Pavlov’s dogs—conditioned reflexes work for adults, too. Even adults’ bodies respond to sleep when you establish a set of rituals to follow before going to bed. Now you can simply follow your routine at the new time, and it will help you in amazing ways.
Don’t try to make up for lost sleep during the day
Fourth, a long afternoon nap will do you a disservice at night. If you’re used to taking a light nap during the day, by all means keep that habit, but don’t let your daytime nap last longer than usual. You’ll almost certainly pay the price for it at night, with all the extra costs and interest.
Your body reacts to changes in light
You can also adjust your internal clock with light and lamps. Light keeps you more alert, while darkness causes melatonin to build up and makes you sleepier.
The most important thing, however, is to maintain a routine that’s as close to normal as possible. So they say. For myself, I’ll keep this in mind as the main change, and by writing this blog post, I managed to kill that hour when I already wanted to go to sleep but shouldn’t have yet.
Of course, our government could also read the articles explaining how daylight saving time is harmful to us and finally make the decision to end it. Until one of our readers sends this story to the government and manages to convince the Minister of Labor and Health, we’ll just have to make do as best we can—for better or worse—depending on our individual skills and willingness.
However, if you have any great tips or ideas for getting through daylight saving time without stress and would like to share them with us, please write to us at blog@fitq.me
