The ongoing jetlag just won’t let go. I went to bed about 10:30 last night. I was very tired and fell asleep quickly. I woke up, after having several dreams, and felt like I had slept a good long time and it must be about 06:00 and time to get up soon.
It was 02:30. And I was awake and couldn’t get back to sleep. I turned a light on (dimly) and read for about half an hour to see if I could get tired and sleepy again, but it didn’t work very well. I went back to bed and mostly laid there awake counting the hours until dawn. It’s been pretty much like this every night since I got back from Europe some ten days ago now. Meanwhile during the day I am tired and my brain is foggy, making it difficult to concentrate on much. I’m hoping at some point my body will just flip into the correct time zone and sleep through the night properly.
I’ve been getting some exercise to try and help convince my body that it’s daytime during the day. I took Scully on a couple of walks (with my wife). We did a long one down past the harbour and she suggested taking our sketchbooks. So here’s my sketch of Oyster Cove and the HMAS Waterhen naval base:
Tonight I had three more ethics classes. The topic on Junk Food is a really good one, and there is some very interesting discussion by the kids on the ethical question of whether it’s okay or not that companies make profits by manufacturing food that is unhealthy for us. And what, if anything, can be done about this state of affairs, and whether any solutions would be better or worse than the status quo.
Conventional sleep wisdom would be to use bright light during the day to convince your circadian rhythms that it’s, well, day, and then dim the lights an hour before bedtime.
Also, common advice is to not lie in bed if you can’t sleep, but to get up for a while and do something that doesn’t require bright light (no screens) or exercise, like listen to music, then go back to bed. Reading in bed is discouraged, in general.
I’m not endorsing any of that advice and I am not qualified to give medical advice. Several doctors have given variations on the advice I typed in, though.
Yeah, I’m doing the light thing. Getting out in the sunshine during the day. We always dim lights in the evening before bedtime. I didn’t read in bed – I got up and went to the living room. And only used as much light as I needed to see, really quite dim.
Anyway, I got a better sleep last night, so hopefully the worst is over.
Glad you’re feeling better.