Jet lag? I tried the Timeshifter App..

This worked REALLY well for me. I did not have jet lag in either direction. I felt my normal energy level on the day after I arrived in Aberdeen even after having been traveling for 24+ hours the day/s before (counting time I left home for the Spokane airport). I waited until today to post because I wanted to make sure I felt back to normal (OK my friends, no joking about whether I am normal or not, hahaha!!) today. It's Sunday and I arrived back home on Thursday night, followed the plan on Friday, felt good Saturday and this AM.

I will definitely pay for the app for my next trip. I liked that it gave me notifications about 30 minutes before you were supposed to do or not do something. I don’t mind paying for science!

@Pam, thank you so much for the play-by-play details about this...very helpful. I'm looking forward to using the app.

For those who are interested, the app is free for your first round trip. However you have to pay if you want to add additional trips. You do not have to pay to get the notifications if you just want to go with the free option for one trip to try it out.

I'm not a melatonin user, but I do use the Target brand sleep aid which is basically benadryl. I'm going to use that in the place of melatonin with the app.

My first time shift starts on September 13th, and I'm happy to report back here after I am settled in Prague for the BOEE tour, which starts on September 17th. 😊

Thanks for sharing your experience Pam. I had an awful bout of jetlag in June. I felt like a zombie for three days going to Germany and four days coming home. I feel like it upset my body so bad. I never did really recover. The brain fog was awful as was my exhaustion. I took lots of vitamins and even tested for covid just to be certain. I usually only have a jetlag episode on Day 3, and an early night solves the problem.
I'll try the Time Shifter app next trip.

Oh yes, Jill!! Do feel free to post your experiences back here!

To me, we are all experiments of one. I know many experience no jet lag whatsoever but this method may help those who do.

I forgot to mention that I brought a sleep mask which I used on the trip over. I did eat the served dinner (my flight let Seattle at 6P) and went to sleep a little later than the app recommended. The cabin lights were still on but I put on the mask, laid down and did drift off. I think I wound up sleeping about 6 hours on a nearly 10 hour flight. I was in Delta One so had the lie-flat seats in the pods.

I also wore sunglasses on the return trip. I slept some, used the sunglasses for a portion of the trip which I'd forgotten I had on and shocked myself by looking in the bathroom mirror and saw what a dork I looked like, lol! Oh well, as Grandmother used to say..."You won't see anyone you know or care about".....

@Horsewoofie, yes, mine really took me out in April. I never want to waste time like that again! I hope it works for you next trip!

Having neither an IPhone or an Apple Watch, does this app work with Android phones?
If so, has anyone used it with one?
Thanks.

Pam, so glad to hear it worked well - hooray! I have the app already but may go ahead and get the paid version when I'm ready for it in March. It's not that expensive and if it works, it's worth it!

SJ, you can find it on Google products, although I have not tried it there. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.timeshifter.timeshifter&hl=en_US&pli=1

I was also getting notifications on my phone so I'm sure they have it set up the same for the Android products. Thanks Mardee for providing the link!

Here's the info from their website too.

https://www.timeshifter.com/the-jet-lag-app

@Mardee - and yes, to me the cost is nominal. I think it's $30/year or $10/a trip so to me that is not much if it is going to allow me to be high energy in Europe right away. I hate that foggy and low-energy feeling! Now, I wonder if it will work for the time change this Fall!!

@SJ, I'm on Android and so far so good! I accidentally paid because I thought you needed to do that for the notifications. It was $24.99 for the year, plus tax.

YAY Pam! How great that it worked so well for you! And your explanation is much more detailed than I would have done, so thanks for that, saved me from being the OP! (Whew). That day when you got up at 4AM cracked me up, I too managed to move my clock TOO far ahead, woke up at 3:30AM on departure day, gave up and got up at 4:30AM, got to sleep on the flight at around 10PM local time, so wow did I sleep well (in a flat SAS bed). I bought some blue-light limiting dorky looking glasses, next time I'm going to just wear sunglasses, which seemed to block out more light on the plane anyway. (PS, I too used the Timeshifter app and followed it as precisely as possible.)

I think the changes you highlighted, plus I used melatonin in a very small 3MG dose ONLY for the few times they suggested, helped me move my internal clock about 4 days coming to Sweden. Jet lag was significantly less, but not non-existent. But I'm 'home' in both CA & Sweden, so not as exciting as jumping into a new travel experience with fascinating places & times you need to be somewhere!

And yes, it's a bit weird to try to limit sunlight when you're heading out on tour, or in my case when the sun comes out in Sweden so I want to be OUTSIDE, so well done with the sunglasses & cap. Dr Huberman would agree that's likely good enough! (Aside, Dr H from Stanford prescribes no sunglasses for early morning & sunset walks to regulate circadian rhythm. https://hubermanlab.com/using-light-for-health/)

I did have to do some studying on it as it seems a little complex for my non-engineer brain.

HA, not a joke. There was an AMAZING chart outlining how they arrived at these conclusions, so if you're an engineer, there's more to study, but personally, I'm just happy with the results. Whatever the insignificant cost is per year, so much cheaper than losing time in a new location!! Will let you know how it goes heading back to CA mid October, who says travel isn't work?!!

Thank you so much for your clear explanation of how the app works. I think I’ll give it a try for my December trip. I don’t like melatonin, but the Kirkland brand Sleep Aid from Costco works really well for me. I wonder if it would be a good substitute?

@Sandancisco - well it was your original thread that pushed me to try this. I'm laughing at your awakening at 330...yes, I do that too. Since I returned home I have managed to sleep until 6A or so which is my normal time. I wondered how the bluelight glasses would work. I just used regular sun glasses and even dorkier....I just wear them over my regular glasses which my family assures me puts me squarely in the "old dorky person" corner. Unfortunately I've reached the stage of life where it doesn't matter to me and I will do what I think is best regardless of how bizarre it makes me look, lol.

I understand what you mean about being "home" as opposed to somewhere fun BUT I did not have jet lag on the home end this time either, lol.

And yes, this felt like work to stick to but wow, for me it was worth it!

@Andrea - I would take whatever you are used to. I don't take anything for sleep but occasional magnesium and I did not want to take that on the plane due to the effects the next day which are fine at home but NOT in an airline bathroom, lol!!

@Pam, did you get push notifications while you were in flight? Not sure if my flight will have Wi-Fi or not, but even if it doesn't, I just wonder if there's some way it can push notifications based on your phone's clock even if in airplane mode.

Jill, yes, I did. I had my phone in airplane mode so my watch was too. I was not on wifi…didn’t even check to see if it was available!!

Thanks Pam! I had also reached out to the Timeshifter app people and they confirmed this before I saw your post. Woohoo!

Wow, good to know how responsive they are to queries!

I just used the app for my trip to Paris and it worked great for me, too. I didn’t follow it exactly, but close enough, and this is the first time I’ve ever flown to Europe and not felt like a zombie the first day due to sleeplessness.

I didn’t sleep a lot on the plane (maybe two hours, max, which is more than the zero hours I usually get) but I still felt pretty good on arrival and was able to stay up until 9:30 PM before going to sleep. I just bought the yearly subscription as well.

@BT83 - That is so good to hear! I'm glad it worked for you as well. I think just even lying/sitting with the eye mask on without sleeping helped with the adjustment although I think I actually got about 5.5 hours of sleep on my way over.

I don't use caffeine at all. Shall I skip trying this app?

@Janet…no, no reason to skip if you don’t use caffeine. The research says adjustment is based on when you get light so the caffeine recommendations are just secondary and help those of us who use caffeine to manage it in relation to the recommended sleep or nap times.

I just wanted to say “thanks” for this post. I earned major points by sharing this app with my son-in-law who was having a brutal time with jet lag on his return from China. It wasn’t in time for him to actually put it into practice, but it helped he and my daughter realize what he was going through was normal and gave a timeline for how quickly he’d recover. He will definitely use for future travel.

Just a heads up for Android users. My time shifting started today but I wasn't getting notifications from the app. I contacted the timeshifter app team and they let me know about a known issue where the app's notifications are getting blocked by some versions of Android--something to do with local notifications.

So if you're on Android, haven't restricted the app and have all the permissions turned on, but still aren't getting notifications, it's not just you!

@Patty! I'm glad it helped "normalize" jet lag for your SIL! It is a physiological issue NOT a psychological one. I always felt like a wuss when I was having issues and felt very beaten down last spring when I had trouble adjusting. I was SO happy to read there is actual scientific research to back up their advice.

@Jill - THANKS so much for the information about Android issues. I hope it works for you! Let us know! AND Bon Voyage!

Here's my update on my experience with the Timeshifter app after traveling on Friday and Saturday and arriving in Prague Saturday afternoon.

Even though I wasn't able to sleep on the plane, and was completely exhausted yesterday after all the travel, I got 8.5 hours of sleep in the hotel last night and don't feel tired at all today. Most important thing on the plane if you're not able to sleep is to at least rest and block out the light, which I did. I'd say I followed the directions of the app about 95%.

All in all, thumbs up on the Timeshifter app!

What an interesting app and thanks to all for sharing their experiences. I decided to download and try out this app.

I'm having a bit of a difficult time inputting my sleeping hours though. The app only does whole hours, but I get to bed around 21:30 (9:30pm) and end my bed time by 6:30. Given my actual sleeping patterns though, I'll wake up several times a night typically around 2am, 3am, and/or 4:30am, etc. Perhaps that's why I feel like I want to input my begin sleep time as 21:30, but the app makes me choose between 21:00 or 22:00 and neither feel right. LOL. What do I use? :) Any ideas? (I know, this seems like a small thing, but for someone who has for over a decade had daily interrupted sleep, getting to bed at 21:30 or thereabouts is what I usually do.)

And I'll say that melatonin did absolutely nothing for me. A pharmacist friend suggested it to me as she also has interrupted sleep but melatonin did wonders for her. I tried it. Did nothing for me. :( Hopefully it works better for others!

@Jill!!! Yea!! I’m happy it has been helpful! Fingers crossed it works on the way back home!

@Muriel - I, too, have a usual bedtime of 9:30. I just input 9P. I usually get up at 5:30 but I think I put in 6A. I didn’t figure adjusting by 30 minutes was going to have an impact. What I was strict about was the no screen and low light an hour before bed. I actually used the time they recommended even if I thought I was going to bed a little later so I might have had low light for 1.5 hours before bed.

For those of you who may be more scientifically inclined, (than I am), here's an article about minimizing jet lag that discusses melatonin. Without understanding the chart well (HA), I think the bottom line about melatonin is that it is released naturally by the body, so when you move time zones, using some at specific times as indicated by the TimeShifter app, may help you adjust quicker, regardless of whether you usually use it or find it effective. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2829880/

@Sandancisco - Thank you for the link to that report on melatonin! I've got it bookmarked to read later!

Just adding to this thread to say I've 'splurged' and bought these SAD eye glasses for coming winter trip to Sweden. The issue with using the Time Shifter app is you actually need some LIGHT on your eyes at odd times of day, and in mid December the sun is barely peaking above the horizon after 2PM. I find myself blurry for weeks, so thought I would give these (not cheap) glasses a try! Will let you know in December how they work. My ophthalmologist said they won't hurt my eyes. https://www.amazon.com/New-Model-Luminette-Therapy-Glasses/dp/B07VMRRB9Y

Oh, wow. I DO want a report on them! I am headed to my eye doc in a few weeks for my yearly appointment and will ask her what she thinks as well. She is a traveler (how she and her husb manage Europe with FIVE small kids I will never know!!) so will totally understand!!

Thank you everyone for your helpful posts about Timeshifter. I gave it a try on my mid-September RSE Munich-Satzburg-Vienna tour. I followed the light exposure and wake-up notifications as best I could going into the trip (wake up an hour earlier and go to bed an hour later on the day before, then 2 hours earlier on the day of), but alas my 5:30pm flight was delayed and delayed and finally cancelled at midnight (I was supposed to be falling asleep as soon as I got on the plane). So that threw off all their recommendations. Luckily I had a day of padding before the tour started and was able to snag a flight the next day by flying west from Dulles to Houston and from there to Munich. The Timeshifter people responded to my message by granting me the opportunity to add the new flights to my trip gratis.

Once aboard the overseas flight I was supposed to sleep and I did put on an eyemask, but in Economy Plus I couldn't lie flat and as usual got very little sleep. My brain was quite fogged when I arrived in Munich around lunchtime but I managed to stay awake and follow their instructions about no sunglasses, etc. I wasn't good for much that day, but slept well that night and was fully functional the next day, the first full day of touring, and every day thereafter.

Two days before the homeward trip Timeshifter had me stay up late, sleep late, stay up later, sleep later, which I tried to follow but you're supposed to have no light the last hour before bedtime, so of course I fell asleep. Again unable to get much sleep on the plane (did use the eyemask for most of it, then the sunglasses) but once home I stayed up as late as they recommended (I think 10pm) and woke up at 4:30 am. Then next day I slept till 5:30, then 7am on day 3 and was totally time shifted. I will definitely be buying this app and using it as best I can on future trips.

Marty!! My word!!

First, it was very nice of the Timeshifter folks to extend your free trial to include your delayed and rescheduled flights. I’m glad it at least partially worked and that you eventually got to Munich. Good grief. Talk about a bizarre re-route.

Thank you so much for adding in your experience! The support staff seem very responsive even to those of us who were using it as a free trial. The mess up in flights is something I hadn’t really taken on board.

Gosh Pam....

She is a traveler (how she and her husb manage Europe with FIVE small kids I will never know!!) so will totally understand!!

Yikes, travels to Europe with FIVE small children?! Ask HER to write a trip report please!! (PS, Yep will report back in 2 weeks flying back to CA, will be using the SAD light glasses to readjust, fingers crossed.)

Hey @Pam, you are my MUSE today as I try to avoid direct sunshine before 5PM on T- plus 2 days before traveling back to CA. Dang, not easy when the weather is as glorious as you described Orkney on the only day it was sunny! At least there are zero UV rays before 10AM this far north in Sweden, so I could do my morning walk minus sunglasses. I'm just keep reminding myself how MUCH I hate jet lag & that it wrecks me for a week!

Hahaha...it's so hard to wrap your head around when you are in a Northern clime and there is S-U-N!! And yes, totally worth it in the end if you don't have jet lag when you get back to CA!

Travel well!

@Pam, I'm reporting back about the TimeShifter app flying from Europe to SF Bay Area - Alas, it was distinctly a case of 'operator error', I couldn't manage to stay awake late enough the few days prior to departure (they want you to slowly stay up until 11PM, not going to happen when I get up every day at 6AM!) Turning on the SAD lamp at 5PM, when I was suppose to be getting some sunlight while the sun was waning, huh just don't think it did much.

Going to Europe was more in synch with my personal preferences, so I could tweak it and it worked very well, significantly less jet lag. On way back - I did try to keep sunglasses on in plane, drink coffee when indicated (that's an easy one!) and rest when told to do so while flying. I would say it helped a bit, but again, it's certainly my error this direction! The SAD light glasses have arrived, they seem easy to wear but take some getting use to, a bit bright but not too bad. https://www.amazon.com/New-Model-Luminette-Therapy-Glasses/dp/B07VMRRB9Y. Let's see if they help me push the bedtime later today. But the big test will be at Christmas, when it's so DARK in Sweden so harder to get the natural light necessary to adjust. Thanks Pam!

Interesting! I also had difficulty staying up until 11P...I am such an early to bed gal. Plus you are supposed to be off screens for that last hour, lol.

I've got those glasses bookmarked. I have my annual eye exam this week so will ask her about them as well. She is a traveler and also likes "gadgets", lol.

Just a note Pam, the SAD light glasses are $200, which I only coughed up because I travel to Sweden each Christmas & wander around in a daze missing California sunshine!

Thanks for the heads-up on the Timshifter app! I used it before and after my recent trip to Barcelona. I did try to follow it as much as possible, though flight delays would move me a half an hour this way or that. I usually never can sleep on a plane, but this time, I was serious about it! I had my eye mask, my neck pillow, and my melatonin!

I actually managed to get close to 6 hours of sleep on the eastbound flight, and when I arrived, I was ready to go! My friends had arrived earlier that morning, all tried to nap prior to my arrival. I was actually able to stay up until around 11:30pm that night, with no issue. I went to sleep with the help of the melatonin, and woke refreshed the next day. I honestly had no jet lag issues during the trip! I didn't do as well on the way back home, probably because I was supposed to be in some light while driving home from Montreal at 7pm. Not happening this time of year. I woke up around 3am for the first couple of nights, but that was the extent of it.

So, for me, the app was a Godsend, and I will surely be using it the next time I'm making a longer trip. A good night's sleep is crucial for me, and having watched my friends suffer the entire time (one girl got around 5 hours of sleep during the first 72 hours), I am sold on the fact that the app will work even if not followed 100%.

Thanks for all the first-hand info on the Timeshifter app. Just wanted to add that it appears that you can use it free for your first round trip -- and for a second round-trip as well if you're a United Mileage Plus member (https://www.timeshifter.com/united). https://www.timeshifter.com/united

GREAT tip about Mileage Plus offering a second RT for free, thank you!

@justsweet -that is great to hear! Yes, I think even though you sometimes can't get or avoid light at the appropriate times it will work pretty well if you can do part of what it says to do!

@chc - THAT is interesting! I will look to see if Delta has any kind of agreement as well.

I just downloaded this for our trip next month. I normally am fine going to Europe, but coming home am a mess for at least a week. Our daughter is going with me, and she is mess upon arrival, so I am making her use the app as well lol. I am anxious to try it! Of course getting sunlight while in Iceland will be tough, lol, but I will just do my best;)

Edited to add: I just realized something. I take a Xanax before flying as my restless leg is a big issue once I am seated on a plane. Does anyone have any experience with how this works with the app?

Mikliz...in case no one has experience with Xanax and Timeshifter, the pivotal part for re-calibrating your circadian rhythm, as I understand it, is the getting light vs no/low light so I don't think the Xanax would affect it. My plan called for me to try to sleep at 6PM on my flight. My plane was leaving at 6P and I went ahead and ate so didn't sleep until 730 or so. I'm guessing your Xanax would only help with sleeping on the plane. I don't have any idea if your plan will be the same as mine as you do have to give the app your usual sleep hours and whether you are a lark or a night owl so somehow that is calculated in.

I'd also recommend contacting them thru the app to ask. They were very responsive when a friend messaged them with a question even though she was using the free plan.

I do recommend a sleep mask. I don't usually use one but I did this time and it really helped. I had not realized how distracted I can be with the IFE screens flickering from nearby passengers.

Pam, that all makes sense, thank you. I have lots of eye masks so will grab a couple of those and put them in the pile now;)

An interesting article on light, color of light, and sleep -- https://www.earth.com/news/light-color-has-no-impact-on-our-internal-clocks-or-sleep-patterns/

I'd posted this in a jet lag thread on the England forum, but figured it may interest some here too.

@VAP, that IS an interesting study!! Thank you for linking it!

“Rather, our results support the findings of many other studies that the light-sensitive ganglion cells are most important for the human internal clock,” says the scientist.“

“In summary, this study dispels the myth surrounding the influence of light color on the human internal clock and sleep. While light-sensitive ganglion cells play a significant role, the color of light, as encoded by cones, is less relevant”

These 2 things jumped put for ke. So I think this also means that the blue blocker glasses that are sold are not useful? At least in affecting sleep/circadian rhythm?