How daylight saving time can impact your health
Mindfully adjusting your body for the time change can help minimize the effects of daylight saving time on your health.
How to adjust your body to the time change
Dr. Jeffrey R. Gardere details ways to help our bodies adjust to the upcoming time change.
Do you find yourself thinking about how daylight saving time will impact your sleep?
Some people may experience anxiety just from discussing the time change, as it can completely disrupt their schedule.
At 2 a.m. Sunday, the clocks will spring forward one hour, marking the beginning of the time change known as daylight saving time for most states. Turning the clocks ahead allows our daylight to shift later into the evening.
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Daylight saving time, or DST, allows for an extra hour of light in the evening during the warmer months.
Prepare now before daylight saving time
To help ease before Sunday, experts said you should prepare before the time changes.
"We still have a couple of days to change our sleeping habits because, as we know, this is all about the circadian rhythm, and it’s based on a 24-hour basis," psychologist Dr. Jeffrey Gardere said.
As the light and darkness shift, our hormones can also shift.
"It really does throw us off," Gardere adds.
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What are the health effects on children?
The effects of time change are not limited to adults. Children in the family will also be impacted by the change.
"They’re going to be thrown off by it, too … and if it throws them off, it’ll throw them off at school where they’re going to be a bit deregulated," Gardere said.
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Parents can help their kids adjust to the time changes by improving their nutrition to regulate their bodies more effectively.
"Lighter meals for a few days. That is very important," Gardere said.
When it comes time for bedtime, the TV should not be on because the light will keep them up even later.
"They’re going to be tired much earlier. That we already know," Gardere said.
The ability to put your children or yourself to bed earlier is dependent on how our bodies regulate energy, according to Gardere. It is recommended that parents allow their children to discover their own circadian rhythm, as they are quite adaptable.
Perhaps it simply boils down to spending some extra cozy time together, which is beneficial for everyone.