How to feel and look good after a long haul flight
Update July 19th 2020: this post did not age well..
Long haul flights are rough, no matter what class you travel. If you’re on a budget or your company has an economy-only policy for business travel, I feel you. Most of us have had the pleasure of spending 10+ hours folded up in a seat in economy with bad food, closely monitoring the flight path thinking “Why aren’t we there yet?”. As someone who travels a lot, I want to share a few tips on how to travel long haul and feel good and look good when you land. In this blog post I will discuss why you may not feel your best when you travel, what causes the various problems you face and some suggestions to help you overcome them.
Cabin pressure & altitude
Commercial airlines can fly at altitude of up to 39 000 ft or above. The in-cabin pressure corresponds to an altitude of 5000–6000 ft, and to a fraction of oxygen we breathe(1). You generally won’t experience problems with higher altitudes until you've gone beyond 5,000 ft above sea level. Heights from 5,000 to 8,000 feet are considered moderate. According to Harvard Medical School, commercial airplanes maintain a cabin pressure of about 6,400 feet above sea level. (2) Sadly, the Harvard article only discusses how men feel at higher altitudes. Yet, another study perpetuating the data gap. Generally studies conducted to impact all of us, are done with just male participants. So instead of creating a situation where one-size-fits all, you create a situation of one-size-fits-males. If you don’t know what I am talking about, please read ‘Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men’ by Caroline Criado Perez. Forgive me ladies, I did not want to spend too much time digging through academic papers for better data on this as altitude is not really what this post is about.
With the lower oxygen levels, your lungs have to work a lot harder to get the oxygen you need. Furthermore, as you aren’t moving your blood will sit in your legs which makes circulating the oxygen through you body difficult which makes you feel worse and more tired. If you have headaches, nausea or just feel generally grim, it could be altitude sickness.
When you feel like garbage, it makes the journey feel even longer. I always carry some over-the-counter painkillers with me to deal with headaches and nausea.
Dry air
If you feel like you look like the crypt keeper when you land, you are probably not wrong (sorry). The humidity on a flight is said to be 10-20%, which is much lower than at ground level where humidity levels are usually between 40% and 60%. I have been told that any vanity considerations are shallow and I should live my life in a pinstriped suit to be successful. To those people I would like to say “How do you like me now?” + hair flick. I strongly disagree. Historically, there has been a running theme that anything that is inherently associated with being a women is shallow, inferior and inconsequential. Beauty and feeling good about yourself are incredibly important and what it takes to feel good is different for everyone. I think we are slowly reaching a point where many women and other groups who have been historically treated as ‘less than’ are saying “Enough.”. We should embrace the things that are associated with the feminine, but that is a discussion for another a blog post. Taking care of my body while I am in a long metal tube is a part of my methods of self-care and preparation for my time in the next location. While I don’t like it, years of social engineering have affected me and I value beauty, so if I can take small steps that make me feel better, I will.
On a plane your sinuses will feel dry, your skin loses moisture and your eyes might be burning. Regarding the latter, your eyes will feel worse if you’re staring at a screen for hours on end. I like to bring eye drops and use a nice skin oil on the inside of my nose (weird I know but the whole sinus situation can get grim on a long haul flight). The Inkey List does tiny bottles of rosehip oil that are easy to carry around with you, it is great to use a few drops all over your face as well. Your skin will suffer on a flight so the question becomes “How shameless are you?”. I’m at that age where my cup of care is pretty much depleted so I have been known to remove my makeup and put on under eye patches to try and diminish my eye bags and put on a full sheet mask. For those who don’t know, they are the masks that make you look like Jason from the Friday the 13th. That said, I realise that is not for everyone so there are ways around this. You can bring a nice gel cream or moisture mask that will go virtually undetected which will help create a bit of a barrier between your skin and the dry air on the plane. A few examples for different budgets:
using food to hack jet lag
It has been said that you can lose 1,6 to 2 litres of water on an average 10 hour flight, that is a significant percentage of your body water. You’re not going to like what I am going to say next but, step away from the alcohol! This is true on the flight, but also the days before you fly. Flying tends to affect me badly so I start my preparation a few days before by ensuring I am hydrated and I keep an eye on my sodium intake. Those little bottles of gin are cute but trust me, it will make you feel so much worse. Depending on the purpose of the trip, I would take a drink on a short-haul flight because you have to live a little but on a long flight it is no-go. Alcohol will dehydrate you more and lead to water retention the day after you drink. This is not what we want. I don’t know about you, but after flying I tend to feel like the Michelin man anyway, so trying to minimise the bloating becomes a priority. I tend to buy 2-3 liters of water before I board a flight for a few reasons. First, I am a control freak and I want to have control over when I receive a beverage and second, those small cups of water that are often used simply do not cut it.
When I board the plane I will set my watch and phone(s) to the time zone of the location I am traveling to and I will eat and drink in accordance with that time zone. So, if it is dinner time in the destination time zone, I will try and eat a dinner-like meal. Airport food is not always the best, but with some prep you can make this work. This may sound like an odd suggestions but there is research behind this. Jet lag is a disorder of you circadian rhythm, so what we need to accomplish is to reduce the impact. Our body clock is a complex system and researchers have shown that “at the heart of our cellular clocks is a complex set of molecules whose interaction provides precise 24-hour timing. […] the insulin, released when we eat, can act as a timing signal to cells throughout our body.”(3) In practice this means that when we eat may be just as important as what we eat.
I don’t have to tell you to eat well. Usually, I do not eat the food provided on the plane. Food that is easy to digest takes preference as your body already has to work hard, the last thing you need is for your digestion to put even more pressure on your energy levels.
What about coffee? Like most people, I love a good caffeinated beverage. Coffee has a mild diuretic effect and it is often said not to drink it. I like to align it with my jet lag strategy, so if I need to sleep on the plane to align my the time zone of destination I won’t drink it for most of the flight but perhaps a cup of coffee just before landing if I plan to stay up for the day. If I need to stay awake on the flight and go to bed upon landing, I might have a cup of coffee close to the take off time.
dealing with jet lag
Jet lag is horrible and there is no magic solution to beat it. Personally, I use the 10:30 PM rule. If I land during the day in the time zone of my destination I will force myself to stay awake until 10:30 PM. This is what (sort of) works for me. Caffeine helps with this and getting outside to get as much sunlight on your body as you can. However, there have been times where I just could not stay awake. If this happens I will sleep for 1-2 hours, this does make my jet lag worse but at least I don’t feel so grim on my first day in the new location. If I land at night, my prep will have started on the plane by forcing myself to stay awake. By the time I reach the hotel I am often exhausted so I can sleep. If all else fails, there is melatonin and I would not travel without it. The dose matters here so ask your doctor about how much you should take. For me 1mg is plenty to knock me out and help me feel refreshed the next day.
It is counter-intuitive to ignore your bodily cues, but traveling across time zones as rapidly as we do is not natural so unconventional steps like the ones in this article can help. What you read here is just what has worked for me, but I have not fully cracked it either. Seeing new places is amazing but there is a small price to pay, I hope some of what you read here will make you feel at least a little bit better on your next journey.
If you found this useful, please leave me a comment below or share this post online.
Safe travels!
Emerald
(1) https://pureadmin.qub.ac.uk/ws/files/401771/The%20effect%20of%20high%20altitude%20commercial%20air%20travel%20on%20oxygen%20saturation.%20M%20Stevenson.pdf
(2) https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/Into_thin_air_Medical_problems_at_new_heights
(3) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/04/190425143607.htm