{"id":5120,"date":"2023-03-14T09:04:20","date_gmt":"2023-03-14T14:04:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cooking2thrive.com\/blog\/?p=5120"},"modified":"2023-03-14T09:06:01","modified_gmt":"2023-03-14T14:06:01","slug":"whats-wrong-with-sun-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cooking2thrive.com\/blog\/whats-wrong-with-sun-time\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s Wrong With Sun Time?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Setting the clocks forward has\nme asking, what\u2019s wrong with sun time? I hate springing forward! I hate it\nevery year from the time it happens until we fall back to standard time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"clock\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For weeks, I feel off. My eating\nschedule no longer works with work day conventions. I\u2019m not sleepy at bedtime.\nI\u2019m groggy when the alarm goes off in the morning. I realize I can slowly\nadjust for these changes, but what are any of us gaining?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Farmers and gardeners are well\naware that plants and animals respond to the sun, not what time we arbitrarily\nassign to its position. Cows do not care whether the clock says 5am or 6am when\nthey are milked, but they are definitely aware if you change the interval between\nmilkings. Why would human animals be any different?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re not so different. Humans\nhave an internal circadian clock. It\u2019s a sort of Big Ben of the mind located in\nthe suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN)\nof the hypothalamus. This master clock accounts for approximately 20,000\nneurons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to a study<\/a> on the effects of Daylight Savings Time on circadian rhythm<\/a>, Circadian clocks roughly consist of a set of proteins, capable of generating self-sustained positive and negative transcriptional feedback loops with a free-running period of approximately 24 h. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This\ncentral clock can directly and indirectly influence many functions: sleep\/rest and\nlocomotor activities; eating and drinking; core body temperature; endocrine\nactivity; metabolism; autonomic and sympathetic activity, and more. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This\nstudy looked at the possible correlation between desynchronization of an organism\nand its environment and the development of cardiovascular disease. Circadian\nclocks use daylight to attune the body to the environment. That doesn\u2019t change\nwhen the clock changes, but because behaviors change due to the time change,\nthe body\u2019s systems are affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cardiovascular\nevents have been observed to follow temporal patterns across 24 hour periods.\nBased on observation, it has been estimated that the incidence rate of acute\nmyocardial infarction (AMI) onset is 40% higher in a morning period than\nthroughout the rest of the day. Rupture or dissection of aortic aneurysms also shows\na circadian preference for occurrence in mornings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nfact that greatly different vascular events have similar temporal patterns may\nbe due to underlying mechanisms. Increased blood pressure, heart rate,\nsympathetic activity, basal vascular tone, and vasoconstrictive hormones exhibit\ncircadian rhythms with phases that correlate with a larger number of cardiovascular\nevents. So, the question is whether the change in pattern required by a shift\nto Daylight Savings Time increases adverse cardiovascular events?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additional\nfactors related to adverse events are stress and lack of sleep. Both of these\nfollow a circadian pattern that changes with DST. Let\u2019s say your system is\nattuned to the external environment and functioning well. You set the clocks\nforward an hour. It feels like external time has doubled so you scramble to keep\nup, but your rhythm is no longer in sync with the environment. This feels\nstressful. And you get less sleep because the change is disruptive. The kids\nwon\u2019t get ready on time and you feel lethargic so you don\u2019t work out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nauthors of the study above reviewed six other studies showing an increased\nincidence of cardiovascular events following the spring move to DST. The\nincrease ranged from 4 to 29% depending on the study and was more pronounced in\nwomen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\nlooks like DST has a demonstrable detrimental effect on health, especially in\nwomen. We have a policy that increases risk of onset of a heart attack by up to\n29%. Does that not give us pause? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nthe US, we talk a lot about healthy lifestyles while enacting policies that aren\u2019t\nhealthy at all. Daylight Savings Time doesn\u2019t make us healthier. It doesn\u2019t\ngive us more hours in the day. It doesn\u2019t save energy. And summertime has\nlonger evening daylight without any arbitrary moving of the clock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps we should begin with do no harm and leave well enough alone. Seriously, what\u2019s wrong with sun time?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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How can change begin when you’re struggling?<\/a><\/blockquote>